Dental Lab Turnaround Time: What to Expect and What to Ask

At AIM, standard turnaround is up to 11 days for crown and bridge, 12 for implants, 11 for removables and 8 for orthodontics. Every practice can get a 2-day rush. Cutoffs and details are on our turnaround page.

Every lab advertises a turnaround number. Very few explain what it covers. The gap between those two things is where most scheduling problems in a practice actually come from: not a lab that was slow, but a lab whose number meant something different from what the practice assumed.

This is a practical guide to what turnaround time means, what it looks like by case type, and what to ask before you plan a seat appointment around it.

Dental lab turnaround time by case type

Here is what AIM publishes for standard turnaround. These are the figures on our own services page, not industry averages:

Case type	Standard	Rush 2-day (all practices)
Crown & Bridge	11 days	2 business days
Implants	12 days	2 business days
Removables	11 days	2 business days
Orthodontics	8 days	2 business days

The full breakdown, with cutoffs, is on the Turnaround & Rush page.

Two things are worth noticing. First, the spread between case types is small. Orthodontic appliances move faster than implant work, but not dramatically. If a lab quotes you a single number for everything, ask what it applies to.

Second, these are maximum estimates rather than targets. A number presented as a ceiling behaves very differently from one presented as an average. An average means roughly half of cases arrive later than advertised. Ask which one you are being given.

What "rush" actually means

Rush is a logistics decision as much as a production one. Same laboratory, same bench, same technicians. The difference is transit.

That matters when you are choosing a lab by advertised rush speed. A lab's rush figure often covers production only. If you are outside its courier area, the honest number includes shipping in both directions, and any lab quoting you the same rush figure regardless of where your practice sits is quoting you production time and leaving out the part you actually experience.

Scanned cases also behave differently from physical ones. A digital file arrives instantly, so a scanned case effectively starts a day earlier than an impression that has to be collected. If turnaround is your constraint, going digital shortens it more reliably than asking for rush on everything.

What changes the number

Turnaround is quoted on the assumption that a case arrives complete and unambiguous. Most delays trace back to one of these:

• Incomplete records. A missing opposing model or an unclear margin means the lab has to ask before it can start. The clock does not stop while the question sits in someone's inbox.
• An open clinical decision. A prescription that reads "discuss material" is not a prescription the lab can begin. Flag decisions as decisions, and the case can start on everything else.
• A remake. This is the big one. A case that comes back needing adjustment does not take the advertised turnaround twice. It takes the advertised turnaround, plus a return appointment, plus the real cost of a remake in chair time you cannot bill.
• Timing that was never confirmed. A requested date is a request until the lab agrees to it. Sending a date is not the same as having a date.

The case submission checklist covers the handoff side of this in more detail.

Five questions worth asking

If you are evaluating a lab, or renegotiating with your current one, these get you further than asking how fast they are (for the full checklist, see 7 questions to ask a new dental lab):

1. Is your quoted turnaround a maximum or an average? This single question reframes everything else.
2. Does it start when you receive the case, or when you begin work on it? Those can differ by days.
3. What is your remake rate, and does a remake go to the front of the queue? A lab that will not answer the first half has answered it. Ours is 2%, and our remake policy and guarantee explain what happens if a case does come back.
4. Does rush include transit to my practice? Especially if you are outside the lab's courier area.
5. Who do I call when a case is running late, and will they know the answer? A named person beats a general inbox.

None of these are hostile questions. A lab that has thought about its own workflow will have ready answers, and the ones that do not are telling you something useful.

Remake rate: the number to watch instead

Turnaround is easy to measure, which is why it dominates the conversation. It is also a poor proxy for the thing you actually care about, which is whether a case seats on the first visit.

A lab delivering in six days with a meaningful remake rate is slower, in practice, than a lab delivering in eleven with cases that fit. The first one costs you a second appointment you did not schedule. We have made that argument at length in why turnaround time is the wrong way to judge a dental lab, and it remains the more useful lens once you have the turnaround question settled.

Predictability beats speed. A lab whose eleven days is genuinely eleven days lets you schedule with confidence. A lab whose six days is sometimes six and sometimes twelve does not, no matter how good the advertised figure looks.

So here is ours. AIM's remake rate is 2%.

For context, a National Dental Practice-Based Research Network study of single-unit crowns found an overall remake rate of 3.8%, with individual practices ranging from 0 to 42% (McCracken et al., Journal of Prosthodontics, 2019). Remakes vary widely, which is why the number is worth asking every lab for, including us.

A remake doesn't just add a second turnaround. It adds a second appointment, a second set of chair time and a patient who has to come back. Keeping that number low is what makes an eleven-day turnaround an eleven-day turnaround.

Planning a case around a real date

If you want a date you can schedule against, send the case details and ask us to confirm feasibility rather than assuming the published figure applies. For anything genuinely time-critical, call the lab on (718) 854-3900 before submitting, and we will tell you honestly whether the date is achievable.

Schedule a case pickup or submit a scanned case when you are ready.