Material selection at a glance.
A working reference for the Type of Crown options on the prescription. The full reasoning behind each is in the Knowledge Centre; this is the short version for the moment you are deciding.
Four questions in order
How much clearance is actually available? This is the constraint that cannot be recovered after preparation, and it eliminates more options than anything else.
Can the field be isolated well enough to bond reliably? If not, anything depending on adhesion is the wrong selection regardless of its other merits.
What does the functional picture look like — the antagonist, evidence of parafunction, span length? And how demanding is the aesthetic requirement, assessed honestly rather than aspirationally?
Where each option sits
Zirconia: least thickness required, bondable or conventionally cementable, strongest for spans and parafunction. Aesthetic ceiling depends on the formulation, and translucency costs strength.
IPS e.max lithium disilicate: needs more thickness, depends on the bond, best optical performance for most anterior work. The default for veneers, inlays and onlays where isolation is achievable.
IPS Empress: most translucent, chameleons best, lowest strength of the ceramics. Thin veneers and conservative inlays in light function.
Metal and composite
PFM: needs the most total reduction of the tooth-coloured options because coping, opaque and porcelain all consume space. Handles long spans, soldered connections, attachments and non-ideal preparations that ceramics do not.
Full cast metal: performs in the thinnest section of anything on the form, adapts at the margin, burnishes, and wears at a rate close to enamel. The kindest option to an intact antagonist and the least aesthetic.
Tescera and Cristobal+ indirect composite: kinder to opposing teeth than ceramic and genuinely repairable, at the cost of wear resistance and long-term colour stability.
Situations with a clear answer
Limited clearance and heavy function: zirconia, or cast metal if appearance permits. Subgingival margin that cannot be isolated: zirconia or metal, conventionally cemented.
Single central incisor beside an intact natural neighbour: lithium disilicate, layered, with a try-in stage and ideally a laboratory shade appointment.
Long-span bridge or an abutment under an existing partial denture: metal-ceramic. Second molar in a heavy bruxer with intact opposing enamel: cast gold.
Revisit after preparation
The material chosen at treatment planning is a provisional decision. If the preparation ends up shorter than intended, if caries extends further than the radiograph suggested, or if clearance turns out tighter than expected, the original choice may no longer be right.
The failure mode is momentum — the plan said layered ceramic, so layered ceramic is prescribed, even though the preparation that emerged will not support it.
Reassess after preparing rather than before. If the answer changes, that is a note on the prescription; if you are unsure whether it should, that is a call worth making before the record is sent.
What the laboratory needs to apply this
A material named explicitly rather than left as doctor's choice. Where we choose, we choose conservatively — usually for strength — which may be exactly right or may deliver a monolithic restoration where you expected layered aesthetics.
Alongside the material: the shade with the guide named, the margin type prepared, the antagonist, and any evidence of parafunction. Those four determine most of what happens after the material decision.
If you want a recommendation rather than leaving the box blank, ask for one and give us the clinical picture to base it on. That is a different request from delegating the decision, and it usually produces a better result than either extreme.
When the answers conflict
A bruxing patient with a high aesthetic demand, or a short preparation requiring a bonded material in a field that will not stay dry, are the cases where no option satisfies everything.
Those are worth a conversation before the tooth is prepared rather than after the record is taken, because each option asks for different clearance and the decision narrows once reduction has happened.
The reasoning behind all of this is set out in choosing restorative materials.
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