Puppy Teething Timeline: When Baby Teeth Come In and Fall Out

The puppy teething timeline is short and unusually predictable: 28 baby teeth erupt between roughly two and six weeks of age, start falling out at about 12 to 16 weeks, and are replaced by 42 adult teeth by six to seven months. Nearly everything owners panic about — the chewing, the blood dot on a rope toy, the tooth nobody ever found — happens inside that window and resolves on its own.

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What follows is the age-by-age version, with the tooth counts and the order the teeth actually arrive in, so you can tell "right on schedule" from "worth mentioning to the vet." The other half of this stage — the needle teeth aimed at your hands — is a training problem rather than a dental one, and we cover how puppy teething and biting fit together in the main guide.

Puppy Teething Chart: The Whole Timeline on One Screen

| Age | What is happening | What you see | | --- | --- | --- | | 2–5 weeks | Deciduous (baby) teeth erupt | Nothing — this happens at the breeder | | 5–6 weeks | All 28 baby teeth are in | A full set of very sharp little teeth | | 8–12 weeks | Puppy comes home; baby teeth intact | Mouthing, chewing, needle teeth | | ~12–16 weeks | Baby teeth start shedding; permanent teeth erupt | Gaps, chewing spikes, occasional blood spots | | 3–6 months | Adult incisors and canines in; premolars follow | A mismatched-looking mouth mid-swap | | 5–7 months | Molars erupt; there were never baby molars | Chewing on bigger, tougher items | | 6–7 months | 42 adult teeth in place; teething over | A clean, even adult mouth |

Two notes before the detail. First, these are ranges, not appointments — individual puppies land anywhere inside them. Second, the sources agree on the shape of the curve but differ by a week or two at the edges, which is a good reminder that your puppy is allowed to differ too.

When Do Puppies Start Teething? Weeks 2 to 6

The first teething round happens before you ever meet your puppy. According to the AKC, baby teeth start coming in at around two to four weeks of age, and by five to six weeks the full set of about 28 baby teeth is in place. The Merck Veterinary Manual gives a slightly tighter window, describing 28 deciduous teeth that begin to erupt at three to five weeks.

The order matters more than the exact week. VCA Animal Hospitals describes the incisors and canines arriving first, followed by the premolars — and notes that dogs have no baby molars at all.

That eruption schedule is also why weaning and teething are the same story. A three-week-old has almost no equipment for crunching, which is why litters start on gruel; if you are still in that phase, our guide to how to soften puppy food covers the texture progression, and our 8-week-old puppy feeding schedule picks up where it leaves off.

Puppy Teething Stages: What Falls Out, and In What Order

This is the part you witness. VCA Animal Hospitals places the turn at around 12 weeks, when the deciduous teeth begin to fall out and the permanent teeth begin to erupt behind them. The AKC frames the same stage as weeks 12 through 16.

The sequence is orderly. PetMD, reviewed by veterinary dentist Dr. Mallory Kanwal, DVM, DAVDC, describes the baby incisors — the small front teeth — going first, with adult incisors and canines erupting between about three and five months, adult premolars between four and six months, and the molars last, at roughly five to seven months.

So a five-month-old mouth that looks architecturally confused, with big new front teeth beside small old ones, is a mouth in the middle of a normal handoff. PetMD notes that the most common signs of this stage are increased chewing, mouthing and a stronger desire to gnaw on objects — not illness.

Two related questions we hear constantly — puppy teething symptoms and how to soothe a teething puppy — deserve their own guides, and we have both coming. For the behavior half of it, start with how to stop puppy biting.

When Does Puppy Teething End?

Practically speaking, six months. The AKC's timeline says that by about six months all the puppy teeth should be gone and the adult teeth grown in, for a total of about 42. VCA Animal Hospitals agrees that permanent teeth are typically all in by six months.

The Merck Veterinary Manual gives a little more room at the back end: permanent teeth usually begin to appear at around four to five months, and all permanent teeth are present by the time the dog reaches seven months. If your puppy is at six months and the last molars are still arriving, that is inside the published range, not behind it.

What Is Normal During Teething, and What Is Not

Three things account for most of the worried searches at this stage.

The tooth you never find. PetMD notes that puppies commonly swallow their baby teeth while eating or chewing, and that this is generally harmless. Finding a tooth in the carpet is the exception, not the rule.

The blood spot on a toy. VCA Animal Hospitals puts it plainly: it is not unusual for some bleeding to occur when the teeth are falling out, but the amount is minuscule. A few pink dots on a rope toy fit that description. Bleeding that keeps going, or that soaks something, is a different picture and a reasonable reason to call your vet rather than wait it out.

The chewing. It escalates because the mouth is busy, and because, as the AKC notes in its teething and nipping guide, puppies explore their world with their mouths and naturally nip at each other while playing — which the AKC calls the time to teach bite inhibition.

Beyond those, we would treat marked pain, a refusal to eat, heavy drooling, facial swelling or a visibly broken tooth as reasons to check rather than reasons to conclude anything. Teething is a plausible explanation for discomfort, but it is not a diagnosis, and only your vet can rule out the alternatives.

Retained Baby Teeth: The One Date Worth Circling

Here is the single item on this timeline we would actually put in your calendar. The AKC advises notifying your veterinarian if any baby teeth remain after six months, because extraction may be needed.

VCA Animal Hospitals explains why it matters: retained deciduous teeth are common in smaller and short-nosed breeds, and a baby tooth crowding its permanent replacement can cause malocclusion — a poor bite — while trapping food between the two teeth and the gum, which predisposes the dog to periodontal disease. VCA notes that persistent teeth need to be removed promptly, under general anesthesia, and that early extraction usually allows the adult tooth to move into its proper position.

The practical version: VCA recommends checking your puppy's mouth every week until about seven to eight months of age to confirm the teeth are coming in normally. Thirty seconds, lip lifted, counting canines.

One more reason to keep an eye on this: VCA notes that retained deciduous teeth show up most often in small breeds and short-nosed breeds, and that the canines are the usual culprits. If you own a toy or brachycephalic breed, we would not treat the six-month mark as optional. Vets often handle a retained tooth during a spay or neuter that is already scheduled in the same window, so it is worth raising at that visit — but VCA's own advice is to book the appointment as soon as you spot a doubled-up tooth rather than wait for a surgery date.

How to Run the Weekly Mouth Check

The check is worth doing badly rather than not at all, and it gets easier the earlier you start. VCA Animal Hospitals makes the case that puppies should get accustomed to having their mouths handled early, both so you can inspect the teeth and so you can retrieve something dangerous later without anyone getting hurt.

Our routine is thirty seconds, after a meal, when the puppy is tired rather than wired:

• Lift the upper lip on one side, then the other. You are looking at the canines — the long fang teeth — for a doubled-up pair, one baby and one adult in the same spot.
• Tip the chin up and look at the front incisors for gaps, wobbly teeth, or swollen, angry-looking gum.
• Note anything that has not changed in a month. A tooth that was loose in week one and still loose in week five is the kind of detail a vet actually wants.
• Pay the puppy for it — a treat at the end turns the whole thing into a trick rather than a wrestling match.

Write nothing down and you will still catch the important stuff. The point is not a dental chart; it is noticing that something is sitting where it should not be, while it is still a five-minute conversation.

What to Give a Teething Puppy at Each Stage

Toy choice is where owners accidentally create a problem. VCA's teething toy guidance is blunt about hardness: avoid anything extremely hard, such as nylon, bones or antlers, because you run the risk of fracturing your pup's new teeth. The test VCA gives is simple — choose chew toys that have a little bend, or that you can indent with a fingernail. VCA also stresses supervision, and removing any toy that is breaking apart.

Cold helps. The AKC's chewing guide suggests ice cubes or frozen wet washcloths as cheap options, chew toys designed to be frozen, or a food-stuffable puppy toy filled with mushy kibble or broth and frozen.

That last suggestion is why our pick is the KONG Puppy, about $7 as of September 2026. KONG builds it from a customized softer natural rubber developed specifically for a puppy's 28 baby teeth, and the hollow center takes kibble or paste so you can freeze it. KONG advises supervised play and removing the toy once it is damaged — follow that, and retire it rather than repair it.

For the earliest weeks, the Nylabone Puppy Teething Ring Bone in x-small runs about $3.59 as of September 2026, with ridges and nubs meant to soothe gums, and Nylabone says chilling it adds relief. Read the limits carefully: Nylabone states this soft material is not intended for powerful chewers or for puppies with adult teeth, and rates the x-small for dogs up to 15 pounds. The Nylabone Puppy Pacifier, about $10 as of September 2026, is the same idea one size up, in a softer material made for puppies that do not yet have permanent teeth, rated to 25 pounds. Both are baby-teeth-window toys by design, and both should come out of rotation once the adult set is in. Both also sit awkwardly next to VCA's advice to avoid nylon: Nylabone states these use a softer puppy material and are not for puppies with adult teeth, so run VCA's fingernail test yourself before handing one over.

If you want something consumable for the shedding months, N-Bone Puppy Teething Rings cost about $10 for six as of September 2026. They are edible, with no plastic or rawhide, enriched with calcium and DHA omega-3 per N-Bone, and the maker designs them for puppies three months and older — which lines up neatly with the shedding phase but means they are not an option for the earliest weeks. For everything else that belongs in a starter bin, see our must-have toys for a new puppy.

The Short Version

Teething is a calendar, not a crisis. Twenty-eight baby teeth by six weeks, shedding from about 12 to 16 weeks, 42 adult teeth by six or seven months, and a weekly thirty-second mouth check until seven or eight months to catch a retained tooth while it is still easy to deal with. Offer something soft and cold, supervise it, and let the schedule do its work.

The one part of this stage that does not resolve on its own is what the puppy does with those teeth while they are in there. That is a training job, and it runs on a different clock — which is why we treat puppy teething and biting as one connected project rather than two.