Cat café

A cat café is a theme café whose attraction is cats who can be watched and played with.[1] Patrons pay a cover fee, generally hourly, and thus cat cafés can be seen as a form of supervised indoor pet rental.

History

The world's first cat café, "Cat Flower Garden" ,[2] opened in Taipei, Taiwan, in 1998 and eventually became a global tourist destination.[3][4] The concept spread to Japan,[3] where the first one named "Neko no Jikan" (lit. "Cat's Time") was opened in Osaka in 2004.[2] Due to Japan's land size and population, many residents live in small apartments or condominiums which do not allow pets, making cat cafés a very popular destination for young workers looking for the companionship and comfort offered. Tokyo's first cat café, named "Neko no Mise" (Cat's Store), opened in 2005. After this, the popularity of cat cafés boomed in Japan. From 2005 to 2010, 79 cat cafés opened across the country.[5]

Controversy

In the United Kingdom, animal charities disagree on whether cat cafés are a suitable environment for cats, with the RSPCA, Cats Protection and the Celia Hammond Animal Trust criticizing them for keeping large numbers of cats in a confined space with a revolving population of people. However, International Cat Care, a nonprofit organization, takes a more positive view, saying, "It is a difficult environment to get right but it's not impossible by any means." All the charities agreed that cat cafés need to be properly regulated.[15]

Asia

Japan

Cat cafés are quite popular in Japan, with Tokyo being home to 58 cat cafés as of 2015.[16] The first was Cat's Store (猫の店), by Norimasa Hanada, which opened in 2005. The popularity of cat cafés in Japan is attributed to many apartments forbidding pets, and to cats providing relaxing companionship in what may otherwise be a stressful and lonesome urban life. Other forms of pet rental, such as rabbit cafés, are also common in Japan.[17]

There are various types of cat cafés in Japan. Some feature specific categories of cat, such as black cats, fat cats, rare or popular breeds of cats or ex-stray cats. Cat cafés in Japan are required to obtain a license and comply with the nation's Animal Treatment and Protection Law.[18]

Japanese cat cafés feature strict rules to ensure cleanliness and animal welfare, in particular seeking to ensure that the cats are not disturbed by excessive and unwanted attention, such as by young children or when sleeping.

Europe

Austria

According to local legend, the world's first cat café opened in Vienna in the summer of 1912 and ceased operation approximately two years later. It is said that Vladimir Lenin was a regular for a period in 1913, finding the feline companionship a comfort during his time of exile. The cat café is known to have ceased operation shortly after the beginning of the First World War, although the much repeated story that the closure was due to its patriotic owner's donating all the cats to a factory making fur-lined boots for the war effort may be apocryphal.[37] In 2012 cat café Neko was opened in Vienna,[38][39] and reopened as Nekopoint in 2023, as did a second cat cafe called BaristaCats.[40][41]

North America

Cat cafés have been spreading across North America since 2014. The goal in North America generally is to help get cats adopted by partnering with local cat rescues or humane societies.[114]

Canada

The first cat café to open in Canada was Le Café des Chats/Cat Café Montreal[115] in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, which opened its doors to the public in August 2014. Café Chat L'Heureux (also in Montreal) was opened in September 2014 with 8 cats adopted from local shelters.

On 17 October 2015 My Kitty Café was opened as Ontario's first cat café, located in Guelph, Ontario.[116]

The Siberian Cat Café opened in 2015 in Chelsea, Quebec. This cat café had only Siberian cats, making it the first hypoallergenic

Oceania

New Zealand

The first cat café in New Zealand, the Cat Lounge, opened in November 2015.[175] There are now many cat cafés across New Zealand.

External links

References

cat café Meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary dictionary.cambridge.org, retrieved 2018-06-10^
日経トレンディネット. 【今回のお題】話題の「猫カフェ」に来るお客さんってどんな人たち？ Nikkei BP, 2008-05-02, retrieved 2025-04-10^
Lindsey Galloway. BBC - Travel - Feline fun in Japan's cat cafes

United States

In the United States, most health departments require special steps to separate the cafe area from the area where the cats are housed. In some cases, this even extends to areas that cats pass through only briefly (e.g., an adopted cat must leave through a separate door without passing an area that prepares food).[118]

Gaining regulatory approval can be difficult, as with KitTea of San Francisco.[119][120][121][122] Starting the process in November 2013,[123] KitTea's design was finally approved in August 2014[124] after extensive negotiation with San Francisco's Health Department. Oakland's Cat Town was the first cat cafe to open its doors to customers, signing a lease in July 2014 and opening just months later in October.[125] These timelines highlight not only the regulatory hurdles for cat cafes that prepare food on premises, but also differences between local governments that are mere miles from one another.

In contrast to Japanese cat cafés, US cafes typically focus on adoptions. Within seven months of being open, Cat Town reported that "the euthanasia rate at its partner shelter has declined from 41 to 21 percent, and 184 cats have made the transition from the cafe's Cat Zone to permanent homes".[126] Similarly, The Cat Cafe in San Diego has facilitated adoptions for more than 250 cats (January 2015 – October 2017)[127] and KitTea of San Francisco has adopted 203 (June 2015 – February 2018).[128]

In January 2015, Purrington's Cat Lounge opened its first cat café in Portland, Oregon.[129] Purrington's Cat Lounge later closed in 2022 after business suffered from the COVID-19 Pandemic.[130]

In June 2015, Crumbs and Whiskers opened its first cat café in Washington, D.C., where it partnered with the local chapter of the Humane Society; this café provides a boarding space for around 15–25 cats at a time, all of which are provided by the Humane Society and made available for adoption.[131][132][133][134][135][136] Crumbs and Whiskers subsequently opened its second café in Los Angeles, California in September 2016.[137][138]

The first cafe in New York City, Meow Parlor, opened in Manhattan in 2014.[139][140] In September 2015, a second café opened in Manhattan, called Koneko, supporting cats from Anjellicle Cats Rescue.[141][142] A cat cafe in New York City's borough of Brooklyn opened in 2016.[143][144] The first cafe in the New York City borough of Queens opened in March 2025 in the neighborhood of Flushing.[145][146]

In October 2015, the Blue Cat Cafe opened in Austin, Texas, partnering with the Austin Humane Society as a cafe and adoption center.[147][148] After years of controversy surrounding the café's role in the gentrification of East Austin and a 2017 interview the owner gave to InfoWars, a website known for propagating far-right conspiracy theories, the Blue Cat Cafe closed in February 2019.[149][150][151] Three years later, the Purrfecto Cat Lounge opened in Austin in partnership with the Sunshine Fund and the Fuzzy Texan Animal Rescue.[152] In In December 2015, the first cat cafe in Dallas, Texas—The Charming Cat Cafe—opened in Vista Ridge Mall, showcasing kitties from Kitty Save.[153]

In December 2015, Seattle, Washington, opened its first cat café, called Seattle Meowtropolitan.[156] In 2017 NEKO Cat Cafe was opened and became the second cat café in Seattle.[157] In 2020, NEKO Cat Cafe opened a second branch in the northern city of Bellingham, Washington.[157]

In March 2016, Cat Cafe Mad opened in Madison, Wisconsin,[158] but was set to close the next year.[159] In December 2016, Ashley Brooks opened "Pounce Cat Cafe + Wine Bar" in Charleston, South Carolina. Pounce has partnered with the largest animal shelter in South Carolina, Charleston Animal Society.[160]

In 2017, the Cafe Meow became the first cat café to open in Minnesota,[161] Tinker's Cat Café became the first cat café to open in Utah,[162] and The Purrfect Roast became Chicago's first cat café.[163] It has since shut down. In 2018, the Windy Kitty Cat Cafe opened in Chicago.[164]

Also in 2017, in Grand Rapids, the Happy Cat Café became the first cat café in Michigan. Unlike most cat cafés, the Happy Cat Café requires that visitors schedule their visits ahead of time, and in large groups. They act as a cat themed party venue, with specialized events like cat yoga parties as well as more traditional events involving food and cats. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Happy Cat Café was shut down for most of 2020, during which they performed renovations, and re-opened on January 2, 2021, but only for one-hour events for small groups.[165]

In Boston the Purr Cat cafe opened in 2017 but closed in 2019 after controversy before and following its opening.[166][167] A Sanctuary Cafe opened in the Boston neighborhood of Beacon Hill in 2024.[168][169]

Two cat cafés, Colony Cafe and The Black Cat Market, have opened in Pittsburgh. The Black Cat Market has experienced several of the regulatory issues outlined above.[170] Columbus, Ohio, was home to the Eat Purr Love Cat Cafe, which was open from 2016 to 2020,[171] with Kitty Bubble Café opening in fall 2022.[172]

Naughty Cat Cafe opened in Chattanooga, Tennessee, in March 2019.[173] They house 30 adoptable cats and visitors can enjoy coffee, tea and beer while spending time with the cats.[174]

History

Controversy

Asia

Japan

Europe

Austria

North America

Canada

Oceania

New Zealand

See also

External links

References

Palestine

Singapore

Malaysia

South Korea

Taiwan

Thailand

United Arab Emirates

Belgium

Germany

Greece

Italy

Lithuania

Netherlands

Poland

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Russia

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Ukraine

United Kingdom

England

Scotland

England

Scotland

United States