Dry food is convenient. It doesn't smell, it doesn't spoil if left out, it's cheap, and cats will eat it. The problem is that cats aren't built for it.
Cats are obligate carnivores who evolved in desert environments. Their natural prey is about 70% water. Dry food is typically 8–10% water. Cats have a low thirst drive because historically they got most of their water from food — which means a cat eating exclusively dry food is often in a state of mild chronic dehydration without showing obvious signs of thirst. Over time this contributes to urinary tract problems, kidney disease, and bladder issues that are genuinely common in cats fed primarily dry food throughout their lives — and that make litter box training harder when discomfort drives avoidance.
This doesn't mean dry food is poison. Many cats live long, healthy lives eating it. But there are better options, and most vets who are honest about the research will tell you that wet food, raw food, or a combination is preferable to dry food alone for most cats.
Wet food: the practical upgrade
Wet food — tinned or pouched — is the most accessible and practical alternative or supplement to dry food. It contains 70–80% water, which brings cats closer to the hydration their biology expects. It's higher in protein and lower in carbohydrates than dry food. Most cats prefer the taste and texture.
The quality variation in wet food is significant. The cheapest tinned cat food is largely water, cereals, and derivatives — not what a cat needs. A reasonable wet food lists a named meat or fish as the first ingredient, has a protein content above 8% in the wet food (which translates to roughly 35–40% on a dry matter basis), and doesn't rely heavily on cereals or plant proteins to bulk out the contents.
Look for: high meat content (ideally 60–80%), named protein source rather than "meat and animal derivatives," minimal to no grains or fillers. Brands vary enormously by country but reading the ingredient list with these principles applies everywhere.
How much wet food: a rough guideline for an average adult cat is 200–250g of wet food daily split across two meals, adjusted for size, age, and activity level. Indoor cats generally need less than outdoor cats. Cats being transitioned from dry food will overeat initially — give it a week or two to normalise.
Raw feeding
Raw feeding — giving cats unprocessed meat, organs, and bone — is closer to what cats would eat naturally than any commercial food. Done correctly, it produces cats with better coat condition, leaner muscle mass, smaller and less odorous stools, and generally excellent health markers. Done incorrectly, it produces nutritional deficiencies that take months to become visible and are then difficult to reverse.
The core challenge with raw feeding is completeness. Commercial cat food is formulated to meet specific nutritional standards. A bowl of raw chicken breast is not a complete diet — it's deficient in calcium, lacks essential amino acids like taurine (which cats cannot synthesise and must obtain from diet), and doesn't provide the full range of nutrients a cat needs. Cats fed only muscle meat without organ meat, bone, or supplementation develop deficiencies.
A complete raw diet for cats follows a rough guideline of 80% muscle meat, 10% organ meat (half of which should be liver), and 10% raw bone — along with supplementation for things difficult to achieve through food alone, particularly taurine, vitamin E, and in cats not eating whole prey, certain minerals.
Pre-made raw cat food — frozen and available from specialist pet food suppliers — is formulated to be complete and is the sensible starting point for anyone interested in raw feeding without building their own recipes. It removes the nutritional complexity while retaining most of the benefits.
Bacterial contamination is the concern most people raise with raw feeding. Cats' digestive systems are shorter and more acidic than humans', which makes them considerably more resilient to the bacterial loads that would make humans ill. Practical hygiene — handling raw meat as you would any raw protein, washing surfaces, keeping food refrigerated — is sufficient for most healthy adult cats.
Cooked food from your kitchen
Some human foods are genuinely suitable for cats. Others are toxic and the distinction is important.
Safe and nutritious: plain cooked chicken, turkey, beef, pork, lamb — unseasoned, no onion, no garlic — much like the simple proteins in easy weeknight chicken dinners, minus the seasoning. Plain cooked fish — salmon, tuna (in moderation, as high tuna intake can cause vitamin E deficiency), cod, sardines. Plain cooked eggs. Small amounts of plain cooked vegetables like pumpkin or courgette can be added as fibre.
Toxic to cats: onions and garlic in any form — raw, cooked, powdered — damage red blood cells and cause anaemia. Grapes and raisins cause kidney failure. Chocolate, xylitol (artificial sweetener), alcohol, caffeine, raw dough. Cooked bones splinter and cause internal damage — raw bones are safer than cooked ones if you're giving bone at all.
Cooking for a cat full-time is possible but requires the same nutritional completeness as raw feeding — plain chicken breast alone isn't a complete diet. As an addition to commercial wet food, cooked proteins are a good way to increase meat content and add variety without the complexity of building a complete homemade diet.
Transitioning from dry to wet
Cats are creatures of habit and many develop strong preferences for the texture and smell of dry food — a common hurdle when you introduce a new cat to a household with established feeding routines. A cat raised on dry food doesn't automatically recognise wet food as food and may flatly refuse it initially.
Transition gradually: mix a small amount of wet food into the dry, increasing the proportion over ten to fourteen days. Some cats accept this without difficulty. Others are more stubborn and need the dry food reduced significantly before hunger overrides preference. Warming wet food slightly releases aroma and makes it more appealing.
Do not withhold food for extended periods to force acceptance. Cats who go more than 24–48 hours without eating can develop hepatic lipidosis — fatty liver disease — which is serious. If a cat isn't eating, offer something they're willing to eat rather than holding out.
The transition may take weeks. Some cats never fully accept wet food as their primary diet and end up on a combination. A combination of good quality wet food and a smaller amount of dry food is significantly better than dry food alone and is a realistic outcome for many cats — especially if the dry portion goes into puzzle feeders rather than a bowl that empties in seconds.
Water intake
Whatever you feed, water availability matters. Cats often drink more from moving water than still water — a cat water fountain is worth considering if your cat drinks little from a bowl. Place water bowls away from food bowls (cats avoid water near their food in the wild, where contamination from prey was a risk). Multiple water stations around the house increases the likelihood of incidental drinking.
A cat eating primarily wet food needs significantly less additional water than one on dry food, but fresh water should always be available regardless.
The single most impactful change for most cats' long-term health is moving from exclusively dry food to primarily wet food. It's not complicated, it's not expensive at the mid-range quality level — especially if you're already buying groceries thoughtfully and can apply the same discipline to pet food — and the difference in hydration alone makes it worth doing.
