Each of the findings below is sourced to specific cohorts and sample sizes. Click Copy on any of them to lift a citation-ready sentence with attribution. Detailed methodology at the bottom of the page.
01 / Geography
3.1×
Dogs listed in New Hampshire adopt three times faster than dogs listed in Texas.
Dogs published in New Hampshire averaged 39 days to adoption in 2024. Dogs published in Texas averaged 122. Texas listed 9× more dogs than NH (34,595 vs 3,772) — yet on a per-capita basis, NH lists more dogs per resident than TX, consistent with the rescue-transport pipeline that moves animals from high-supply Southern states to low-supply Northern destinations.
02 / Puppies vs seniors
2.3×
Puppies adopt in 30 days. Senior dogs wait 70.
Puppies averaged 30 days to adoption in 2025. Senior dogs averaged 70. Adults and young adults sit between them at 60–63 days. The senior penalty is real but smaller than it is for cats — and adopters do still take older dogs.
03 / Breed
2.6×
Goldendoodles adopt 2.6× faster than pit bull terriers.
Goldendoodles averaged 26 days to adoption in 2024 — the fastest breed in the dataset. Pit Bull Terriers averaged 68 days, the slowest. Designer mixes (Goldendoodle, Labradoodle, Maltese) cluster at the top of the speed list; pit-bull-family breeds (Pit Bull Terrier, American Staffordshire Terrier, American Bulldog) cluster at the bottom. America's most-listed dog — the Labrador Retriever, n = 26,441 — sits in the middle at 49 days.
04 / The "no" question
1.8days
Filing an honest "not good with kids" barely costs the dog at all — within the same shelter, the wait gap is 1.8 days.
Within the 282 shelters that file dogs as both "good with kids" and "not good with kids" (n=162K dogs in 2025), the average wait gap between the two labels is just 1.8 days. Adopters who want a kid-friendly dog match the dog to the family — they don't avoid the listings flagged "No." Filing an honest "not good with kids" essentially doesn't slow adoption.
05 / Seasonality
+30%
Summer brings 30% more dogs into the shelter system — and wait times rise to match.
June 2024 published 37,296 dog listings. December published 28,723 — a 30% summer surge that lines up with kitten/puppy season intake. Wait times follow: dogs listed in May wait 55 days on average; dogs listed in December wait 43. Same shelters, same animals, just more of them at once and fewer adopters out looking.
06 / Euthanasia by state
4.1×
Dog euthanasia rates vary 4× by state. New Hampshire euthanizes 3.6%; Louisiana euthanizes 14.9%.
Across 3.5M dog outcomes reported to Shelter Animals Count in 2025, the state-level dog euthanasia rate ranges from 3.6% in New Hampshire to 14.9% in Louisiana. New England states (NH, ME, VT, MA) cluster at the low end alongside the Pacific Northwest. Southern interior states (LA, AL, OK, KY) and parts of the Southwest sit at the high end. The same shelter-system geography that drives adoption-speed differences shows up in life-and-death outcomes.
01 / The senior gap
17%
Only 17% of senior cats find a home in their first 30 days. For kittens, it's 66%.
The age penalty for cats hits hardest at the 30-day mark and only widens from there. By 60 days, kittens are at 83%. Senior cats sit at 23%. By 90 days, kittens hit 89%; seniors only reach 27%. The fast cohort gets faster; the slow cohort gets stuck.
02 / Kitten season
2×
August lists twice as many cats as April.
Twice as many cats enter the shelter system in August as in April. August 2024 saw 35,353 cats published as adoptable; April saw 17,743. The summer surge — kitten season as the spring litters reach surrender age — doubles supply at the moment when shelters can least handle it. Dog volume swings only 1.3× across the same year. Cat seasonality is twice as severe.
03 / Geography
5.7×
Cats listed in Nevada adopt almost six times faster than cats listed in Texas.
Cats listed in Nevada averaged 29 days to adoption in 2024. Cats listed in Texas averaged 165 — a 5.7× spread, wider than the dog spread (3.1×) on the same data. Northeast and West Coast states cluster at the fast end; Southern interior and a handful of Mountain West states cluster at the slow end.
04 / Euthanasia by state
1 in 5
Hawaii euthanizes 1 in 5 cats. New Hampshire euthanizes 1 in 45.
Across 3.4M cat outcomes reported to Shelter Animals Count in 2025, the state-level cat euthanasia rate ranges from 2.2% in New Hampshire to 19.8% in Hawaii — a 9× spread. The geographic pattern echoes dog euthanasia (Northeast and Pacific Northwest at the low end; Southern interior, Southwest, and Hawaii at the high end), but the variance is wider for cats. California — the state with the largest cat outcome volume by far (~400K) — sits at 11.2%.
05 / Senior penalty
2.3×
Senior cats wait more than twice as long as kittens, on average.
Kittens averaged 46 days to adoption in 2025. Young cats averaged 91. Adults averaged 83. Seniors averaged 104. The age penalty for cats is steeper than for dogs (where senior dogs wait only 2.3× longer than puppies and just 7 days more than adults).
06 / Breed
1.6×
Ragdolls adopt in 31 days. Domestic short hairs wait 50.
The most popular cat in shelter listings (Domestic Short Hair, n = 152K in 2024) waits 50 days for adoption. Recognizable purebreds adopt much faster: Ragdoll 31 days, Maine Coon 35, Bengal 38, Siamese 40. The breed effect for cats is real but smaller than for dogs (cats spread 1.6×; dogs 2.6×).
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