Buying Guide for Best Dog Toys in 2024

A dog owner will always desire to keep his dog or puppy jolly, joyous, and jovial. Best Dog Toys and Best Puppy Toys are the second most important requirement for dogs, after Food, to stay fit and fine.

Selecting the best toys for your best furry friend to keep them healthy, active, and engaged is a tough and lengthy task.

The market is flooded with millions of dog toys, branded and local as well, of various shapes, sizes, and colors, with various new options being added every day and even when we are perusing this article.

We enumerate the factors influencing the choice of toys for dogs and toys for puppies. We will also elaborate on the benefits of toys for dogs and the requirement of toys for puppies.

Let us get started!

Why Dogs Need Toys? What are the Benefits of Best Dog Toys?

It is very easy to visualize the several amazing benefits that come along while your dog is playing with the best toys.  We enumerate the most important benefits hereunder:

Exercise | Agility & Activeness

Exercise is the foremost reason why many dog owners get toys for their furry friends. “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” is aptly applicable to the world of four-legged friends. It means that without time off from work or routine chores, a person becomes both bored and boring. To kill this boredom, your dog needs to play.

Playing with fetch and tug toys allows your pet to move around and get physical exercise, which is crucial for his health and happiness.  Agility and activeness serve as healthy weight management, amuse, and reduce the number of trips to your Vet (Veterinarian). 

On the other hand, without regular exercise, a dog may become overweight and obese, which eventually may lead to unavoidable various diseases like diabetes, blood pressure, and cardiac. “If your dog is fat, you’re not getting enough exercise” – unknown author.

Intellectual Stimulation | Psychological and Mental Benefits

Play is the brain’s favorite way of learning. Animals love to play. Apart from enriching physical heath, playing with toys offers mental stimulation, thereby managing your dog’s energy level and rectifying many behavioral problems, which may be a direct result of boredom or excessive energy. 

Boredom is a widespread problem and it generally ends with your dog chewing up on furniture & sofa, tearing socks & shoes, ripping pillow & cushions, or breaking speakers & other electronic gadgets.

In short, toys act as boredom busters for dogs which can prevent and help resolve many such unwarranted problems and destructive behavioral issues. Without enough rational play excitement and adequate intellectual stimulation, dogs can become defiant, destructive, disobedient, and downright impossible to handle.

Dental Health & Hygiene

Dental cleanliness is critical health anxiety for some dog parents; hence, protecting a dog’s dental health is an important task. Certain toys, especially chew toys or dental chewable treats, encourage chewing that stimulates saliva which helps to diminish plaque, remove tartar, and help maintain the teeth clean.

Getting such toys, which are designed to clean teeth as your dog plays, is a much easier, practical, and pocket-friendly exercise to improve dental health and hygiene than taking your dog to a vet for medical cleaning and professional help.

If you have a dog puppy going through its teething stage, a chew toy may help to keep his teeth clean and sharper. This may also considerably dissuade your puppy from biting stuff and other materials, as commonly seen during the teething stage when the puppy is exploring his teeth on each household object.

Relationship | Better interaction and improved bonding.

“A boy can learn a lot from a dog: obedience, loyalty, and the importance of turning around three times before lying down.” – Robert Benchley. Called men’s best friend, not without any reason, has a strong connection with the parents and owners. 

A dog parent should spend time and take active participation in playing with his dog, especially fetch and tug toys. This, apart from imparting benefits of physical exercise, also helps improve building interaction and bonding between you and your dog, thereby proving to be of great mental impetus.

These toys and such routine play also promote bonding among the dogs, in case one has more than one dog. This activity becomes all the more crucial and necessary in multiple-dog households wherein it helps dogs bond with each other as well as understand their respective places in the gang.

What are the Important Factors to Consider Before Buying Toys for Dogs?

The market is surplus with millions of toys and their numbers are increasing daily. It is really hard to choose the best toys to keep your dog busy. We enlist the important factors hereunder for you to consider before buying dog toys for your canine friend.

Age of the Dogs

Your dog’s age is the primary factor to determine the types of toys.

• If you have a young dog puppy with delicate baby teeth and soft gums; you may opt for soft plush toys or rubber balls.
• When the dog puppy is in the teething stage and is growing; you may choose dog toys with a firmer texture and plenty of chew toys.
• Once the growing stage is over and you have an adult dog; you may get indestructible and big toys like balls or rope toys, and fetch and tug toys.
• In your dog’s old age, his teeth and jaws may no longer be strong as they used to be and when he may not like fetch or tug exercises; you may go in for soft toys, like the one you gave him in his childhood, but bigger.
• It is, therefore, significantly important to consider your dog’s age when hunting for the right toy for him.

Size of the Dogs

• Alike your dog’s age, his physical size is the second most important factor to determine the types of toys. This is also related to the respective breed size of the dog.
• An adult dog, the bigger size, won’t get proper amusement and enticement to play with smaller toys, while a young dog puppy, the smaller size, won’t be able to play with large toys.
• It is hence essential to look for the proper size of the dog toy, compatible with your dog size, which would motivate your dog to get actively involved for the desired benefits or play.
• Your dog may not like to play with a very large toy if he cannot hold the toy in his mouth, while there is a risk of your dog swallowing if the toy is very small. Therefore, it is better to look for a reasonable size of toys matching or compatible with your lovely dog’s size.
• A dog toy should be appropriate for your dog’s current size. Balls and other chew toys that are too small may be mistakenly swallowed or may choke your dog’s mouth or throat.

Chewing Behaviour of the Dogs

• The chewing behavior of your dog is the third factor that would decide your selection of the best dog toys for your canine.
• You should take serious note of your dog’s chewing pattern and understand the chewing behavior of your dog when buying a toy for him.
• A dog may be having bad behavior of excessive chewing or behaving in a wild manner with soft toys or chewing toys and ingesting parts which may be fatal.
• Therefore, it is crucial to evaluate your exact chewing behavior of your and base your selection of toys accordingly.

The Texture of the Toys

• The material used in making toys and the texture of the toys, including the color and flavor of toys, are important factors to be considered before deciding on the type of dog toys.
• Different dogs like different textures.
• Some dogs like rough and hard toys, while others like smoother and softer toys.
• Some dogs like to play with a particular color of toy and may not like it when replaced with a similar toy of a different color.
• You already know what kind of disposition your dog has. Take a closer look at what he enjoys chewing on, the flavors or colors he seems to be fond of, and what games or toys does he like. Finding the likeness of your dog may require a little degree of patience and research. 
• The best way is to start with getting economical or budget toys for your dogs to examine their likes and tastes. Once you get a feel of your dog’s likes and dislikes, you can go for better toys accordingly to match his requirement and desire.

Variety and Rotation

• Variety is the spice of life and dogs may get tired of the repetition.
• A dog will easily get bored too soon and too fast if given only a single toy and will be very much excited to have a few toys to choose from rather than just one.
• When considering buying toys for your dog, always try to give a few new toys to choose from. Dogs like to enjoy a new toy and get easily bored with the same ones.
• As a good parent, you must keep rotating your dog’s toys, weekly or in short intervals, by making available only a few toys available at a time. Keep the balance toys in the closet for weekly rotation.
• Make sure to keep your dog’s favorite toy always easily accessible. For example, if your dog has a favorite chew toy, like a Kong Classic, you should probably make it available all the time for him to play with as and when he wants.
• Try to place the variety of toys in a toy box and allow your dog to pick which to use. This would tempt him into playing every day and for longer durations, without getting bored.
• Make sure to have a variety of toys from each type, like balls, rings, chew toys, tugs, plush, etc. All the toys need not and must not be of the same type.

Safety

Understanding the safety issue is also an important determinant to consider while choosing the right kind of toys for your dog. Many factors contribute to the safety or danger of a toy. Many of those factors are dependent upon your dog’s size, activity level, energy, and play style.

Although we cannot guarantee your dog’s enthusiasm or his safety with any specific toy, we enlist the following guidelines to take care of:

• A dog toy must be made up of non-toxic material and must be pet-safe or dog-proof for all dogs. Read the toy’s packaging, the list of ingredients, and the instruction manual, to make it safe sure for your lovely four-legged friend.
• As a good and responsible dog owner, please make it a routine to habitually inspect your dog’s toys to make sure they are in good condition, neat and clean for their overall health and well-being, and are safe for your dog to play with.
• If your dog damages a toy, immediately throw it away as broken toys are risky for dogs because their broken parts might be accidentally ingested or can result in bleeding gums.
• Therefore, it is better to monitor your dog’s toys regularly and discard any toy that starts to break into pieces or has pieces torn off.
• You should keep an eye on it so that your dog does not break off and ingest large pieces of toys. Your dog should never ingest stuffing, plastics, or any other harmful materials.
• In case, if you have a medical emergency or need immediate medical treatment for your dog, consult your veterinarian. Otherwise, please do consult an animal hospital or emergency veterinary facility, or vet healthcare.
• Avoid toys with sharp edges that could cut or harm your pooch. Additionally, avoid toys that have been filled with beads or beans.
• Squeaky toys should be given under supervision as all dogs tend to locate the hidden squeak source and destroy it. Your dog may try its best to pull out the squeak and may ingest it.
• Do consult your veterinarian about the safety of toys, like bones, chew toys, and rawhides. Generally, very hard rubber toys are safer and last longer as wear and tear are minimal in such kinds of toys.
• Whenever in doubt and if you find any change in your dog’s stool pattern or color, which may be on account of your dog having chewed or ingested some broken part of the toys, consult your Veterinarian at the earliest without any delay.
• Rope Toys – Not suitable for aggressive chewers as they can shred the rope into pieces. And/or swallow fibers, strands, or chunks of the rope toy. For fear that it might thereby create digestive problems in acute cases;
• In either case, a rope toy should never be used as a replacement for a chew toy.  As it tears and shreds easily, which can be swallowed or ingested.
• First, there is always an element of risk of causing intestinal damage.
• Second, it may lead to severe blockages in certain cases. Hence, a dog cannot be left unsupervised or unattended with any rope toy;
• In the first place, a rope toy is not the best chew toy.  In either case, it should never be used as a chewing deterrent because of its inherent danger;
• As it is soft and flexible, some dogs may mistake them for clothing or other fabric. So this could stimulate problem chewing, which is again a negative behavioral issue.