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Best Apps for Dog Parents Vol 2
We hear you, you loved our dog app recommendations. So, we put together another list this year of some of our favorite apps for you…
We hear you, you loved our dog app recommendations. So, we put together another list this year of some of our favorite apps for you dog lovers out there. You can find a wide range of different apps from dog walking apps to dog training apps to apps that actually help you communicate with your 4 legged friends. Let us know some of your favorite dog related apps.
Jump Down:
1. Wag
2. Pawscout
3. Dogo
4. Petfinder
5. Human-to-dog translator
6. Walkies
7. Rover
8. Paway
Wag!
The go-to professional dog walker app
Especially for city-dwellers, Wag! Is seemingly the go-to choice to find pet care. I’ve tried a few other apps and it’s like pulling teeth trying to get information and find the right person to watch my pets. With Wag!, the experience is a whole lot better.
The primary use for Wag! is dog walking. You can input your pet’s profile and Wag! will show you all the available caregivers within a certain radius. Each caregiver has a photo, a rating, and the services they provide. All communication is handled in the app so you don’t need to give out your personal phone number to message your dog walker.
If you do book someone to walk your doggo, you can follow along the walk in real-time. It shows their progress overlaid on a map using the GPS in the walker’s phone. You can see the path they take and even any — ahem… events — along the way. Once the walk is done you’ll see a summary with photos of your dog loving every minute of it as well as how far they went, how long they walked, any activities that happened, and a note from your walker.
There simply isn’t any other app that has as many customization options as Carrot does. That combined with the Carrot’s charming personality and lovely graphics makes this one of the most popular weather apps around.
Pawscout
Social media for pet lovers
Pawscout is a whole social network that revolves around pets, and I don’t mean nothing but short videos of cats pushing cups of water off counters. You can go find that on Instagram. This is for pet owners who want to connect with their local pet community.
In Pawscout, there’s a lot of different applications that fit under the auspices of a social media network. For example, you can aid lost pets. If you find a lost dog, you’re able to post photos and help it find its owner. Additionally, if you lose your pet — and you have a Pawscout Tag — other Pawscout members will be notified if they come nearby thanks to Bluetooth. They can also scan the Tag and learn about your dog including name, medical info, and more.
You can also talk with nearby pet owners. This does include sharing photos, arranging playdates or walks with others, and places that are great to go with your pet. I love the idea of a place where other dog owners can share restaurants that are dog-friendly or parks that I should maybe avoid.
Dogo
Teach that dog new tricks!
Part of your responsibility as a dog owner is properly training. This can be the essentials like how to go outside for the bathroom and how to sit or it can be fun tricks like how to shake or rollover. Dogo is a great app that can help you with both.
The app touts over a hundred tricks you can teach your dog. You start by either choosing the trick you want to learn or the training program you want to follow. Training programs have general goals such as basic obedience, strengthening your friendship, or staying active. My personal favorite is the “Little Helper” program. Each of these gives you the number of skills they’ll learn and how long that program will take.
As you start training, you can take advantage of all the features in the app. There are videos that guide you through how to teach the skill including proper hand motions. There are visual instructions too, which give explicit guides such as how long to wait between commands and when to use the clicker. By the way, the app has a built-in digital clicker so you don’t need buy one! A clicker can be very useful while training your dog and I love that this app including one that can be customized.
The app also allows you to talk directly to dog trainers, read relevant articles on dogs, add helpful widgets to your Home Screen, and get digital certificates when a program is completed.
Petfinder
Find your new best friend
Ok, nobody tell my wife about this app. Deal? There’s no way you open the PetFinder app without immediately falling in love with some adorable fur ball. We used PetFinder in the past ourselves to find local organizations and rescues that had animals available for adoption and it was a huge help.
PetFinder will find animals near you including dogs and cats. There are a ton of filter options depending on how picky you are. If you want a boy Novia Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever puppy, you can filter to that and see if any are available and how far away they are. Of course this means tons of photos of them looking into your soul with their big eyes.
You can tag and save any animals you’re consider and easily share their profiles with your family and friends. If you’re on the fence, you can run a poll from the app for everyone to vote on which one they think would be the best fit..
Human-to-Dog Translator
This joke app is sure to get your dog’s attention
There will be plenty of folks who aren’t impressed by the comical Human-to-Dog Translator app, but I’m will to bet quite a few dog lovers will be. This highly-rated joke app has an array of emotions and reactions simplified to buttons. Tap on the one with the corresponding graphic and the app will play the matching bark out your phone’s speakers.
If the pre-included options simply aren’t enough, you can use the microphone. Just speak your phrase into the mic and the pseudo-scientific app will translate your words into dog lingo. If you long-hold on the display you can also unlock a secret mini game full of adorable puppies.
This app may seem like a joke, but dog owners love it because despite the silliness, their dogs seem to respond to it. I’m not suggestion that this app actually translates your words, but the barking and noises that the app produces is enough to startle up a reaction. In my case, my long-eared hound mix can’t stop tilting his head side to side whenever I tap in the app.
Walkies
Pet care, walks, and drop-ins
Walkies is a bit similar to Wag!, but has a few other options as well. Especially for those who are offering these services. Yes, you can book dog walks through the app. Like Wag! you can follow along via the GPS and see photos that your walker uploads. But it’s the long-term care or drop-ins that I loved about Walkies.
If you offer these services it makes it very easy to schedule everything. You can see each dog’s profile and when you fed them, when daycare started, when they got treats, any photos you want to upload, or when medication was administered. It’s quite verbose and gives you a lot of control as well as plenty of information to the pet owner.
For those who have a team of pet watchers that can be managed as well. Each caregiver has a profile for your team and you can schedule who is checking on each pet and when. That is viewable as a high-level calendar for a better view of the day or week.
Finally, the app makes it easy to send invoices to your customers. Customers can quickly pay and you can manage those finances from the same interface you use to maintain the schedule, bookings, and progress. Oh — it also has report cards too. As a pet parent, I love getting a report card on our dogs each day to know how they did.
Rover
Petsitters that come to you
Depending on your location, some petsitting apps may be more common. Another excellent one to try out is Rover. Rover works in over 14,000 cities with over 200K registered sitters. With Rover, you can book pet boarding, house sitting, day care, drop-in visits, and dog walks.
More than 95 percent of the sitters have 5-star reviews and even highlight those that go through a background check. If you plan on having someone visit your house, knowing they’ve been independently vetted and backgrounded can ease the concern.
With any of the above there is constant communication within the app, including messaging and photos. Dog walks are tracked via GPS and bathroom breaks are denoted.
Paway
Find local pet friends
Paway is another social network catered to pet parents. You can mark your neighborhood and get regular updates from others in your area. If people head to a certain park they can share that on the neighborhood feed. It also has a way to notify owners in the area of a lost dog, complete with pics.
One of the most useful features is local hazards. It can show a map of a planned walk and highlight areas that are good, as well as areas to stay away. They may have an aggressive dog, dangerous pavement, or other hazards that are best avoided.
As you walk your dog you can share it with your friends or family. This is great if you want your kids to keep you in the loop as they walk the dog or if you’re hoping to meet up with some of your like-minded dog parents. Plus, the app promotes monthly challenges. This can be purely based on the number of walks, the distance, or other parameters. Collect rewards and invite friends to compete as well.
But enough about other people's apps.