Best cat food for overweight indoor cats

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Is your kitty a little heavier than he or she should be? Even packing on just a few pounds can have a much more dramatic impact on cats than on humans. So today, we’ll be talking about the best cat food for overweight indoor cats.

Indoor cats are at a big risk for becoming overweight. Many of them get almost no exercise, and they are lacking in mental stimulation.

However, there’s also another big problem at play. Their humans don’t know how much too feed them.

If you were planning on buying a lower calorie food to help with your cat’s woes, then you may be sorely disappointed. Many cats will simply continue to eat, and you’ll need to actively monitor their intake for them and be mindful of how much they are eating.

How much should you feed a cat?

How much wet food should you feed your cat

Cats should eat approximately 3/4 to 1 oz of canned food per pound of body weight every day to maintain their weight. If you need your cat to lose weight, then try subtracting a couple of pounds off of that number.

For example, a 10 pound cat that needed to lose weight and normally eats 10 ounces of food per day would get dropped down to 8 ounces of food per day.

Make sure to split this amount into multiple feedings and keep tabs on your cat’s intake.

wet cat food feeding chart

How much dry food should you feed your cat?

If you’re feeding your cat a dry food, then you should realize that free feeding them, or leaving food out all the time is not realistic. Animals can eat because they’re bored just like humans, and your cat can still be overweight, even with a lower calorie food.

Instead, use the feeding chart below and feed them 2 or 3 times per day. Your cat’s ideal weight will depend on their breed and general size. Obviously a Maine Coon is a very large cat and they will have higher calorie requirements than a feline with a slighter build.

cat foods for weightloss

Feeding your cat a wet food will result in lower calories, because all dry foods have some kind of fillers which are basically just empty calories. However, if you do need to feed dry and you don’t have time to offer your cat multiple meals then you can get an automatic feeder to manage their weight.

A microchip feeder works particularly well if you have multiple animals and you need to make sure a bigger kitty is not eating the smaller cat’s food.

Best cat food for overweight indoor cats

Okay, now that we have set some realistic expectations for feline weight loss, it’s on to some great foods. best cat food for overweight indoor cats. While we believe that weight food diets will give the best results, it is possible for your cat to lose weight eating dry food as well.

We’ve included options across several price points to help you decide. They are ranked in order of what foods we think are the best, but all of them are high-quality.

When choosing the best cat foods for weight loss we’ve picked cat foods which are low in carbohydrates, contain no fillers or empty calories, are highly-nutritious and attractive to cats. After all, a diet food that your cat refuses to eat is useless.

#1 – NomNomNow (Fresh)

best cat food

Our top pick for foods for indoor cats to lose weight is NomNomNow. Not only is this food particularly healthy, but the system it uses also makes it effortless to manage your cat’s weight!

That’s because all of their foods come in containers which are perfectly portioned for your individual cat. This means there’s no guessing or worrying that you’re feeding them too much or not enough.

The best part though, is that you can get this kind of tailored cat food experience for a lot less than you might expect. NomNomNow’s cat plans start at just $14 per week, which is comparable or possibly even cheaper than a high-quality canned diet.

best food for cats who need to lose weight
All of NomNomNow’s foods come portioned for easy weight management and feeding

Above you can see one of the sample recipes for NomNomNow. They do a great job of laying out the nutritional information and helping you to see exactly what’s in the food.

This makes it a great choice for cats who have dietary restrictions like diabetes. However, if you need more help then they also will be happy to help you choose the best diet for your cat.

It’s the cream of the crop when it comes to cat food, and it’s a great choice for pretty much every feline. Plus, if your fur baby has troubles with allergies, vomiting or diarrhea, then the limited ingredient nature of these foods will likely do wonders for them.

If you’d like to give NomNomNow a try, then you can use this link to get 50% off your first order. They also frequently give out free goodies with the boxes like free treats and full size samples of the other cat foods so your cat can try them!

#2- Wysong Arcehtype (Raw dehydrated)

best cat foods for weight loss
Archetype is one of the few starch free cat diets available.

If your kitty doesn’t do well with any carbohydrates, then you’ll be happy to know that this food is one of the few starch free foods for cats. In fact, Archetype is made of over 95% meat proteins.

What fruits and vegetables are in the food come in tiny portions and they are very low impact. That makes this a great choice for diabetic cats or those with allergies.

This is actually a dehydrated raw diet, and you can either feed it dry in chunks or use water to make it essentially a wet food. Raw diets are very beneficial for cats, because they focus on a whole prey approach which means including healthy organ meats and bones.

They have several diets available and all of them have their own nutritional information, which you can see on Wysong’s website. If you’d like the lowest calorie option however, then it’s probably the rabbit formula.

Be warned though, sometimes cats may refuse to eat an unfamiliar protein. If your cat is a picky eater then you may want to go with the chicken flavor which they would be more familiar with.

In any case, Wysong makes extremely high-quality products, and this is a great choice if you’re looking to cut all of the junk food from your cat’s diet. You can save 10% on this food by signing up for Wysong’s auto-ship program too!

#3 – Halo Cat Food (Canned and Dry)

best dry cat foods for weight loss

If some of our other foods were out of your price range, then be sure to take a close look at Halo. This high-quality cat food brand is one of the best weight loss cat foods for the money.

While canned foods will never be as beneficial as fresh or raw diets, it’s a close second. Plus, you can pick up this particular food for about the same price as a comparable decent canned food at a big box store.

The difference of course being that Halo’s quality is far superior. Both their canned and dry foods are free from nasty filler items, and they have many different flavors and specialty diets available.

This includes grain-free, gluten free, kitten, senior cat and other varieties. The senior flavors are typically lower in calories by the way, for cats who are less active than they use to be.

If you need a dry cat food or canned cat food for weight loss that won’t break the bank, then this is a good choice. The only issue here is that the ingredients vary for each flavor so if you have a sensitive cat you’ll need to make sure everything is okay for them.

Want to save even more money on Halo’s great food? If you’re an Amazon Prime subscriber then you can get up to 20% off if you sign up for their auto-ship program.

#4 – Orijen Fit and Trim (Dry)

cat foods for weight loss

Our second dry food pick is for Orijen. This awesome cat food is a combination food that’s made to keep your cat slimmed down.

It’s a dry food, but it also features dehydrated meat which really ups the taste factor. Your cat won’t even know that he or she is eating a “diet” food, because it’s not.

Orijen is a biologically appropriate and healthy food, and that makes it naturally more healthy. They also offer a ton of valuable meat proteins for your cat instead of fillers with no nutritional value.

In a 12 pound bag of Orijen cat food you’ll get at least 10 pounds of meat. That’s an important distinction, because many other high protein foods up their protein levels not with meat but with cheaper plant based proteins.

This food includes ingredients like whole eggs, and fresh or dehydrated meats like chicken, turkey and flounder. Plus, the bag should also include feeding instructions to help you manage your cat’s weight or maintain it once they’re at a good level.

Unfortunately, this food doesn’t seem to be part of Amazon’s auto-ship savings program like Halo. You can check out reviews from pet parents and see prices here.

#5 – Taste of The Wild Cat Food (Canned and Dry)

cat food for weight loss

The last food on our list is Taste of The Wild. While this is a pretty good food for weight loss due to its lower calorie count, there are a couple reasons it’s last.

Their dry foods use meat meals instead of whole meats like Halo. This isn’t bad per say, but meat meals are more heavily processed and they have less nutritional value but higher protein per ounce since all the water has been removed.

They also have their vegetable items a little too high up the list, and this likely means that they inflate their “high protein” claims using peas instead of meat like Orijen does.

This makes the food cheaper but also not quite as good. However, is is grain-free and generally low in fillers, especially the wet foods.

While it’s not quite as good as some of our other choices, a lot of cats seem to love eating it. Plus, some of the foods are available for the extra discount for Amazon’s subscribe and save (not all of them though).

If you’re interested in seeing more information about this food you can do so here.

Other ways to help your cat lose weight

We talked briefly about how a lower calorie cat food is not really the answer to weight problems. As a pet parent, you’ll need to help your cat manage their diet.

You can start by using an automatic feeder for dry foods or setting a feeding schedule for your feedings.

There’s no need to stop there though, and you should consider addressing the real reason that your cat may be over eating. A lack of mental stimulation.

While cats aren’t nearly as needy as dogs, they do still desire attention from their owners. How much time have you spent with your cat?

Is it possible that your cat is over eating because he or she is bored? It’s a good idea to try to make a habit of helping your cat to get more exercise to help with their diet routine.

Try getting a fun new toy like a laser pointer or something for them to chase. Perhaps maybe a cat tree that encourages them to climb and be more active.

While physical activity will of course burn calories, the mental stimulation will ease their boredom and may help them to eat less on their own.

Is your kitty a real smart cookie? Then maybe you should think about getting them a food puzzle type of toy.

These toys give your cat something to do to keep them out of mischief. They keep them from getting bored, and they have to work for their food, slowing down their eating.


Michelle Rei
Michelle Rei
Michelle is a pet parent turned amateur pet product researcher. After adopting a fur baby with digestive issues caused by bad pet food, she's poured hundreds of hours into research to find the best of the best to help him and other pets live happier and healthier lives.
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