How to choose the right food for your dog

Start with the ingredient list

Ingredients are listed in order of weight before processing. A food listing "chicken" first contains more chicken than any other single ingredient, but that does not mean most of the formula is animal protein.

Watch out for ingredient splitting: when a label lists "ground whole corn", "corn bran" and "corn gluten" separately, each may sit below the animal protein even though the three combined outweigh it.

What the guaranteed analysis says, and what it does not

The guaranteed analysis gives minimum and maximum percentages, not exact values. A food declaring "minimum 26% crude protein" may contain 26% or 31%.

Crude protein also measures total nitrogen, not protein quality. Feather meal is high in crude protein and extremely low in digestibility. That is why the ingredient list matters as much as the panel.

Compare by serving, not by bag

The bag price is misleading. What matters is the daily feeding cost, which depends on the food's energy density.

1. Check the feeding recommendation for your dog's weight.
2. Divide the bag price by its total weight in grams.
3. Multiply by the recommended daily intake.

Denser foods need smaller portions and can work out cheaper per day even at a higher price per kilo.

Signs the current food is not working

• Persistently loose stools or very high stool volume
• A dull coat or noticeable shedding with no dermatological cause
• Recurrent itching, particularly around the paws and ears
• Continued food refusal in a dog that used to eat well
• Weight gain or loss outside what you would expect

Any of these warrants a veterinary check before switching food. Changing on your own in a dog with an underlying condition can make things worse.

How to transition

Switch gradually over seven to ten days, increasing the proportion of the new food every two days. Abrupt transitions are the most common cause of diarrhoea in otherwise healthy dogs.

In dogs with a history of digestive sensitivity, stretch the transition to as long as 14 days.

What we weigh in our reviews

At PawReviewLab, a food's score combines the declared nutritional composition, the palatability and digestibility that owners consistently report, cost per serving and packaging quality. The full methodology — sources, criteria and weights — is set out on the lab page.