Dog bed size guide

Measure your dog the way it sleeps

Wait until your dog is lying down and relaxed, ideally asleep in its favorite position, and measure it there rather than standing. A dog standing up is shorter than a dog stretched out on its side, and the bed has to fit the second one.

1. 1

   Run a soft tape from the tip of the nose to the base of the tail, where the tail leaves the body. The tail itself can hang off a bed without bothering anyone.

2. 2

   If your dog sleeps on its side with its legs straight out, measure from the paws to the top of the back as well. That number is the width the bed needs.

3. 3

   If it sleeps curled up, measure across the widest point of the curl. That is the diameter a round bed needs.

4. 4

   Write the numbers down in inches. Every size on our pages is printed in inches, length by width by height.

Add the inches its sleeping style needs

Our own rule, worked out from the sizes we make, adds a margin on top of the measurement. A dog that sleeps stretched out needs a flat bed about 10 inches longer than it measures nose to tail, so the paws and the nose both stay on the foam. A bed with bolsters needs about 8 inches more than the dog, because the dog lies inside the bolsters and rests its head on one of them.

A dog that curls up is the exception. It needs less length than it measures, because it folds itself in half, but it wants a soft rim to press against. For those dogs we suggest a round bed about as wide across as the dog is long when curled. Use the finder below with your own number, and it lists the beds we make that are long enough.

On a sofa bed, the bolsters take part of the length

Every size we print is the outside of the bed. On a flat mattress that is also the sleeping area. On a sofa bed it is not: the bolsters stand on the edge of the base, and the space your dog lies in sits between them. That is the reason the rule above adds a margin for bolster beds too.

If your dog lies with its head on one bolster and its legs reaching toward the other side, give it the larger of two sizes. If it presses its back into a corner and tucks its legs in, the smaller one is usually enough, and the closer walls feel snug.

Our orthopedic sofa bed comes in nine sizes from 24 by 18 inches to 52 by 41, which leaves room to step up or down by one size without changing the bed.

For a crate, the crate floor decides

A bed inside a crate has a hard limit. Measure the floor of the crate inside the bars, length and width, and pick a bed just under that size, so it lies flat instead of curling up against the sides. Our flat beds and pads are cut to the common crate floors: a 41 by 27 inch bed for a 42 inch crate, for example.

The crate itself has to fit the dog. The American Kennel Club sizes a crate by measuring the dog from the tip of the nose to the tip of the tail and adding 3 to 4 inches, then suggests a washable bed or mat inside it. If the crate fits your dog by that rule, a bed cut to the crate floor fits too.

Very big dogs and dogs that share a bed

For giant breeds, a veterinarian quoted by PetMD suggests a bed about one fourth longer than the dog lying down, which lands close to our 10 inch margin for a dog of 40 inches. Our largest beds are 52 by 41 inches, and the human-size bed is 72 by 44, big enough for a large dog with a person beside it.

Two dogs that sleep together need the length of the longer dog and the width of both. Measure them where they sleep now, side by side, before you add the margin.

When your dog falls between two sizes

Take the bigger one if your dog stretches out, if it is still growing, or if it will share the bed. Take the smaller one if the bed goes in a crate, if your dog curls up, or if the room is small. The difference between two of our neighboring sizes is usually about 6 inches in length.

Every EHEYCIGA bed page has a table of its sizes with the price of each. The list below runs every bed we make from its shortest size to its longest.

Every size here is from EHEYCIGA dog beds.