Hong Kong —
It’s an age-old question. Are you a cat person or a dog person?
In East Asia, the number of cat teams seems to be increasing recently.
Take for example Taiwan, a self-governing island where the number of domestic cats will outnumber dogs for the first time in 2025, according to a government study. The number of pet cats has grown rapidly, increasing by nearly 33% from 1.3 million in 2023 to 1.7 million last year.
The same thing happened in mainland China in 2021. Japan was probably the earliest initiator of this trend, with cats overtaking dogs 10 years ago. Cats are also becoming more popular in areas where dogs are still more common, such as South Korea and Hong Kong.
All these places have certain things in common. That means people live in small apartments in crowded cities, are often lonely, have busy jobs, and have little time to spend with their dogs.
“I think it would be more convenient (in the city) to have a cat because you have to take your dog out for walks often and you might not have much time and some people are afraid of dogs,” Ellen Chan, a Hong Kong resident, told CNN in an interview one afternoon at a cat cafe filled with visitors and cats in frocks.
She added, “I think cats are cuter.”
If these factors sound familiar, it may be because they are contributing to declining birth rates in any of these regions, despite governments’ best efforts to reverse the trend.
“People are now choosing not to have children, so owning a pet is almost like having a child,” says Paul Wong, a clinical psychologist and associate professor at the University of Hong Kong (HKU) who works on therapy animals.
Due to the challenges of city life, people “may want to own a cat rather than a dog,” he added.
stress, busyness, loneliness
Some of these places have a history of cat mania that helped spark the current cat craze.
For example, Japan is home to the little cat cartoon Hello Kitty, which was born in 1974 and built an $80 billion empire. There are also several “cat islands” where wild cats live, making them popular tourist destinations.
But the cats were in a more difficult situation elsewhere. For many years, Koreans have associated dogs with bad luck and evil spirits, which is one reason why dogs have historically been less popular as pets.
But that is gradually changing. The number of pet cats in South Korea has increased sharply since the coronavirus pandemic, according to a 2025 report from KB Financial Group. This is probably because COVID-19 restrictions have limited outdoor activities in recent years, making it easier to care for cats indoors.
Gong Soo-hyun, a veterinarian at Baryomaru, a cat adoption center in Hwaseong, a city in northwestern South Korea, told CNN, “I feel that interest in cats is increasing.” More people than ever before are coming to adopt cats and volunteer, she said.
The main difference over the past decade or so has been a shift in thinking from thinking about animals as utilitarian objects to seeing them as companion pets, HKU’s Wong said. For example, in the past, dogs were mainly used for purposes such as security, and cats were used for pest control. Now they are used to “cope with feelings of loneliness,” he added.
Meanwhile, many parts of East Asia have seen significant changes in demographic and social trends in recent decades. Across China, Japan and South Korea, young people are leaving their rural homes in droves to seek work in big cities, often leaving behind empty villages populated by a dwindling number of elderly people.
But city life also comes with its own challenges. Many young people in East Asia face competitive job markets, stagnant wages, high costs of living, and grueling working hours.
China’s excessive work culture has become so problematic that it was found guilty by the country’s Supreme Court in 2021. Similarly, Japan, where the government imposes legal restrictions on overtime work, has a special expression for “death from overwork.”
“This situation has made cats a more viable option, especially for the younger generation,” said Joe Ngai, assistant professor at the Department of Counseling Psychology at Shui-en University in Hong Kong. “Cats are well adapted to indoor environments and do not require daily walks, providing a form of companionship that fits more easily within the constraints of Hong Kong’s urban life.”
These pressures are one of the many reasons why young people in Asia are increasingly choosing not to get married or have children. Japan’s population has been declining for 16 consecutive years, while South Korea’s birth rate is the lowest in the world. Similar trends are seen across the region.
However, with the increase in single-person households, feelings of loneliness are also increasing. Some young people withdraw completely from the outside world for long periods of time, a phenomenon known as hikikomori. In South Korea’s capital, authorities are spending nearly $327 million on a five-year plan to combat loneliness. And in China, an app called “Are You Dead” that required users to check in daily went viral as it exploited widespread feelings of isolation.
In the absence of human companions, children, and spouses, people turn to animals. Asia’s pet economy is booming, and they too are opening up their wallets.
Pet food is one of the fastest growing consumer sectors in China, with industry value expected to soar to $12 billion by 2030, according to a 2024 research report by investment bank Goldman Sachs. Also, according to South Korea’s largest online marketplace, more pet strollers were sold than baby strollers in South Korea in 2023 for the first time.
This may not be welcome news for governments hoping for more babies. But instead of children, the companions of kittens may provide much-needed solace to struggling young people in Asia.
“If people’s happiness level improves, it might be better than having a sad population with fewer people,” Wong said.
