While it’s not something you can control completely, it is possible to help your cats to enjoy or at least tolerate spending a lot of time in the car. And it’s so helpful when they don’t hate it! We didn’t plan to do travel nursing when we first got our cats, but we made it a priority even then and we are SO glad that we did. Our cats have spent up to 10ish hours in the car and gone on five and six day road trips across the country, and they do great!

our top tips

start them out young

Now this is probably the most important step, and also the most impossible for many people if they’re just thinking about this now years after getting their cat. But don’t worry, though we haven’t attempted to acclimate an older cat to the car ourselves, we’ve heard success stories and are convinced it is possible.

When we got our cats we were living in Montreal, but frequently travelled back to New Hampshire to visit family. We also got our cats from my family in New Hampshire, so they both had to make that initial 5ish hour drive up to their new home. That was really the motivating factor for us to try to train them to like the car. We didn’t want to have to worry that they would hate that drive when we planned to do it semi-frequently. I also brought our first cat, Pepper, to work with me when I was nannying in Montreal because my days were long and Dan hadn’t moved up yet.

take short, frequent trips

Those trips to work with me meant that Pepper was in the car for 20 or so minute drives at least four times a week. Once Dan moved up she stopped coming to work with me, but we still made an effort to take her (and her sister Sage when we adopted her) on frequent, short drives. At Christmastime I love to drive around and look at people’s Christmas lights. We were able to find little things like that which made fun outings for us as well as a productive outing for them to get used to being in the car.

let them roam free

There are plenty of tips out there for getting your cat used to riding in the car in a carrier, but we didn’t have much success with that. We preferred letting them roam around and sit on our laps, so honestly we didn’t try very hard to get them acclimated to riding the carrier. That said, we did put in an effort to get them used to being in their carrier for bringing them out to the car. We also always have their carrier open in the car for them to curl up in, which Sage now does 99% of the time. Pepper sometimes joins her and sometimes curls up on one of our laps.

They both did much better in the car when we allowed them to roam free. In general, we found that they only really roamed around a lot when they were kittens, and now that they’re a bit older (around one and two years old) they usually find a place to curl up and stay there most of the ride. When they’re kittens, it’s obviously important to be careful and make sure they don’t end up near the pedals. We only ever had that issue once thankfully, but found it much easier to manage when there were two of us in the car. If you sometimes have to keep them in their carrier for safety reasons, but otherwise don’t like to, that’s ok! We would keep them in their carrier at times for that reason, but largely found we didn’t have to.

give them positive associations

Roaming around and exploring the car is already a positive association for a young, or just particularly adventurous, cat. However, there are some other things you can do to help them enjoy the car as well. We like to have treats, toys, and catnip ready in the car during long trips. When we were first training them to like the car we made sure to have those things even just for short trips.

If there are two of you in the car you can more easily play with them while on the road, otherwise you may have to just leave the toys out for them to entertain themselves with. Catnip is also useful if your cat becomes stressed as when eaten it can actually have a calming effect on your cat. Treats are an obvious way to help your cats build a positive association with the car. Having a cat bed or carrier that they love available to them is also a good idea.

Other pro tips for cats in the car

get a good litter box

If you’re planning to bring your cats on long road trips, invest in a good litter box! We love having ours for travel nursing because it’s enclosed. In general that helps with clean up (less litter being kicked out of the box), but also it helps contain any…smell. Both of these benefits are even more important when travelling long distances in the car with cats. Something else you can do to help avoid a stinky road trip is add a few drops of essential oils to the filter on your litter box. Not all boxes have this, but again is a big reason why we love ours! Check it out here (affiliate link).

take breaks on longer trips

It can be helpful to take short breaks when on longer road trips to encourage your cats to move around, eat, and drink. Most often, our cats don’t like to eat or drink when the car is actively moving (other than eating treats). So we try to be intentional about offering them food and water when we make stops, though their food and water is always out and accessible to them even while we’re driving. Make sure your cat knows where the food, water, and litter box are when in the car.

how do your cats do in the car?