Brand Scorecards

50 brands · 2,354 verified foods · 13 with FDA recall history

When people ask a vet how to judge a pet food brand, the answer is usually some version of the same four questions: does the company employ a board-certified veterinary nutritionist, does it own the plants that make the food, does it substantiate its diets with real AAFCO feeding trials, and does it publish peer-reviewed research. Those four questions are what this table answers.

Every cell is one of four states, and the honest one matters most: green means we found a source saying yes, red means we found a source saying no, and amber means the company does not disclose it. Amber is not a failing grade — it is a fact about the company's transparency, and 10 of 50 brands answer none of the four with a sourced yes. There is no overall score and no star rating, because the four criteria do not trade off against each other in any way we could justify weighting.

What "none on record" means

It means no FDA recall matched this brand in the records we hold — not that the brand has never had a problem. FDA recall notices name the recalling company, which is often a parent or a co-packer rather than the brand on the bag, so matching is imperfect and we say so on every brand page. Check the full recall feed if you want the unfiltered records, and read the methodology for how the join is made.

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