The 6 Best Cat Foods for Kidney Disease

The 6 Best Cat Foods for Kidney Disease

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The best cat food for kidney disease eases the burden on your cat’s organs while keeping him as strong and healthy as he can be. It’s a tricky balance that few foods achieve.

We recommend Royal Canin Veterinary Diet Renal Support D Morsels in Gravy as the best cat food for kidney disease. Though it’s not perfect, this food has a good record among renal patients and one of the least objectionable ingredient lists in the veterinary diet category.

To help you find the right food for your cat, we’ve recommended five foods for cats with kidney disease. Most are prescription foods. Others aren’t. All of them have a history of helping cats with CKD.

At a Glance: Best Cat Food for Kidney Disease To Buy

We highly recommend looking at the comparison table we have below where we highlighted the features of each product. You’ll also find more detailed information about each product later in the article.

What’s The Best Cat Food For Kidney Disease?

After hours of research, I’ve identified seven qualities that set apart the best cat food for kidney disease.

The seven key qualities to look for: 

1. High calorie density
2. High palatability
3. High-quality or restricted protein
4. Low phosphorus levels
5. Increased B vitamins
6. Anti-inflammatory omega-3 fatty acids
7. Low sodium

By combining these qualities, the best cat food for kidney disease keeps your cat strong and lean, slows disease progression, fights inflammation, and reduces the amount of toxins in his bloodstream.

Which Foods Do All Of Those Things At Once?

Not many foods have all seven qualities at the same time. The few that come close are almost all veterinary diets formulated for cats with kidney disease.

They’re far from perfect. They focus on protein restriction rather than protein quality. Most offset disease-appropriate nutrient and mineral levels with species-inappropriate carbohydrate content and unwanted additives.  If you’re used to giving your cat the meatiest and best, these diets are going to be a hard sell. But they seem to help.

The following list features three prescription foods and two that you can buy with or without a veterinarian’s approval.

Best Cat Food For Kidney Disease: Our Top 6 Picks

This Royal Canin food is formulated for cats with kidney disease and is only available with a veterinarian’s prescription.

With wheat flour, modified corn starch, and corn flour prominent on the ingredient list, it’s a high-carbohydrate product and not one we’d recommend for healthy cats. That said, it has several qualities that make it a good option for those suffering from kidney disease.

While many therapeutic foods suffer in the flavor department, this food has a cat-friendly taste and, according to customer reviews, encourages sickly cats to eat. With 32 calories per ounce, the food is relatively calorie-dense, helping your cat to keep weight on.

Controlled protein and phosphorus help to reduce toxins in the bloodstream and the inclusion of fish oil helps to control inflammation.

The food is roughly 30% protein and .44% phosphorus on a dry matter basis.

Like the Royal Canin recipe listed above, this food is only available with a veterinarian’s approval. According to Hill’s, the nutrition of k/d has been “clinically tested to improve and lengthen the quality of life” of cats with kidney disease.

The k/d formula addresses kidney disease with increased calorie density, controlled phosphorus, mild protein restriction, anti-inflammatory fish oil, and low sodium.

Compared to our number one recommendation, this food has a few more warts. For example, it contains sugar and caramel color, neither of which are necessary or beneficial for cats.

The food’s phosphorus content is .49% on a dry matter basis and the protein is 30% on a dry matter basis.

Cats with kidney disease require a diet of the highest quality and that’s exactly what Smalls fresh food has to offer. Not only do they use real animal proteins as the primary ingredient, but they don’t use any low-quality grains, fillers, or artificial additives. Only the best for your cat, and only from Smalls.

This Smalls Fresh Ground Bird is a great choice for cats with kidney disease because it is made with real ingredients, starting with chicken thighs and chicken breast. It offers high calorie density and plenty of moisture, not to mention irresistible chicken flavor.

Perhaps what you’ll love most about Smalls is that they take the work out of shopping for cat food. Simply fill out a quick profile for your pet and they’ll match you with the perfect diet. Even better, they’ll ship it right to your door in regular deliveries.

Healthy or not, all cats are prone to chronic dehydration. When you add kidney disease into the equation, dehydration becomes almost inevitable. Rather than relying on subcutaneous fluids, we recommend feeding a high-moisture diet. It’s the effortless way to hydrate your cat with every meal.

But when caring for a cat with kidney disease, you can’t always have things your way. Some cats refuse to eat anything but kibble and, ultimately, you have to give your cat what he wants.

If your cat will only eat dry food, consider this kibble from Royal Canin. Like other prescription renal diets, the formula has low protein, restricted phosphorus, and extra EPA and DHA from fish oil.

The food’s protein content is between 24.5% and 28.8% on a dry matter basis, while phosphorus lingers under 0.59% on a dry matter basis.

This Weruva food isn’t a prescription diet and doesn’t check all of the kidney disease control boxes, but it’s a good option to consider if you’re looking for a non-prescription food that doesn’t contain any sugar, artificial colors, or other potentially-inflammatory ingredients.

Unlike most protein-rich foods, it’s low in phosphorus with just 1.0 mg per 1000 calories or 0.57% on a dry matter basis. That’s about as low as you can get without a prescription. The food doesn’t skimp on protein or meat content, with shredded beef playing center stage.

As always, that protein content presents a challenge. The protein-forward recipe will help your cat to maintain lean muscle mass but might contribute to toxic buildup in the bloodstream.

The food contains pumpkin, sweet potato, carrot, and potato starch, but it manages to keep carbohydrate content minimal. The food is also light on fat and doesn’t contain any sources of omega-3 fatty acids.

If you choose this food, consider supplementing with salmon oil or another source of EPA and DHA for anti-inflammatory benefits.

If you’re looking for a way to give your cat the best and still have some money left over for cat litter, this recipe from Hi-Tor may be a good alternative to traditional prescription foods. Though it’s available without a veterinarian’s approval and Hi-Tor doesn’t explicitly call it a therapeutic diet, the recipe embodies many of the characteristics of prescription cat food.

For example, it has reduced protein, controlled levels of phosphorus, and low sodium. The food is intended to be highly-digestible and easy to eat.

The food is around 36% protein and 0.71% phosphorus on a dry matter basis.

In an article on low-phosphorus food, a writer at Nom Nom describes feeding cats with kidney disease as “a life-saving dietary juggling act.”

It’s almost impossible to find food that keeps all of those balls in the air—one that’s low in protein but won’t starve your cat’s muscles, low in phosphorus but rich in animal-sourced nutrition, palatable but made with CKD in mind.

Most of us are going to drop at least one. Some will sacrifice muscle mass for controlled protein and lower BUN levels. Others will forget about protein restriction to save our cats’ muscles. Most eventually forget about nutritional control and just try to find food that our cats are willing to eat.

Though it helps to try kidney disease-specific foods, you don’t have to keep feeding them if they don’t help your cat.  The goal is to keep your cat happy, strong, and eating for as long as possible.

*This article is not a substitute for veterinary advice. Your veterinarian can provide personalized suggestions relevant to your cat’s unique situation.