Smallest Cat Breed

Above: Singapura photo by Helmi Flick. The smallest cat breed is fairly easy to find. First, it is commonsense that the vast majority of domestic cats are going to be of a similar size. The mixed breed cats are all medium sized cats with what I would term "normal" (i.e. to be expected of a domestic cat) appearance. They are well balanced cats, they haven't got wedgie heads or extra long legs.

Although some purebred cats will be a bit on the bigger or smaller side they would normally find that happy middle ground. However, the cat fancy demands that cats be of type (the right appearance for a particular breed) and over a long period of time this objective has separated out cat breeds in terms of size making them more distinct.

That said, one cat is known to be probably the smallest cat breed and it is the Singapura, otherwise known as the Drain Cat (see one in a drain). Thus cat is meant to be native to Singapore but they are very few in Singapore as it happens (if any). This cat is probably a hybrid cat created by the cat fancy. You can read more about this breed on the main website.

Although the Singapura is probably known to be the smallest cat breed there are others that might pose a good challenge to that title. In fact there is more than one. The group of cats called Dwarf Cats would probably produce one or two individual cats that are small enough to be a the lower end of the spectrum of cat size.

There are number of dwarf cat breeds. The founding breed is the Munchkin, a not uncommon cat. The other dwarf cats are quite rare or very rare. These are the Napoleon, Skookum, Kinkalow, Lambkin, Genetta, Knook, Minskin and Bambino. There is one other the Dwelf but there is only a drawing of this cat breed the last time I looked.

These cats are normal cats with short legs due to the dwarfism gene. This will automatically make the cat smaller. I'm guessing here but cat breeders of dwarf cats will probably breed from smaller normal cat breeds (crossed with the Munchkin) as a dwarf cat looks more interesting if she is small. I expect all the dwarf cats to be on the small side.

The Miniature cats and Teacup cats are obviously the smallest but these are not recognized cat breeds. They are normally Persian cats (Traditional Persian) bred small through prolonged selective breeding. I cannot include them in this post as the smallest cat breed.

Finally some cats that are normally mid ranged in terms of size can be smaller and more delicate. The Devon Rex comes mind as such as cat, especially when bred to an extreme. Some of the Modern Siamese and Orientals are also lightweights and smaller than average.

You can see the full range of cat breed sizes on this page: Largest Domestic Cat Breed. The smallest wild cat species is the rusty-spotted cat by the way.

Photograph: Singapura cat copyright Helmi Flick  - please respect copyright. Helmi is a professional photographer.

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