Best-value dry cat food

A 4 kg neutered cat needs about 238 kcal a day by the Merck Veterinary Manual's formula (70 x kg^0.75 x 1.2). That's 86,720 kcal a year, or about 23 kg of dry food. Bags differ in size and in calories, so I sort them by what 1,000 kcal costs.

This comes from labels, store pages and the named sources below. I haven't fed these to a cat. The calories are the figures Pets at Home prints, so they're the store's or maker's statement and no lab of mine checked them.

All six prices are one-time prices on Pets at Home, read on 2 November 2026. The year column uses the same formula at each food's printed calories, and those prices.

The top bag needs a second look

The own-label price looked wrong to me, so I read the page again. Same figure, and the page's own per-kilo line agrees. Check it before you plan a year around it, since only 2 reviews sit under the listing and a price this far below its neighbours may not last.

The recipe doesn't explain the gap. Cereals come first and chicken is 4%. Whiskas is built much the same way, with cereals first and 4% chicken in the brown kibbles, and the calories nearly match: 3,750 kcal/kg against 3,760 kcal/kg. Per kilo they're £1.35/kg and £3.15/kg.

The feeding tables don't match, though. Pets at Home suggests 40 to 60 g a day for a cat of 3 to 5 kg. Whiskas suggests 55 to 65 g at 4 kg. The formula lands on 63 g for either bag, above the own-label range. If you follow the lower table your sum shrinks, and so does your cat's dinner. Weigh the cat and adjust.

What paying more buys

Purina ONE lists chicken first at 17%, then dried poultry protein and wheat. Protein is 34 %, against 30 % for Whiskas. For me that's the most sensible step up on this list, though nothing on a label shows your cat will do better on it.

Lily's Kitchen goes furthest on ingredients: fresh chicken 65%, chicken liver 5%, potato 21%. Protein is lower, at 27 %. Pets at Home shows 12 reviews averaging 4.3 out of 5, the lowest score of these six listings. Reviews on a shop's site are opinions, though, and they don't measure a cat's health.

The two specialised recipes

Royal Canin's slot is the shaky one. Pets at Home prints no calories. zooplus.co.uk shows "3.76 kcal" with no unit beside it, so I didn't use that either, and the figure in the table runs on the assumption printed next to it. The same page shows a 10 kg bag at a lower price per kilo.

Hill's has a 3-for-2 on the page until midnight on 3 November 2026, and the table ignores it. I go through the sum in my Hill's Sterilised review.

On the two foods in the wet vs dry yearly sum, dry is a fraction of the wet bill. A budget pouch can still undercut a premium bag. To run your own cat's weight, use the pet cost calculator, or browse all dry cat foods.