Will Dog Phones One Day Be a Reality

As our technology progresses, so does dog tech. Today, we have GPS collars, RFID doggy doors, and more, but what about dog phones? Dr. Ilyena Hirskyj-Douglas, adjunct professor at the University of Glasgow, asked the same question and experimented to see how effective a dog phone would be. Her lab assistant: Zack, a 10-year-old labrador retriever!

In her experiment, she rigged a ball with a motion detection device to trigger a video call straight to her phone. “I thought something like this could help the dogs somehow have options and more control,” said Dr. Hirkyj-Douglass. “We decide so much about their lives that maybe just having this choice is exciting in and of itself.”

Unfortunately, Zack was never trained on how to use the device. So, every call made was an accident, and the experiment was inconclusive.

Nevertheless, testing out the question is the first step to determining if dog phones are in our future. The pet tech industry has reached $5.5 billion in market value, with the potential to reach more than $20 billion by 2027. This experiment questions the possibility of what pet tech can be and the extent to which it can help our co-dependencies. If pet phones were successfully tested, then the market would explode as it’d be a means to bring more freedom to dogs and humans. What would you do with a pet phone?