Need a Paw-trait for National Cat Day? Check Out These Cat Cafes

Today is National Cat Day! Whether you’re looking for the purrr-fect cat to adopt or simply enjoy snuggling with a feline while working, cat cafes are the latest trend among coffee and animal lovers.

One of the world’s first cat cafes opened back in 1998 in Taipei, Taiwan. Loosely translated as “Kitten Garden,” this cafe started as a way for folks to unwind after a long day, but quickly evolved into a major tourist spot. In the mid-2000s cat cafes began to open in Japan, followed closely by openings in Europe and the U.S.

The first cat cafe in America was introduced as a sponsored pop-up cafe in New York City in April of 2014. While this pop-up cafe first introduced the idea to the U.S. the trend was quickly popularized and Oakland’s Cat Town became the country’s first permanent cat cafe in October of the same year. Since then, cat cafes have been opened in Austin, Seattle and many more cities.

Interestingly enough, regardless of what people are writing in their cat cafe reviews on Yelp, they tend to give a rating of 4 and 5 stars. And in the minds of consumers, “cats” are definitely the bigger pull than the “cafe” aspect. Out of the most common phrases in cat cafe reviews, “cafe” didn’t show up until the 19th phrase. “Tea” and “coffee” didn’t even crack the top 100.

In honor of our feline friends, we’ve pulled together a list of the 10 most photographed cat cafes in the U.S., because who doesn’t love a good cat photo? To come up with this list, we identified businesses in the “themed cafe” and “pet adoption” categories, then ranked them based on how frequently users submit photos. We included only one business per state for geographic diversity.

1. KitTea Cat Cafe in San Francisco, CA