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01 Channels Reshaped — Content E-commerce Surges

Domestic brands rise with the tide

China's online pet market has grown steadily since 2021, at an 18% CAGR, but the channel mix underneath is shifting. Tmall, on years of built-up strength, remains the leading channel; Douyin, powered by the rise of live-stream commerce, has grown sales at a CAGR above 110%.

This ebb and flow between channels has rewritten the growth playbook for brands — and domestic brands are the trend's biggest beneficiaries. Seeded by live-streaming and short video, a cohort of local brands — Gambol's Fregate, Jichong's Xianlang, China Pet Foods' Toptrees — scaled fast.

02 The Cat Economy Heats Up — Premium Staple Food Is the New Direction

Cat food and treats grow steadily, share keeps climbing

By pet type, cat food keeps taking a larger share of the market. Per the latest China Pet Industry White Paper, cats outnumbered dogs among urban pets (dogs and cats combined) for the first time in 2021 and have kept growing since. Better suited than dogs to apartment-style urban living, cats keep fanning the “cat economy.” Catalyzed by consumer trust, product quality and the science-led feeding mindset, domestic brands have made cat food their point of attack — building proprietary brand portfolios and leapfrogging the incumbents.

03 Domestic Brands vs the Global Giants

Domestic and overseas brands diverge

Splitting the field by ownership — take the top 15 brands — domestic and overseas players differ in playbook and focus, and the cat staple-food segment shows that divide most clearly.

Domestic brands: from 14% to 25%, a leapfrog

Domestic brands within the Top 15 lifted their combined share from 14% in 2021 to 25% in 2026 year to date. Gambol is the case in point — Myfoodie holds the mid-market, all-category base (the No.1 domestic brand), while Fregate attacks premium cat food. Fregate's share climbed from under 1% in 2021 to 4%. Positioned as high-end fresh-meat cat food, it claimed the vacant premium price band for domestic brands, used “fresh meat” as its anchor to iterate the category generation by generation and stretch into functional lines, and built Tmall as its base camp while pushing hard on Douyin, amplified by top KOLs — a benchmark case for domestic brands.

Overseas brands: squeezed first, now bottoming out

Overseas brands have been under pressure in this space: their combined share within the Top 15 slid from 38% in 2021 and bottomed out in 2024, with signs of recovery since 2026. The standout is Royal Canin — share up from 9% in 2021 to 12% in 2026 year to date. Royal Canin develops staple foods with breed, size, age, health status and lifestyle as the first-priority variables, holding first-mover positions across three high-value directions: breed-specific, functional and prescription foods. As Chinese pet owners' grasp of science-led pet care deepens — from “eating enough” to “eating well” to “eating scientifically” — Royal Canin's breed, functional and prescription lines are winning growing recognition. Domestic brands, meanwhile, are already pushing into functional niches, with new launches densely targeting gut health, joint care and urinary care. This high-value ground — functional and prescription food — is the focus of the next round of competition, and whether Royal Canin can hold its first-mover moat faces a real test.

Closing Take

At its core, this structural shift tracks Chinese pet owners moving from “having food” to “eating scientifically”. For brands, the opportunity sits on three axes: quickly claiming the channel dividend of content e-commerce, precisely occupying the premium staple-food price band, and deeply building a specialized product matrix (breed-specific, functional and prescription foods). Specialized functional food may well be the next core battleground.

Sandalwood's pet-food monitoring covers brand, SKU, price, formulation and sales volume.