How we test

What we are measuring

One number, in grams: how much litter ends up on the floor beyond the mat. Every other quality of a litter mat — comfort, cleanability, durability — matters, but they are secondary to the thing the product exists to do.

As far as we can tell, no other review site publishes this measurement. That is the gap we are trying to fill.

The test bay

• A marked, fixed floor area, identical for every product.
• Two surfaces tested separately: one hard floor panel, one low-pile carpet panel.
• The mat sits at the box exit in the same position every time.
• The same litter, from the same bag, for every product in a round.

The two legs

1. Controlled deposition

A measured mass of litter is applied to a weighted paw-simulator, which crosses the mat a fixed number of times with a fixed stride. Everything landing beyond the far edge of the mat is swept up and weighed to 0.1 g. Five trials per product; we report the mean and the spread, not a single number.

2. Live use

Seven days of real use with our cat. Track-out is collected and weighed at a fixed time each day. This leg is noisier than the controlled leg and we treat it as a sanity check on it, not as the headline result.

Secondary measures

• Litter released when the mat is shaken out
• Time to clean, in seconds
• Edge curl and slip after seven days
• Wash and dry time
• Observed paw comfort — reported as an observation, never as a welfare claim

What we record for every test

Test date · product and model · where it was bought and for how much · room conditions · surfaces used · our cat’s coat type · every raw measurement · photographs and video · the limitations of that run · any relationship with the manufacturer · whether the page carries affiliate links.

What this test cannot tell you

Our results come from one cat, a long-haired indoor cat, in one home. Tracking depends heavily on an individual animal’s behaviour — how it digs, how it exits, how much litter its paws hold. A mat that wins here may not win in your home.

We have no dog. We do not test dog products or multi-pet households, and we will not claim to.

The controlled leg is a model of tracking, not tracking itself. It is repeatable, which is its whole value, but it is a simplification.

Scoring

There is no single TailVetted score. Scores that combine unrelated qualities into one number hide exactly the trade-off a buyer needs to see. We rank by measured performance and state separately who each product suits.

Corrections

If we get something wrong we change the page and say what changed and when. If a manufacturer disputes a result, we publish the dispute alongside the result.