How to Get Your Cat to Use a Cat Tree (When They're Being Difficult About It)

You spent time researching cat trees. You read the reviews. You assembled the thing — probably with a cat supervising unhelpfully from three feet away. You stepped back, pointed at it proudly, and your cat walked directly past it to sit in the cardboard box it came in.

Welcome to cat ownership. This happens to almost everyone. The good news is it's not permanent — cats are creatures of habit and suspicion, and a new object in the house is treated as guilty until proven innocent. The better news is there are some genuinely effective ways to speed up the process. Here's what actually works.

The single biggest reason cats ignore a cat tree is placement. If you tucked it in a spare bedroom or a quiet corner away from the action, your cat has no reason to go there. Cats want to be where the household is — they just want to observe it from a safe, elevated distance.

Move the tree to your living room, near a window if possible. Window placement is the cheat code — a cat who won't look twice at a tree in the hallway will absolutely claim the top perch if it means they can watch birds and judge the neighbours at the same time. Give it a week in a new spot before deciding the tree is a failure.

New cat trees smell like the factory, the shipping box, and approximately zero cats. Your cat's entire worldview is organized around scent, and an object that smells foreign is an object to be avoided until further notice.

The fix: rub a blanket or piece of clothing your cat already loves all over the tree. Put one of their existing toys on a platform. If you have catnip, a light sprinkle on the top perch is practically cheating — most cats cannot physically resist investigating a catnip smell. You're not tricking them, you're just translating 'this is safe' into a language they understand.

Sometimes the problem isn't the cat — it's the tree. A cat who loves enclosed spaces and hides under the bed is not going to be thrilled about an open-platform tower with no condo. A cat who climbs everything in sight is going to be bored by a compact 30-inch tree. Matching the tree to your cat's actual personality matters more than most people think.

If your cat is a hider, look for something with a proper enclosed condo — like the Hey Brother Cat Tree, which has a two-door condo your cat can disappear into and a hammock they'll discover on their own timeline. If your cat is a climber and a percher, something taller with multiple open platforms gives them the vertical territory they're actually after.

Hey Brother Cat Tree Tower

$31.99

$39.99

★★★★☆(223)

Cats are not dogs — they don't come running because you're enthusiastic about something. They come running because there's something in it for them. Treats are your most reliable tool here.

Place a treat on the lowest platform. When they eat it, place the next one a level higher. Repeat over a few sessions — not all at once, because cats also don't respond well to being rushed. You're building a trail of positive associations one level at a time. Within a few days most cats have made the logical leap that the tree is a treat-dispensing structure and will investigate it voluntarily.

Before your cat will rest on the tree, they need to feel safe around it. A good way to accelerate this is interactive play near and on the tree. Drag a wand toy up the side, across a platform, into the condo entrance. Let your cat chase it onto the tree without making a big deal of the fact they're on the tree. The goal is for 'being on the cat tree' to become associated with fun rather than with you pointing and saying 'look, go up there.'

For cats who are particularly play-motivated, a tree with built-in toys helps a lot. The PAWZ Road Cactus Cat Tree has two dangling play balls that give curious cats a reason to approach and investigate on their own — sometimes that initial interaction is all it takes.

Paws Cactus Cat Tree

$35.99

$39.99

★★★★☆(3086)

This one sounds obvious but it's the most common mistake. Picking your cat up and placing them on the tree — especially repeatedly — almost always backfires. Cats do not like being put somewhere they didn't choose to go, and now the tree has a negative association attached to it: being manhandled.

Let the tree be their idea. Your job is to make the tree as appealing as possible and then get out of the way. Cats are contrarian by nature — the more you push, the more they'll resist. The less you react to them ignoring it, the sooner they'll decide it was their idea all along.

Some cats take a week. Some take a month. Senior cats and particularly anxious cats can take even longer to warm up to new furniture. If you've done everything above and your cat is still side-eyeing the tree from across the room, the answer is usually just patience.

The turning point for most cats is the moment they feel like the tree is theirs — once they've rubbed their scent on it, scratched the posts a few times, and napped on one platform, the whole thing gets claimed and they'll defend it from imaginary threats for the rest of its life.

If you've tried everything and your cat genuinely refuses, consider whether the tree itself is the right fit. Some cats really do have strong preferences — a cat who hates enclosed spaces won't use a condo-heavy tree no matter what you do. A cat who's uninterested in heights isn't going to suddenly become a climber because you bought a 5-foot tower.

The FISH&NAP Cute Cat Tree is a good option for cats who want options — it has a condo, a rooftop bed, a basket perch, and a scratching post ladder, so there's genuinely something for most personality types. More features means more chances for your cat to find the one thing they actually like about it.

FISH&NAP Cute Cat Tree

$40.99

★★★★☆(3217)

Getting a cat to use a cat tree is less about training and more about setup, patience, and picking the right tree in the first place. Location, scent, and positive associations do most of the heavy lifting. The rest is just waiting for your cat to decide — on their own schedule, obviously — that the tree was their idea all along.

Which, if you know cats, is exactly how it was always going to go.