Egg is one of the few "can my dog eat this" questions where the answer is genuinely yes - and where almost every follow-up question has a different answer. Cooked is not raw. Eggshell is not a necessary part of feeding egg to your dog. And "how many a week" turns out not to be a question about eggs at all.
- Plain cooked egg: yes. No butter, no oil, no salt, and nothing from an omelette pan that had onion in it.
- Raw egg: two separate concerns - avidin in raw egg white can reduce biotin absorption, and raw animal products can carry pathogens.
- Shells: unnecessary. A complete food already covers calcium.
- How many a week is a calorie question. One egg is a surprisingly large share of a small dog's entire treat allowance.
Are eggs actually good for dogs?
Eggs are a good source of highly digestible, complete protein, along with other nutrients. USDA figures for whole hard-boiled egg come to 155 kcal and 12.6 g of protein per 100 g - which puts a medium egg at roughly 60–80 kcal depending on its size.
The honest framing, though, is the one the WSAVA Global Nutrition Committee uses for every treat: a treat is anything given in addition to a complete and balanced diet, and treats should never replace a meal. If your dog is eating an appropriate complete and balanced diet, their main food is already providing the protein and other nutrients they need. Egg is a nice thing, not a nutritional fix.
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How many eggs can a dog eat in a week?
There's no per-week egg number, because the limit isn't about eggs - it's about calories. WSAVA's rule is that treats should always make up less than 10% of a dog's daily calorie intake. Everything counts towards that 10%: egg, cheese, training treats, the crust off your toast.
So the sum is: find your dog's daily calorie figure (on the food packaging, or from your vet - WSAVA is clear that individual dogs vary a lot), take 10% of it, and divide by roughly 60–80 kcal per egg depending on its size. To make that concrete: a dog whose complete food provides 600 kcal a day has a treat allowance of about 60 kcal - which is less than one medium egg.
For scale, here's WSAVA's own calorie table for foods people commonly hand to dogs:
| Food | Measure | Calories |
|---|---|---|
| Lean cooked chicken breast, no skin | 28 g (1 oz) | 47 |
| Lean cooked beef | 28 g (1 oz) | 64 |
| Digestive biscuit | 17 g (one biscuit) | 75 |
| Peanut butter | 1 tbsp | 81 |
| Cheddar cheese | 28 g (1 oz) | 120 |
| Dried pig's ear | 56 g (2 oz) | 242 |
A small dog can blow their entire daily treat budget on one dried pig's ear several times over. For a medium or large dog, a couple of eggs spread over a week may fit comfortably within the calorie allowance, but the appropriate amount still depends on the individual dog's size, body condition, activity level and what other treats they receive. For a small dog, a whole egg can use a substantial proportion of the daily treat allowance.
Can dogs eat raw eggs?
We'd cook them, and there are two distinct reasons - worth separating, because they're often blurred together. The avidin concern is specifically about raw egg white. The egg yolk contains biotin, and cooking the egg denatures avidin.
1. Raw egg white reduces biotin absorption. This one is specific and well described. Per the MSD Veterinary Manual: "While egg yolks are a good source of biotin, raw egg whites contain a glycoprotein called avidin that binds biotin and prevents its absorption in the GI tract." Avidin is a heat-sensitive antinutritional factor; cooking denatures it and prevents it from binding biotin in the same way. Keep it in proportion, though: MSD also says naturally occurring biotin deficiency is very rare in dogs and cats. This is a reason not to make raw egg a habit, not a reason to panic over one stolen egg.
2. Raw is raw. WSAVA lists unprocessed, raw animal-based treats as a pathogen-transmission risk in its owner guidance, and the FDA's own two-year survey of commercial pet food found the raw category to be the outlier: of 196 raw pet food samples, 15 were positive for Salmonella and 32 for Listeria monocytogenes, against zero Salmonella in the dry dog food tested. That study is about raw pet food rather than eggs specifically, but it's the clearest picture of why vets are cautious about raw anything - and the risk runs to the humans in the house as much as the dog.
What about eggshells?
Eggshell is mostly calcium carbonate, which is why it comes up as a home calcium supplement. If your dog is eating a complete and balanced food, that calcium requirement is already met, and adding minerals to a balanced diet is one of the easier ways to unbalance it. There's also a practical point straight from WSAVA's treat guidance: make sure any treat is an appropriate size and shape to reduce the risk of choking. Sharp shell fragments aren't that.
A scrap of shell swallowed with a stolen egg is very unlikely to cause harm. Deliberately feeding shell is a conversation to have with your vet, not a life-hack.
Plain boiled or plain scrambled is fine. What tends to arrive with the egg isn't: butter and oil add a lot of fat, salt isn't required, and a leftover omelette or fried breakfast can carry onion or garlic - both genuinely toxic to dogs and cats, and both easy to miss in a mixed dish. WSAVA also flags milk and dairy for cats specifically, so scrambling with a splash of milk is a bad idea for the cat even where it's fine for the dog.
Which dogs should skip eggs
Whole egg contains a meaningful amount of fat and calories for a treat, particularly for a small dog. If your dog is overweight, has had pancreatitis, or is on a veterinary-prescribed diet, WSAVA's own advice is that conventional treats may not be appropriate at all - check before adding anything. Egg is also a recognised food allergen for some dogs, so if your dog is on an elimination diet for suspected food allergy, an egg treat can quietly undo weeks of work.
Can cats eat eggs?
Yes, with the same shape of answer: plain and cooked, in small amounts, inside that same under-10% treat allowance - WSAVA publishes the identical rule for cats. Cats' allowances are much smaller in absolute terms, which makes portion size matter more: WSAVA lists a 28 g serving of cooked prawns at 29 kcal and the same weight of cheddar at 120 kcal, against a daily treat budget for an average adult cat measured in tens of calories, not hundreds.
The raw caveats are the same, and the dairy point is a cat-specific one - WSAVA lists milk and dairy products among the things to avoid for cats, because many are lactose intolerant.
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Related guides: Pet Food Safety Checker · Can Dogs Eat Bananas? · Can Dogs Eat Onions or Garlic? · Can Dogs Eat Cat Food?
Her review is dated 14 September 2026 and her comments are applied in full. Dr de Klerk qualified from the Royal Veterinary College in 2014 and is a member of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (reg. 7088779). This article is general information, not a diagnosis, and doesn't replace veterinary care. If you're worried about your pet, contact your vet.