Do you have a new puppy who won’t stop barking? Although some barking is completely normal for most breeds and breed types, when puppy barking becomes excessive it’s important to understand why your puppy is barking and how to reduce barking the right way.
Why Do Puppies Bark?
Most puppies bark from time to time. However, there are a few different reasons why they do so. Indeed, research shows that barking is context dependent meaning that dogs bark based on factors such as their environment, emotional state, and specific situations (Pongrácz et. al, 2010). Reasons puppies bark can include:
Attention-seeking Barking
This can happen when you disengage from playing with or giving a puppy attention. It’s often paired with jumping up, nipping, or pawing. Barking for attention can also occur when you leave the room or leave the puppy home alone.
Fear or Alert Barking
Fear or alert barking happens in response to situations such as hearing an unfamiliar or loud noise, seeing strangers or visitors to the home, or seeing other dogs. Some puppies also bark at inanimate or moving objects such as cars, bicycles, and skateboards.
Frustration Barking
Barking due to frustration usually happens when a puppy is contained by some kind of barrier it cannot get through, such as a play pen, crate, or baby gate. This can also happen when a puppy is on lead and cannot go where they want to.
Understanding the reason for your puppy barking will help you determine the best way to address and prevent the barking.
How To Stop a Puppy From Barking: Start With Prevention
The best way to stop your puppy from barking is to ensure you are meeting your pup’s physical, social, and emotional needs. This can be achieved by ensuring your puppy receives:
- Age-appropriate enrichment
- Sniffing activities
- Short daily positive reinforcement training sessions
- Adequate sleep (puppies need 18–20 hours/day)
- A consistent routine for feeding and other activities to help reduce uncertainty
It’s also important that you avoid accidentally reinforcing barking. Many puppy owners inadvertently reward behavior they don’t like. For example, giving their puppy pats and attention when the puppy jumps up on them. Avoid giving your puppy any attention (eye contact, talking to them, or picking them up) as a consequence of barking. This will help to ensure your puppy doesn’t learn that barking results in something they want.
How To Get a Puppy to Stop Barking for Attention
If your puppy is barking for attention, follow these steps to work on reducing the barking:
- Ensure your puppy’s needs are being met: Dogs are social, intelligent animals who need adequate daily physical exercise as well as opportunities to sniff, explore, and problem-solve. They also need social interaction and companionship.
- Teach quiet behavior: If your puppy is barking, wait for a brief pause (2-3 seconds) and mark and reward with a high value treat and attention. Done consistently, this teaches your puppy that quiet behavior (not barking) is reinforcing. Gradually increase the duration of quiet before reinforcement.
It’s also critical that any barking is ignored and not accidently rewarded with attention (e.g. eye contact). Consistency is key, so remember to keep meeting your puppy’s needs, ignoring barking, and reinforce quiet behavior as often as possible.
Helping a Puppy Who Barks Due to Fear or Anxiety
To help a puppy who is barking because they are afraid or anxious we need to change the puppy’s underlying emotional response to the trigger. If you’ve determined your puppy is barking due to fear or anxiety, follow these steps:
- Do NOT punish barking due to fear or anxiety as this can increase the level of fear/anxiety and make the problem worse.
- Avoid flooding the puppy—do not over-expose them to the trigger in an effort to “make them get used to it.”
- Gradually expose the puppy to the trigger at a distance the puppy tolerates well. Slowly work on decreasing the distance to the trigger over time (desensitization).
- Pair triggers with positive experiences such as high value treats to work on creating a positive association (counter-conditioning).
- Utilize management strategies outside of training sessions such as:
- Visual barriers to help block visual access to triggers
- Sounds masking to help drown out scary noises
- Safe spaces to retreat to if the puppy is feeling scared or anxious
Puppies who were not well socialized to a range of sounds, surfaces, people, and environments are more likely to develop fear or anxiety in response to these things in future. The good news is that puppies are always learning and fear can usually be successfully resolved. However, when fear has a genetic basis, rather than being a learned behavior, it can be much harder to modify.
Managing Frustration and Barrier Barking
If your puppy is barking due to frustration, you can work to address it by taking the following steps:
- Teach your puppy impulse control gradually.
- Reinforce calm behavior (such as sitting quietly) at gates and when in the crate/puppy pen.
- Reward calm and quiet behavior by opening doors/pens.
- Avoid opening doors/pens while the puppy is barking (to avoid reinforcing the behavior).
- Use differential reinforcement of incompatible behavior (DRI)—rewarding the puppy for doing something else instead—to reinforce a behavior that’s incompatible with barking, such as sitting quietly, during the times the puppy tends to bark.
What NOT To Do When Your Puppy is Barking
Remember, if your puppy is barking:
- Don’t yell at your puppy.
- Don’t use aversive collars.
- Don’t spray water.
- Don’t scruff or intimidate.
- Don’t expect instant results.
Barking is a normal behavior and serves a purpose for your puppy. Punishment can increase stress, fear, and anxiety which can increase barking in the long-term. Focus on addressing the root cause of the barking and using positive reinforcement to teach quiet behavior.
As a note, while puppy barking is normal, in some cases it can signal underlying issues such as separation anxiety, noise phobias, pain, discomfort, or even lack of sleep. If the barking is escalating or your neighbors are complaining, it’s a good idea to have a check-up at the vet and, if a health issue is ruled out, consult a qualified behavior professional. The good news is that most puppies grow out of excessive barking with guidance, as emotional regulation improves as puppies grow up and mature. Consistency, reinforcing calm behavior, and meeting your puppies needs are important steps to address puppy barking. Remember, your puppy isn’t trying to annoy you, they’re just learning how to live in our world.
Research shows that counter-conditioning can successfully reduce excessive barking in dogs (Carrero & Bennett, 2025). To help reduce barking in your puppy, you can teach them the “quiet” cue. This involves consistently capturing quiet behavior and rewarding it with high value outcomes such as treats and praise. Next, you pair silence with the word “quiet” and follow with reinforcement. Repeat over and over and your puppy will learn to associate the word “quiet” with positive things and will offer quiet behavior when asked. Then you can use the cue to stop barking when needed.
References:
Carrero, J. C., & Bennett, S. L. (2025). Effect of classical counterconditioning (Quiet Kennel Exercise) on barking in sheltered dogs. Journal of Veterinary Behavior, 77, 42-51.
Pongrácz, P., Molnár, C., & Miklósi, Á. (2010). Barking in family dogs: an ethological approach. The Veterinary Journal, 183(2), 141-147.
I have an Aussie puppy. You articles and love for dogs has helped us tremendously. My puppy is worried around dogs she finds intimidating. She barks like crazy. I’m working with her and it has really helped. Thankyou