Dog enrichment activities cater to your dog’s natural instincts to sniff, chew, forage, and more. Enrichment is mental exercise for your dog, and while it shouldn’t take the place of physical exercise like walks and running, it’s part of giving your dog a holistically fulfilled life.

Enrichment activities like food puzzles have been proven to reduce stress and increase relaxation behaviors. In addition to being a great way to supplement your dog’s daily routines, enrichment can help keep your pup from getting bored if it’s too hot or too cold to take her out on her normal walk or if your dog has an exercise restriction due to injury or illness. It’s also a fun way to keep puppies and high-energy dogs from becoming destructive during times when you can’t entertain them yourself.

While many things can be considered enrichment for your dog (play, social interaction with people and other dogs, car rides, etc.), we’re going to focus on five dog enrichment ideas that you can do indoors.

Puzzle Toys

Dog puzzle toys offer fun challenges that keeps your dog’s brain working. The simplest puzzle toys, like the Kong Wobbler or the Outward Hound Orbee-Tuff Snoop, just require your dog to push them around to get the food out.

More challenging puzzle toys require your dog to push buttons, pull out drawers, open flaps, nudge sliding pieces, and more. I recommend getting two to three different puzzle toy options and rotating them so your dog doesn’t get bored.

I like the Nina Ottosson Outward Hound line of dog puzzle toys, as they come in multiple levels depending on your dog’s ability. You can start with lower-level toys and try harder ones once your dog gets the hang of them.

If your dog likes to chew or ingest plastic, opt for puzzle toy options that don’t have removable pieces.

Lick Mats and Stuffable Toys

My favorite lickable enrichment dog toys are lick mats, Kongs, West Paw Toppls, and the Woof Pupsicle. All of these options are easy to fill with food, pop in the freezer, and end up with an activity that keeps your dog busy licking for up to an hour.

Licking is a calming behavior for dogs and many of these toys—like Kongs and West Paw Toppls—are relatively durable and chew-resistant. This makes them good options for crate training and leaving with your dog or puppy when you need to leave the house (if your dog isn’t prone to destroying toys).

My favorite way to fill Kongs and Toppls is to soak my dog’s kibble in water for a few hours until soft, then stuff it into the toy. I’ll then top it with a small spoonful of wet food and a treat or two, then freeze the entire thing. This way, you don’t add too many additional calories to your dog’s daily diet, since she’s getting enrichment with her normal allotment of food.

You can use pre-made fillers or even plain peanut butter for lick mats, Kongs, and Toppls, but just be aware of the serving sizes for these options, as you can unintentionally add too many calories to your dog’s diet if given regularly.

For the Woof Pupsicle, I find that the pre-made Pupsicle Pops take my dogs the longest to finish. The brand also as a treat mix that you just add water to and pour in the brand’s Pupsicle treat tray mold before freezing. You can make your own pupsicle refills using the mold if you want to choose your own ingredients.

If you don’t have a lick mat or stuffable toy, you can add water or dog-safe chicken broth to your dog’s food in a normal dog bowl and freeze it. Your dog will get the same enjoyment of licking without having to buy an additional product.

Snuffle Mats and Games

Snuffle mats for dogs are an easy way to prolong mealtime and let your dog use their nose. Snuffle mats generally consist of long pieces of fabric attached to a base that make good hiding spots for kibble and other small pieces of food. Your dog will sniff or “snuffle” their way around the mat to find and eat all the hidden food.

My favorite snuffle mats are the Pet Parents Forager Snuffle Mat and the PAW5 Wooly Snuffle Dog Feeding Mat. Both have dense snuffle sections and are machine washable for easy cleanup.

If you don’t have a snuffle mat or don’t want to buy one, it’s easy to make DIY dog enrichment toys. Try filling a box with shredded paper and scattering a cup of food in it, stuff toilet paper or paper towel rolls with newspaper and small pieces of food, or simply lay a towel down, sprinkle some treats on it, and roll it up and tie it in a knot. You don’t need to spend a lot of money to enrich your dog through sniffing.

Scent Work-Style Enrichment

Even easier than snuffle mats, scent work-style enrichment includes putting pieces of food in various containers (small boxes or Tupperware containers work well) around your home for your dog to find.

Put your dog in another room or in her crate while you set this game up. Start simple with five or six containers or boxes on the ground in the same room and put a few pieces of food in each of them. Release your dog into the area where the containers are, but don’t say anything or show her the containers. Let her use her nose to find all the treats!

Once you’ve done this a few times, you can start putting food in only some of the containers, add additional containers, and start moving the containers to various places in the room.

This type of activity is the foundation that many instructors use to teach competition scent work, so if your dog enjoys this game, consider getting them into this sniff-centric sport.

Chews

Many dogs find the act of chewing enriching, and simply giving them a high-quality chew bone will keep them entertained. I mainly recommend beef cheek rolls as a long-lasting chew option. They’re an easily digestible rawhide alternative and aren’t as expensive as other dog chews.

If your dog doesn’t like beef cheek rolls, bully sticks or collagen sticks paired with a bully stick holder, like the Woof BullySafe or the Bow Wow Labs Buddy Safety Device, are also good picks.

Never leave your dog unattended with a chew, as they can be choking hazards depending on your dog’s chew style. Opt for giving your dog a chew while hanging out in the same room—that way you can monitor her for any signs of choking while she chews.