Ways to Spend Time With Dogs Without Owning One

There are many reasons why someone may not be able to own a dog: A lease that says no pets. Travel that would mean constant boarding. Twelve-hour shifts. The financial commitment of 10 to 15 years of food and veterinary care. The flexibility you would lose by committing to owning a dog. Some people are in a waiting period; others have decided that owning a dog is not for them.

That does not mean that you cannot enjoy the company of dogs. The options below run from an hour on a Saturday to a recurring commitment. Programs vary by region, so treat this as a list of suggestions to search for locally.

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Choose by how much time you want to commit.

1. Take a Shelter Dog Out for the Day

Many shelters run day-trip programs under names like Doggy Day Out, Dog Daycation, Adventure Buddy, Foster Field Trip, or Borrow a Buddy. After completing an orientation, you may take out a dog from the shelter that has been cleared for outings. You can take the dog on a hike, to a park, to a coffee shop patio, or for a nap in your car with the windows down. At the end of the day, you bring the dog back to the shelter (or apply to adopt because you have fallen in love!)

This benefits the dog because it gets a break from the shelter. It improves their mental health and helps with their socialization. The shelter benefits because volunteers can take photographs of the dog and provide feedback on the dog’s personality and behavior in different situations. This helps to get the dog adopted.

To find one, start with the shelters closest to you and search their volunteer pages directly. Many programs will provide you with a leash, collar, water bowl and waste bags. If it is warm out, check how hot is too hot for dogs before you commit to a hike, and see our guide to keeping a dog cool in the car for the drive there and back. A dog on their first outing in months can also be a flight risk, so check the collar fit before you leave. Our guide what to do if a dog runs away provides tips on what to do if your dog runs away. If you are planning something longer than a park visit, see our dog road trip gear guide for travel gear recommendations.

2. Volunteer to Walk Shelter Dogs

If you have time to commit every week, consider a recurring shelter shift. Shelters often depend on volunteers to walk dogs, play with dogs in play groups, socialize shy dogs, provide laundry and kennel cleaning, and staff weekend adoption events.

Volunteers usually have to go through an orientation process, and often have to be at least 16 - 18 years old. Younger volunteers often need a parent who has also completed the training.

3. Have a Shelter Dog Sleep Over for a Weekend

A sleepover is a field trip that includes a night at your place. You pick a dog up in the afternoon, they stay at your place, and you return them the next morning, or after two nights, or over a holiday weekend when the shelter is short-staffed and loud.

If your living situation allows for this, it can make a real difference in the life of a shelter dog. It allows them to decompress away from the stress of a shelter. It also familiarizes them to life in a house. You can also provide the shelter with information about the dog’s personality. If you have kids, cats, or other dogs in your home, you can let the shelter know how the dog responded to them. This can help them get adopted.

A first night in a strange house can be overwhelming for a dog. Many shelters will provide a crate for the dog to sleep in. Having a quiet, enclosed place to retreat to makes a real difference. For more information, see our crate training guide.

The key point: fostering does not always mean keeping a dog for months. One night can be a real benefit to a shelter dog.

4. Short-Term Fostering

Between a sleepover and open-ended fostering, these stays range from a few days to a couple of weeks. Shelters that run these well have specific names for them:

• Respite Foster: Covering for a long-term foster who is traveling or needs a break
• Emergency Foster: Short placements during an eviction, a hospitalization, a natural disaster, or a large seizure of animals
• Recovery Foster: A quiet place for a dog healing from surgery, usually with medication schedules and activity restrictions
• Short-Term Shelter Foster: One or two-week decompression stays for a dog struggling in the kennel

Longer foster stays allow dogs to relax and acclimate to new surroundings. They also help shelters by freeing up shelter space.

This is especially beneficial around the 4th of July. Shelters are often forced to euthanize healthy dogs to make room for all the dogs who come in as strays because they were scared by fireworks noise and ran away. Fostering saves the life of the shelter dog, and saves the life of the dog who needs the shelter space while they wait to be reunited with their owners. If you have a dog in your home during fireworks, see our fireworks anxiety checklist for tips on keeping them calm.

Be realistic about what you are taking on. A recovery foster means medication on a schedule and enforced rest. Reputable programs will cover all veterinary costs.

5. Walk a Dog for Someone Who Needs Help

Not every dog who needs walking lives in a shelter. Seniors, people with disabilities, homebound owners, and people recovering from surgery or a hospital stay often have dogs they love and cannot exercise. Volunteer programs can fill this gap and help dogs stay with their families and out of the shelter.

PAWS/LA is a long-running example. Its P.A.C.E. program supports low-income seniors and people with serious illness in Los Angeles County with veterinary care, pet food, transport, and dog walking. It assigns walking volunteers to clients who live nearby. Similar programs run through Meals on Wheels affiliates and local humane societies.

6. Puppy Yoga

Puppy yoga is a standard yoga or stretching class held in a room with loose puppies. The puppies are sometimes available for adoption. Classes are usually 60 to 90 minutes long. Some yoga studios only offer classes with puppies; others offer such classes as an elective a few times a week.

That does not mean every yoga studio operator is irresponsible. It does mean it is important to check welfare standards before you book. Studios should allow puppies rest between classes, and they should have access to water at all times. There should be first-aid trained supervisors on premises, and puppies should be sourced only from licensed shelters and breeders.

Ask two questions when you book: where do the puppies come from, and where do they go between classes? A well-run facility will answer both questions immediately.

7. Adoption Lounges

Some shelters will allow people to visit with dogs in adoption lounges. Rather than looking at dogs in individual cages, dogs are allowed to interact with each other and potential adopters. This is done in a room on site or outside in a dog run. Some shelters will reduce or waive fees on special adoption event days.

Look for venues that work with a recognized shelter or rescue, have staff supervising interaction, and give dogs a private space to retreat to.

8. Therapy Dog Events

Libraries, schools, universities, hospitals, and community centers will sometimes host visiting therapy-dog teams of a registered dog and their handler. One such format is the reading program, where children read aloud to a dog. R.E.A.D., run by Intermountain Therapy Animals since 1999, is one, and Pet Partners registers teams across the US. Some universities run similar finals-week stress-relief events.

Another option is to spend time reading to or performing music for dogs in shelters. This provides enrichment to the animals and reduces their stress levels, while socializing them to human interaction. Some programs encourage children to do this to improve their reading and musical skills. Two of the organizations on our dog charities page are examples. Wild Tunes encourages volunteer musicians to play in shelters, and Tails That Teach builds reading programs around empathy for animals.

9. Rescue Transport

Dogs sometimes need to move from a shelter to a foster home, from a foster home to an adopter, from an overcrowded rural shelter to a partner rescue in another state, or from a veterinary clinic back to a foster after surgery. Much of that movement happens in the cars of volunteers.

Doobert is one such coordination platform, matching volunteer drivers with organizations across the US and Canada. Long routes are usually run as relays: you drive one leg of an hour or two and hand off to the next driver. Transport is often coordinated with rescue flights.

If you have a car and some free time, it can be a great way to help out a rescue organization.

The organization will tell you how the dog should be secured for the drive. If you need to provide your own gear, see our picks for travel crates for road trips. For a dog who struggles in a moving car, see car anxiety for dogs for tips on traveling with a dog.

10. Service-Dog Puppy Sitting

Service-dog organizations place puppies with volunteer raisers for a year or more. That is a serious commitment. Those raisers travel, work, and occasionally need a break, and the organizations maintain rosters of approved sitters to cover the gaps.

Guide Dogs for the Blind uses puppy sitters. After an online self-study course and a home visit, volunteers can set their own availability: a weekend a month, a week a month, or ad hoc. Canine Companions runs a comparable puppy sitter and foster role covering stays from a single night to several weeks, after a general orientation and a separate application.

These are structured programs, not casual dog-sitting. You will be asked to follow the organization’s training and socialization rules exactly — specific commands, feeding protocols, rules about where the puppy may go and who may handle them — because you are one link in a chain producing a working dog.

The organization sets the equipment rules, so check with them before you purchase anything. If you are setting up a space for repeat stays, see our puppy crate picks.

Find Programs Near You

A good place to start is to search for programs alongside your city or town, then go directly to the organization’s own volunteer page.

Start with your municipal animal services department, your local Humane Society or SPCA, established local rescues with a physical presence, and service-dog organizations covering your region. Municipal shelters are usually the most under-resourced and the most likely to need help.

If a program you want does not exist nearby, ask anyway. Several shelter field trip and sleepover programs have started because a volunteer asked whether they could take a dog out for an afternoon or an evening.