
The majority of complaints that veterinarians receive from cat parents are that their cat has an upset stomach, and since it already takes a while to digest food in cats, having an upset stomach does not help or ease the process of food digestion for your cat.Īn upset stomach is one of the gastrointestinal disorders that cats can suffer from due to different reasons. Sometimes, your cat might experience an upset stomach after eating a lavish meal, or a while after doing so, while the food is still in your cat’s stomach. After 8 hours or so pass, your cat’s empty stomach will begin sending signals to the cat’s brain, which will stimulate the hunger response your cat exhibits. Once the food, for example, wet cat food, reaches the stomach, it moves to the small intestines within hours, and the stomach is emptied once again. Your cat’s stomach structure is simple, and it is very similar to your stomach structure as a human as well. How long does food stay in your cat’s stomach? Therefore, the period of digestion does not apply in this case. When cats throw up, most of the time, they tend to throw up undigested food. NOTE : although it takes 10 to 20 hours for digestion in cats, it can be shorter if your cat is ill, and it is throwing up. Once the process in the stomach is finished, the food then moves to the small intestines for further digestion, in addition to extracting nutrients, which explains the period cats take to digest food. Once inside the cat’s stomach, your cat’s food is broken down by a strong acid that breaks down any bones that went down your cat’s digestive tract, and it destroys even bacteria. Your cat’s teeth are made for slicing through parts of meat instead of chewing them slowly and steadily, that is why they tend to swallow chunks of meat, which take longer to pass through.

Since cats are obligate carnivores, meat is their primary source of protein and the core of their diet. That is because the food takes nearly 10 to 20 hours to move from through the cat’s entire digestive tract. Digestion in cats takes barely less than 24 hours. Moreover, some people think that cats and humans have the same period of digestion however, a cat’s digestive system begs to differ. Human digestion takes about 7 to 8 hours, which seems a long time for some people.
/GettyImages-692769883-be7b4e75cbe044448bdadd5f679c9e94.jpg)
19 Conclusion How long does it take a cat to digest food?
