How to teach your dog to spin

Teaching your dog a new trick is a fun way to provide mental stimulation. If you’re looking for a new way to play with your dog and build your bond, try this step-by-step guide to teaching your dog to spin.

Before you start

While learning can be a lot of fun for your dog, it’s important to ensure your training sessions are stress free. Keep each session short – we recommend up to five minutes at a time. You can repeat the sessions multiple times a day, but make sure your dog has plenty of breaktime in between.

Practice in an area where there are minimum distractions. Curious dogs may find the outdoors too exciting – instead, make a space at home with no toys out to distract them.

Most importantly, pay attention to your dog's body language. If your dog is getting bored or frustrated, stop the training session and give them space. Signs that your dog is frustrated can include barking, whining, mouthing, pawing or jumping up.

What you’ll need

To make learning as enjoyable as possible for your dog, you’ll need their favourite reward. This can be a tasty treat, like a small piece of sausage. If you and your dog are familiar with clicker training, you can use a clicker for this training.

How to teach your dog to spin

Step one

Have your dog stand in front of you and hold the treat in front of their nose. Slowly move the treat to the side of their head, letting them follow it with their nose.

Step two

Continue to move the treat in a circle around your dog’s body. Once they complete a circle give your dog the treat and mark the action with an enthusiastic “yes”. If you are using a clicker, you can click instead.

If your dog is struggling to complete a circle, you can reward them for smaller movements such as turning halfway around. Once they are comfortable with this, you can progress into a full circle.

Step three

Repeat step two until your dog is turning more confidently in a full circle.

Step four

Now you can begin adding a word or phrase and using the motion of your hand as a hand signal. You can do this by guiding your dog round in a circle as you were before, but this time without a treat in your hand. At the same time say the word “spin”. Repeat this step until your dog becomes more familiar with the word and hand signal.

When your dog is feeling more confident, you can start to make your hand signal smaller so you are just moving your wrist and pointing.