How Much to Feed a Boston Terrier: Feeding Chart by Age and Weight

General nutrition information compiled from product labels and published sources, not veterinary advice. Your veterinarian is the right person to choose a diet for your dog, especially one with a health condition.

Most owners ask how much to feed a Boston Terrier the first week the dog comes home. The bag has a chart, the breeder gave a number, and a neighbor says something different. This guide shows how to turn a label into a starting amount, check that amount against your dog's body, and adjust from there.

The Boston Terrier feeding chart below comes from the feeding guides on real product pages. We compared label data. We did not run feeding trials or taste tests, and we did not feed these foods ourselves. Treat every number as a starting point. A veterinarian sets the amount for an individual dog.

What you need

The bag or can of your dog's current food, with the feeding guide and calorie statement.
A dry measuring cup (a level cup, not a scoop or a coffee mug).
A kitchen scale that reads in grams, if you want to be more exact than cups.
A home scale or your vet's scale to get your dog's weight.
A notebook or phone note for weights, amounts and treats.

Know the size you are feeding for

Wikipedia, summarizing the American Kennel Club (AKC) standard, lists three Boston Terrier weight classes: under 15 lb, 15 lb and under 20 lb, and 20 lb not exceeding 25 lb. So an adult Boston Terrier is a small dog, and your own dog could sit in any of those three groups.

That matters because food labels are written by weight. Hill's Science Diet small and mini formulas are for dogs up to 25 lb full grown, which covers the whole range. Royal Canin sells size-based small formulas. Neither company sells a Boston Terrier-specific formula that we could find, so do not expect a bag with your breed on it to feed any differently.

How to work out how much to feed a Boston Terrier

Step 1: Get a real weight

Weigh your dog today. Do not guess from the breed standard or from what the dog weighed at the last visit. The easiest way at home is to weigh yourself holding the dog, then weigh yourself alone, and subtract. Write the number down with the date.

Step 2: Find the calories on the label

Cups are only useful if you know how much energy is in a cup. Look for the calorie statement, usually written as kcal per cup or per kg. Foods differ more than most people expect. Here are the figures printed by each brand for the foods we compared:

Hill's Science Diet Adult Small & Mini Chicken & Brown Rice: 357 kcal per cup.
Hill's Science Diet Adult 7+ Small & Mini: 359 kcal per cup.
Hill's Science Diet Puppy Small & Mini: 418 kcal per cup.
Royal Canin Small Adult: 359 kcal per cup (calculated, as fed).
Royal Canin Small Puppy: 349 kcal per cup (calculated, as fed).
Merrick Kitchen Comforts Small Breed Chicken & Brown Rice: 467 kcal per cup.
Nom Nom Chicken Cuisine (fresh): 244 kcal per cup.

A cup of the Merrick recipe holds roughly 110 more calories than a cup of the Hill's adult recipe. Swapping foods cup for cup can quietly add or remove a lot of calories in a small dog.

Step 3: Read the label's chart for your dog's weight

Find your dog's weight on the feeding guide and read across. The table below uses the Hill's Science Diet Adult Small & Mini Chicken & Brown Rice Recipe label, because it lists amounts at weights that cover the Boston Terrier range. The calorie column is simple arithmetic: the cups on the label multiplied by the 357 kcal per cup Hill's prints. It is our calculation, not a figure from the label.

Dog weight	Adult, per day (Hill's label)	Approx. kcal per day	Hill's 7+ senior, per day
10 lb	1 cup (95 g)	about 357	7/8 cup (85 g)
15 lb	1 1/3 cups (130 g)	about 476	1 1/8 cups (110 g)
20 lb	1 2/3 cups (160 g)	about 595	1 1/2 cups (150 g)
25 lb	2 cups (190 g)	about 714	1 2/3 cups (165 g)

The senior column comes from the Hill's Science Diet Adult 7+ Small & Mini label, which lists 359 kcal per cup. It is a smaller amount at each weight. Hill's describes that formula for mature adults of 7 years and up.

A 10 lb row will not fit most adult Boston Terriers, since the AKC classes start under 15 lb. It is on the label, so it is shown here. For a dog between rows, such as 17 lb, most owners start between the two nearest amounts and adjust with the steps below.

Step 4: Feed by age

Puppies need a different food and a different amount. The Hill's Puppy Small & Mini label gives these amounts for a 10 lb puppy:

Puppy age (10 lb puppy)	Per day (Hill's label)	Approx. kcal per day
Under 4 months	1 1/2 cups	about 627
4 to 9 months	1 1/3 cups	about 557
10 to 12 months	1 cup	about 418

The calories here use the 418 kcal per cup Hill's prints for the puppy recipe. Notice that the amount goes down as the puppy gets older, even though the dog is heavier. Growth slows, and so does the need for extra energy.

The Royal Canin Small Puppy page shows its daily amounts as an image and offers a calculator for a tailored amount, so check that page for your puppy's weight. Hill's lists its puppy formula for dogs up to one year, and its adult formula for 1 to 6 years. We did not find a breed-specific age at which a Boston Terrier counts as an adult, so ask your veterinarian when to change foods.

Boston Terriers are well under the 70 lb adult weight that AAFCO uses for "large-size" dogs, as the Whole Dog Journal explains. That means the large-breed wording on a puppy food does not matter for your dog.

Step 5: Split it into meals

Royal Canin suggests feeding its Small Adult diet in 2 to 4 equal portions per day. Many owners of adult Boston Terriers use two meals. Younger puppies often do better with more frequent, smaller meals. Whatever the count, divide the daily total so you do not feed the full amount twice.

Step 6: Check the body, not just the bowl

Body condition scoring is the check that tells you whether the chart is working. Veterinary offices commonly use a 9-point scale, where about 4 or 5 is considered ideal, lower is too thin, and higher is overweight. You can do a rough version at home:

Ribs. Run your hands along the sides. You should feel the ribs under a thin layer of padding without pressing hard. If you have to dig, the dog may be carrying extra weight. If the ribs stick out sharply, the dog may be too lean.
Waist from above. Stand over your dog. There should be a visible tuck behind the ribs. A straight line or a bulge suggests extra weight.
Belly from the side. The belly should rise up toward the back legs, not hang level with the chest.

The Boston Terrier's short, smooth coat makes this easier than on a fluffy dog, but the square, muscular build can hide a few extra pounds. Ask your vet to score your dog at the next visit and show you what the right feel is.

Step 7: Adjust for activity and life stage

The label is built for an average dog. Your dog may not be average. A Boston Terrier that does daily play sessions or agility may need more than the chart. One that mostly naps may need less. Neutered adults often need less than the chart too, though that is a conversation for your vet.

Make changes small and slow. A common approach is to change the daily amount by a small step, hold it for two to four weeks, then weigh and score again. Big jumps make it hard to tell what worked. Your veterinarian can tell you what step size makes sense for your dog.

Step 8: Count everything that is not the bowl

Treats, training rewards, chews and table scraps all count toward the day. If you are training with food, take the treats out of the meal portion. The Merrick label gives one concrete example for wet food: reduce the dry amount by 1/2 cup for every 6 oz of wet food added. That is the brand's own guidance for its dry food, so check your own bag for the equivalent.

If you feed wet or fresh food

Wet and fresh foods are mostly water, so the amounts look very different.

Royal Canin Canine Health Nutrition Beauty Adult Loaf in Sauce (wet): 155 kcal per can. The label gives 1 can (152 g) for a 4.4 lb dog at low activity, and 3 to 4 cans for a 22 lb dog depending on activity.
Nom Nom Chicken Cuisine (fresh): 244 kcal per cup. When it is the whole diet, the company's chart gives 1 cup (218 g) a day for a 10 lb dog and 2 cups (366 g) for a 20 lb dog.

For a side-by-side look at the ingredients and guaranteed analysis of these foods, see our label comparison of dog foods for Boston Terriers.

Tips

Weigh the food at least once. Hill's lists grams beside cups. Scoop your usual cup, weigh it, and see how close it is to the label. Scooped cups can easily run heavy.
Weigh the dog on a schedule. Once a month for adults is enough for most people. Puppies change faster.
Change foods gradually. Because calories per cup vary so much, recalculate the amount whenever you switch, and ask your vet how to transition.
Keep weight in mind for breathing. A Vet Times report on a PLOS One study found that 62.5 percent of 104 tested Boston Terriers had some grade of brachycephalic airway obstruction, though the breed was less severely affected than English or French Bulldogs. Keeping a dog lean is one thing owners can control. Talk with your vet about what that means for your dog.

Common mistakes

Using the puppy amount too long. Puppy food is more calorie-dense. Staying on it past the time your vet advises can add weight.
Feeding by cup across brands. One cup of a 467 kcal food is not one cup of a 357 kcal food.
Ignoring treats. A handful of training rewards can be a real share of a small dog's day.
Reading the chart as a rule. Label guides are written for dogs in general. They are a place to start.
Changing the amount because of one bad day. Look at trends over weeks, not a single meal.
Guessing about food allergies. Wikipedia lists atopic dermatitis and allergic skin disease among the breed's skin conditions. One fresh-food company's article says corn and soy are the main triggers and suggests an 8 week single-ingredient food trial. That is a company's view, not clinical evidence. If your dog itches a lot, see your veterinarian before changing the diet on your own.

What to expect

If the amount suits your dog, you may notice steady weight, a visible waist, ribs you can feel under a light cover, and consistent energy. If the amount is too high, weight may creep up over several weeks. If it is too low, you may see weight loss or a dog that seems hungry all the time and looks lean. Results vary from dog to dog, and no food or portion size is certain to produce a particular outcome.

No food is a treatment for any medical condition. If your dog has a health issue, a veterinarian decides what to feed and how much. Prescription diets are something only a veterinarian prescribes.

If you are unsure about heart-related diet questions, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's Center for Veterinary Medicine posted its latest update on its investigation of diets and canine dilated cardiomyopathy on December 23, 2022. It says adverse event reports alone do not establish causation, and that it does not plan further public updates until there is meaningful new scientific information. Your vet can help you apply that to your dog.

Quick summary

Weigh your dog and write it down.
Find kcal per cup on your food's label.
Read the label's amount for your dog's weight and age.
Split it into meals.
Check ribs, waist and belly every few weeks.
Adjust in small steps for activity, treats and body condition.
Ask your veterinarian to confirm the amount.