The 18 Smartest Dog Breeds

Smartest dog breeds, ranked

Dogs have been humankind’s faithful companion since as far back as the Stone Age, and it’s not just because they’re so dang cute. They’re intelligent in a way that’s ideal for humans, a state of affairs that was entirely intentional; over the millennia, humans bred dogs to be perfect canine companions. At any moment in history, the smartest dog breeds have served as more than man’s best friend: They’ve been navigators and field guides, wartime comrades, detectives, garbage collectors, movie stars, and security consultants, as renowned canine researcher and professor Stanley Coren, PhD, points out in his iconic book The Intelligence of Dogs. Dogs are among the few animals that have traveled to space, and they’ve saved countless lives, both literally and metaphorically.

“There are three types of dog intelligence,” says Coren, who defines canine smarts by the way dogs interact with humans. The first is “instinctive” and focuses on what the dog has been bred by humans to do. The second is “adaptive,” or how well the dog learns from its environment to solve problems. The third is “working and obedience,” or how hard the dog is willing to work to please its people and do its jobs. What underpins all three is the desire and ability to communicate effectively with humans—both by understanding its human’s signs, actions, and commands, and by expressing itself via barks, body movements, and actions.

The average dog can understand 160 words, according to Coren, and some dogs comprehend as many as 250 or more. But what may be even more fundamental to effective communication between dogs and humans is that dogs, as a general rule, actually care. “Dogs are very attentive to and responsive to us,” Alexandra Horowitz, head of the Dog Cognition Lab at Columbia University’s Barnard College, told the American Kennel Club (AKC).

Although this is true for all pooches, the smartest dog breeds have certain traits that put their intelligence a step above. Just as some of our furry friends are known for being affectionate dog breeds, small dog breeds, or dogs that don’t shed, others are known as the most intelligent dogs, at least according to Coren’s rubric. So, how smart are dogs exactly? The pups on our list may not be ready to challenge you to a game of cards, but they do their jobs, and well.

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