Research overview: panting and limited sweating as cooling mechanisms

Cats cool themselves differently from humans, and this overview reviews their reliance on panting and limited sweating. Lacking extensive sweat glands over the body, cats have sweat glands mainly on their paw pads and dissipate heat largely through panting and evaporation from the respiratory tract when hot, supplemented by behavioural avoidance of heat. Panting becomes prominent under heat stress. Researchers study cooling through thermal physiology and observation. Why it matters: the cat limited capacity for evaporative cooling makes it more vulnerable to overheating than animals that sweat freely, with implications for heat-stress risk and welfare. Understanding these mechanisms explains why behaviour, such as moving to shade and reducing activity in heat, is so central to feline temperature regulation, and why visible panting in a cat is a meaningful sign of significant heat load.