Loose-leash walking allows your pup to sniff, explore, look around, and get some much-needed mental stimulation… all while simultaneously being aware that there is a human at the other end of the leash. It’s also three words that are hard to say together. (I promise to never judge you for calling it “loosh-leash walking.”)

Walking with your dog can be an important part of everyday life. Many dogs* need daily walks for mental and physical stimulation, socialization, and bonding time with their people. Puppies in particular need lots of opportunity to explore the environment, as the whole world is brand new to them! 

*Important Note for Reactive Pups: If you live in an urban environment and have a leash-reactive dog, do not take them on leashed neighborhood walks. Instead, develop ways of getting them cardio in your home or backyard, take them to areas where they can explore off-leash, and offer them lots of extra enrichment exercises.

Tools Needed

• High-Value Training Treats
• Leash
• Recommended: Front-Clip Harness
• Recommended: Treat Pouch
• Optional: Clicker

Focus

Before we get to the specifics, here are four basic principles to apply to any skill you’d like to teach your puppy:

Set your puppy up for success.
Meet your basic needs and your puppy’s basic needs before you begin training. Make sure both you and your puppy are feeling safe, comfortable, and secure in your surroundings. Work in a place where both of you can focus and at a time of day that works for the two of you. Make sure you have all of the tools you need.

Remember that your dog is a very good dog.
Dogs are an entirely different species from humans, with a different set of social rules, environmental affordances, developmental milestones, and genetic mandates. It is imperative to remember that most human rules are not inherently reinforcing for our canine companions.

Teach your puppy to love the behavior you want to see.
The fastest way to teach a puppy what is acceptable in our human world is to teach them to genuinely love our rules. Help your puppy love goal behaviors by rewarding those behaviors with things your puppy already loves.

Start at the beginning.
Start easy, and gradually work through challenging but achievable goals. When training is easy and fun, your puppy will love to learn and to build on their skills.

When to Train

If your dog is thirsty, hyper, distracted, or needs to pee, do not work on this behavior. Only practice loose-leash walking when you are sure all of your dog ’s needs have been met and when they are willingly engaging with you. Skills must be learned before they can be used.

Where to Train

Start in a very easy and familiar place, preferably inside your home. Gradually add more challenging locations as your dog is successful, always starting the process from the beginning when you change locations. If your dog gets confused or distracted, chances are you have made the location too difficult for her. Go back to a successful location and increase the difficulty in a more gradual way. 

How to Train Loose Leash Walking

Note: It’s easiest to do the exercises below with a marker word or a click before delivering the reward (likely a high-value treat). For the purpose of this tutorial, we will use the shorthand “C/T” for “click and then treat,” but feel free to substitute a marker word if that works better for you!

Step 1: Identify the Desired Behaviors
What behavior do you want your dog to exhibit while out on a walk? Everyone’s a little different, but we're going to guess that your desired behavior list looks something like this:

• Behavior 1: walking by your side, even when you change direction
• Behavior 2: checking in with you via eye contact

Step 2: Teach your dog to Love the Desired Behaviors
There is nothing intuitive or inherently reinforcing about loose-leash walking. What is inherently reinforcing to your dog ? Food... toys.... attention... praise… autonomy… Note that this list does not include “being attached to a human with a rope.” Loose-leash walking may be naturally reinforcing to humans, but not to dogs. So what to do? Teach your dog to love all of the things on your desired behavior list. Instead of telling them that they have to walk by your side or check in with you, teach them that they get to do those things. Make everything a game.

• How to Train Behavior 1: Walking by Your Side
  • Pick a time and location that is easy for both you and your dog to stay focused. 
  • Get your dog excited to engage with you by being a little silly. Run around. Any time your dog ’s shoulder is roughly even with your hip, C/T.
  • Be silly. Change direction. Make it a game. Have FUN. Try to “lose” your dog , but keep things easy enough for them to actually be successful, at (gradually!) increasing levels of difficulty. 
  • Always end the training session on a high note, leaving your dog wanting more.
  • Aim for three training sessions per day for three days.
    
    
  • Add Duration

• • Once your dog is absolutely cuckoo for cocopuffs about being by your side, work on adding duration to the behavior. Instead of marking the moment your dog ’s shoulder is even with your hip, keep moving (with your dog still at your side) for a couple more steps before the C/T. 
  • Gradually increase the time between the moment your dog comes to your side and the C/T.
  • If your dog strays from your side—oops!—you’ve made the game too hard. Take a step back in training and make the game easier by decreasing the time between your dog coming to your side and the C/T.
  • Always end the training session on a high note, leaving your dog wanting more.
  • Aim for three training sessions per day for three days.
    
    
  • Add Distraction

• • Once your dog loves staying by your side and who can stay by your side even when you change direction and who LOVES THIS GAME SO MUCH OMG they LOVES THIS GAME SO MUCH, gradually add distracting elements.
  • Distraction Ideas: Put a toy on the ground. Have a family member sit on the couch while you walk by, and then add in waving arms or clapping. Move to your backyard if you’ve been working inside. Add in the leash. Do the hokey pokey.
  • If your dog strays from your side — oops! —you’ve made the game too hard. Take a step back in training and make the game easier by decreasing duration and/or distraction. 
  • Always end the training session on a high note, leaving your dog wanting more.
  • Aim for three training sessions per day for three days.
• How to Train Behavior 2: Checking In 
  • Pick a time and location that is easy for both you and your dog to stay focused. 
  • Get your dog excited to engage with you by being a little silly. Run around. Any time your dog makes eye contact, C/T. Throw a little party. Teach your dog that you are the most fun thing to track in their environment.
  • Always end the training session on a high note, leaving your dog wanting more.
  • Aim for three training sessions per day for three days.
    
    
  • Add Distraction

• • Once your dog is absolutely convinced that you are the most exciting thing in the room and is demonstrating this by enthusiastically and frequently making eye contact, gradually add distracting elements.
  • Distraction Ideas: Put some toys on the ground. Change up the location. Squeak a squeaky toy. Have a friend play her trombone in your backyard. Do the electric slide.
  • If your dog stops thinking that you’re the most rewarding thing around — oops! — you’ve made the game too hard. Take a step back in training and make the game easier by decreasing distraction. 
  • Always end the training session on a high note, leaving your dog wanting more.
  • Aim for three training sessions per day for three days.

Step 3: Put it on Cue
Dogs do not speak our language. The only way to teach them the meaning of a behavior is by pairing the name for the behavior with the actual behavior. Name loose-leash walking whatever you like: “let’s go,” “this way,” “cucumber.” It doesn’t matter what you call it, as long as you’re consistent. This is called your “cue” word or phrase. 

Say your cue right before your dog displays the behavior you want to name. How do you know your dog is going to display the behavior? Well, you’ve already warmed them up by running around and rewarding them when they are by your side, so you’ll probably feel pretty good about them coming to your side when you start moving, regardless of anything you say.

It will take your dog anywhere between 30 to 100 repetitions of pairing the name of the behavior with the actual behavior before they have that “lightbulb” moment, understanding that the sound you are making is directly related to the behavior they are doing.

You will have to go through the process of putting the behavior on cue again when you add in duration and distraction. your dog might know that “let’s go” means staying by your side and checking in with you while you are in your living room... but all bets are off when you’re on the sidewalk in front of your house. When you change the training environment, always start from the beginning and build up.

Step 4. Proof the Behaviors
To "proof" a behavior in dog training means to gradually strengthen the desired behavior by exposing the dog to various distractions, environments, and situations. This helps ensure that the dog reliably performs the behavior even when faced with challenges. To proof a behavior is to practice the behavior in different contexts, all the while gradually increasing the difficulty level to ensure the dog responds consistently and accurately.

• Building Duration
  • By this point, your dog loves being by your side because of all of the work you did in Step 2. Now your job is to teach your dog to love staying by your side. 
  • To increase the duration of a behavior, withhold the C/T at gradually increasing intervals. When your dog ’s shoulder reaches your hip, for example, take three steps and then C/T. Then try taking five steps. Then eight. Then ten. Etc. 
  • If your dog stops being successful — oops! — you’ve made the game too hard. Take a step back in training and make the game easier by decreasing duration. 
  • Always end the training session on a high note, leaving your dog wanting more.
  • Aim for three training sessions per day for three days.
  • When you are building duration, do your best to limit distraction.
    
• Building Distraction
  • By this point, your dog loves being by your side because of all of the work you did in Step 2. Now your job is to teach your dog to love being by your side, even when there are other fun things in their environment. 
  • To increase the distractions around a behavior, get creative. Take the show on the road. Engineer the environment to be just distracting enough for your dog to take note, but not distracting enough for them to leave your side. Work gradually.
  • If your dog stops being successful — oops! — you’ve made the game too hard. Take a step back in training and make the game easier by decreasing distraction. 
  • Always end the training session on a high note, leaving your dog wanting more.
  • Aim for three training sessions per day for three days.
  • When you are building distraction, don’t also work on building duration.
    
• Combining Duration and Distraction 
  • Give it a shot! Work incrementally. If the task becomes too hard (or not very fun) for either of you, make things easier until you are both ready to take the next step in training.

✔️ Keep in Mind

Taking walks is to benefit your dog first and foremost, not you. If your dog does not enjoy walks, do not make them go on walks. If they do enjoy walking, allow them to sniff and make periodic stops. Don’t get too caught up in thinking you are going to cover a certain amount of ground. Consider letting your dog choose the direction of travel, as well as the pace (within reason, of course). Until you have proofed a behavior, don’t have a specific destination in mind for walks. If you absolutely need to get somewhere specific with your dog and don’t feel like training, consider driving, even if it is a short distance.

Practice giving your dog free rein to sniff, but don’t let them move forward if they are pulling. (This allows the pulling to be “successful” in their mind, which will only reinforce pulling!) Do a U-Turn to get them back on track.

Bring treats on every single walk with your dog . You never know when you might encounter something new, or when you’ll need to practice skills.

If your dog picks up something unsafe on your walk, practice saying “Trade!” and sticking a big handful of treats in front of their nose. If they don't go for the treats, try scattering them on the ground. If they have a hard time with this as well, practice trading treats for lower value items at home so that the behavior will be familiar (and reinforced!) next time.

Lesson Activity

Recommended Media for Loose Leash Walking

• Read: Loose Leash Walking: Training Your Dog Not to Pull, Nancy Tucker, Whole Dog Journal, March 2017
• Listen: #90: Loose Leash Walking - Part 1, Hannah Branigan, Drinking from the Toilet
• Listen: #91: Loose Leash Walking - Part 2, Hannah Branigan, Drinking from the Toilet
• Listen: #50: How to train your dog to walk on a loose leash, Annie Grossman, School for the Dogs
• Listen: Training Basics: Leash Walking Tips, Summit Dog Training, Pod the Rescue 
• Watch/Listen: Loose Leash Walking with Susan Garrett, Susan Garrett, Shaped by Dog
  This is a YouTube playlist of all of Susan Garrett’s podcasts on loose-leash walking. You can listen to them as podcasts, but they are also entertaining to watch as videos.
• Watch: How to Train Your Puppy to Walk on a Loose Leash, Training Positive, YouTube