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Cat lovers, now is your time. Cat cafés have surged in popularity in Kansas City over the past several years, offering even more spots for you to sip a cup of coffee while petting a friendly cat — and potentially take one home.
The first known cat café opened in Taiwan in 1998. Kitten Garden in Taipei was actually recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records as the “oldest cat café still in existence” in 2022, and they are still open for business.
Animal cafés really took off in Japan, where you can now visit an owl café, a micro pig café, and a café that allows you to interact with hedgehogs and otters.
In Kansas City, cats are still the only animals you can befriend over a beverage, but there is still plenty of fun to be had. Before you go, know that there are some rules you have to follow before you walk in off the street to pet the cats.
All of the cafés require a fee of roughly $15 to enter the cat spaces for between 30 minutes to an hour. You should plan your visit ahead by reserving your spot online. The cat rooms can accommodate walk-ins if they have enough space, but they can get busy at peak hours, so make a reservation if you don’t want to get turned away.
The cafés also have different rules around when children can enter the cat rooms — some allow kids under on certain days or hours, and others maintain a specific child-to-adult ratio. Read each café’s policy before bringing kids 18 and under.
And if you fall in love, all of these spots have adoptable cats onsite. You do not have to visit with the intention to adopt, but all of the cafés do serve the dual purpose of helping cats find new homes.
You can still support these businesses if you are allergic to cats, or don’t want to pay the fee to visit the cat area. Each café serves its drinks and other food items in a separate space, isolated from the cat room.
Whiskers Cat Café and Coffeehouse
Kansas City’s first cat café, Whiskers Café and Coffeehouse, opened in 2018. Tucked away in a small row of shops at 37th at Southwest Trafficway, Whiskers holds both a roomy coffee shop and a separate “cat lounge” next door where you can play with, or maybe just read a book among, the cats.
Whiskers is a full-service café with a standard menu of coffee and espresso drinks like lattés and Americanos. They also have “not coffee” options that include chai tea and lemonade. It’s a comfy spot to hang out to do some work, even if you don’t plan to venture into the cat lounge.
Like all cat cafés, visiting the cat lounge next door requires you to register and sign a waiver. Your $15 registration fee comes with a free cup of drip coffee, and registrations are only available to those aged 10 and older.
Whiskers has a roster of resident cats who live at the facility, and they also have some adoptable cats roaming the cat lounge and others kept safe in cages (where you can still give them pets).
The cat lounge has spaces where you can sit on the floor and wait for cats to approach you, but it’s also filled with cat toys if you want to find a way to entice an interaction.
For cat-loving kids, Whiskers offers 30-minute “family time” sessions where up to two children can visit with an adult. They also hold other fun events like Yoga with Cats and Paint Night With Cats classes.
If you are interested in adopting a Whiskers resident, they have a serious process to match cats with the most suitable owners. You can learn more about their adoption process on their website.
Second Cup Cat Café
Located right off of I-35 Highway, Second Cup Cat Café opened in 2022 as Johnson County’s first cat café.
Second Cup features a large, homey space decorated with comfortable couches and chairs where you can sit with a cat on your lap. The space is fully equipped for cat entertainment, with perches on the walls, cat trees, cat beds, and toys.
All of Second Cup’s feline residents are adoptable, and for $15 you can spend an hour with the cats—just to have fun, or to potentially find a new friend to take home. Second Cup partners with local shelters to host their cats in need of homes. In January, they celebrated their 650th cat adoption.
If you visit Second Cup’s cat space, your ticket purchase comes with a free hot or cold drink. On Tuesdays, the entrance fee is half-priced. Because the café has limited space, they recommend making a reservation before visiting, particularly on Tuesdays.
Children are welcome at Second Cup, and kids 5 and under can actually enter the space for free. As with all cat cafés, children 18 and under should be accompanied by an adult and supervised closely.
Like Whiskers, Second Cup also hosts fun, cat-centered activities. Check their Facebook page to see when you can take a Cat Yoga class or take a one-time art class. They also host a book club on the third Monday of every month. For $20, anyone can join and spend two hours discussing the monthly selection among the cats. You can find the upcoming book to read on their Facebook page.
If cats are somehow not your thing (thanks for reading this still!), Second Cup’s large building is actually home to an indoor dog park as well. For a $5 entrance fee, you can bring your dog to play indoors as long as they are friendly with other dogs and up-to-date on all vaccinations. They are open during limited hours, and they ask that you check their Facebook page to see if the indoor dog park is open.
Espurresso Cat Cafe
In the heart of downtown Lawrence, Espurresso Cat Cafe allows passersby to glimpse into the Purrlor and see the cats lounging in the window. Espurresso opened in 2023 and is the first of its kind in town.
Like Whiskers in Kansas City, Espurresso is designed to be both a hip place where anyone can come in and enjoy a coffee or pastry, in addition to being a place where cat lovers can reserve time to pet cats. You might want to pose for photos in the café, which features a wall with a large neon pink “Meow” sign and a hand-painted mural of tropical plants (and a hidden kitty) by Lawrence artist Yuri Park.
They have coffee and espresso drinks like mochas or lattes, and they also offer fun, cat-themed specialty drinks like Simon’s Tux — a black and white mocha. You don’t have to order coffee, they also have lavender lemonade, Arnold Palmers, and handmade pastries including a “pawp tart.”
Espurresso allows adults 18 and older to book 30-minute slots for $10 (plus tax), or you can spend a full hour with the cats for $15 per person. They also hold kid-friendly hours for children 17 and under from 2:00–5:30 pm on Wednesdays through Sundays, but children must be accompanied by an adult.
Unlike other cat cafés that have separate cat areas, the Purrlor is a smaller area, fully enclosed in plexiglass, within the larger café. This means that patrons with cat allergies can still see the cats through the windows. The intimate space is filled with plush seating areas that can be enjoyed by cats and humans alike, and has cat trees, perches, and a shelf of toys you can use.
Purrlor residents include one (very friendly) permanent resident, Syd, and a rotating roster of cats adoptable through the Lawrence Humane Society. The staff is happy to introduce Purrlor visitors to the various felines, and you can also read the cats’ biographies on the wall.
You are, of course, encouraged to visit just to get your cat fix when needed. But if you decide to adopt, you can take your cat home from Espurresso within 15–20 minutes as long as you meet the adoption criteria (are 18 and older, have a valid ID, and pay with a credit card). Adoption fees are $125 for kittens and $60 for cats 6 months or older.
Sugar Kittens Cafe and Cattery
Sugar Kittens Cafe and Cattery opened as the Northland’s first cat café in 2020. They currently reside in the Crossroads Shopping Center strip mall at 318 Route 291 in Liberty, Missouri.
Sugar Kittens recently expanded to open a second location in Lee’s Summit in June 2024, in the Pine Tree Plaza strip mall on SW Blue Parkway.
You can certainly get your sugar fix at Sugar Kittens. They serve a wide range of quirky craft bottled sodas from all over the world, as well as Fat and Weird Cookies, which are unique gourmet cookies packed with a gooey or doughy filling.
Examples include the Party Animal, which is a sprinkle-covered almond sugar cookie, topped with frosted animal crackers, and stuffed with an animal cracker frosting filling. Or you can try the Cookie’s Anonymous, which is a blue cookie with chocolate chips, Biscoffs, Oreos and cookie dough bites, and then filled with a cookie icing core.
The main space also sells Sugar Kittens merchandise like t-shirts and mugs, cat toys, and other cat-themed gift items.
For many Sugar Kittens visitors, the cattery is the main draw. For $14.14, you spend 50 minutes lounging with adoptable cats in a feline-centric environment with cat trees, cat furniture, and plenty of cozy seating options for humans as well.
Sugar Kittens allows children of all ages during any of their visiting windows, but they maintain a 1-to-1 adult-to-child requirement for kids 10 and under. A single adult can visit with up to three children aged 11 to 15.
Sugar Kittens also has party packages, where you can reserve the cattery for up to 20 people for 50 minutes or an hour and 50 minutes. For an added cost, you can add soda and cookies to your party package.
Like the other cat cafés, Sugar Kittens also facilitates adoptions. If you are interested in adopting, you can make an appointment to meet their available cats, which come from local shelters and pet agencies like Chain of Hope and Blue Springs Animal Control.
Cats 9 months and over have a $75 adoption fee, with a discounted rate for adopting a pair. Kittens have a $175 adoption fee, except long-haired kittens have a $250 fee. Siamese cats and other special breeds have a $300 adoption fee. After completing an application, adoptions can take up to 48 hours.
