There are plenty of things you can plan around when decorating a home with a cat.
A cat bed can be tucked beside an armchair, a scratching post can be carefully chosen, and toys can disappear into a basket when visitors arrive.
The litter tray is more complicated.
It needs to be accessible and private enough for your cat but, at the same time, inconspicuous. Far enough from food and water but not banished to some distant corner that your cat never wants to visit.
Depending on your home, finding a space that satisfies all those requirements can feel surprisingly difficult.
The good news is a cat litter tray does not need to become the focal point of a room. But, wherever you ultimately decide to place it, the starting point should always be the same: find a location that works for your cat first, then make that location work visually.
Where is the best place to put a cat litter tray?
The ideal litter tray location is generally somewhere quiet, private and easy for your cat to reach.
That sounds straightforward until you start looking around an actual house.
The quietest room might be one your cat rarely enters. The laundry might seem perfect until the washing machine starts its spin cycle. A cupboard might conceal the tray beautifully but feel cramped or difficult for the cat to access.
So rather than asking, “Where can I hide the litter tray?”, a better first question is: “Where can my cat comfortably use it?”
Once you have a few possible locations, aesthetics can come back into the conversation.
Find a location that works for your cat first, then make it work visually.
Keep the litter tray away from food and water
Putting all of a cat’s belongings together may seem logical from a human point of view. One neat little cat station: food here, water there, litter tray tucked beside it.
Your cat may disagree.
Cats generally prefer their toileting area to be physically separated from their eating and drinking areas. This is worth considering when space is limited.
Instead of trying to create a single “cat corner”, it can work better to distribute your cat’s resources around the home. The litter tray might live in one room, water somewhere else and food in another appropriate location.
Visually, this can actually be an advantage. Rather than one corner containing every piece of cat equipment you own, you can discreetly spread items across various rooms.
Choose somewhere quiet but not forgotten
Privacy matters, but isolation is not necessarily the goal.
A litter tray hidden at the back of a rarely used garage may be wonderfully invisible to you, but it could be inconvenient for your cat. Equally, a tray beside a television, in a busy hallway or next to a frequently slammed door may be too noisy and intimidating.
Just like humans, cats need to feel comfortable and relaxed when it’s time to heed the call of nature.
Look for the quieter edges of rooms rather than automatically searching for the most remote place in the house.
Possible locations might include the corner of a second bathroom, a discreet section of a home office, a quiet hallway nook, an unused section of a spare room or a sheltered corner of a laundry.
Ideally, the room will have easy-to-clean flooring, like tiles, floorboards or linoleum. Carpet is notoriously harder to clean and spilt litter can easily catch in the fibres.
The right place will ultimately depend on your cat and your home.
Is the laundry a good place for a cat litter tray?
The laundry is an obvious place for a cat litter tray because it usually has a hard floor, is easy to clean, and keeps the tray away from the rooms where people spend most of their time.
That doesn’t mean it’s always ideal.
A noisy washing machine can make an otherwise quiet room considerably less appealing for your cat when they are toileting.
If your laundry is spacious enough to position the tray away from loud appliances, it may work perfectly well. For example, if the appliances are tucked away behind cabinetry.
If the only available spot is wedged between the washing machine and dryer, it may be worth looking elsewhere.
This is where observing your cat matters more than following a universal decorating rule.
Can you put a cat litter tray in the bathroom?
A bathroom can work very well as a place to put a cat litter tray.
Hard flooring makes cleaning straightforward, and bathrooms often contain natural niches beside vanities, baths or storage units where a tray can sit without dominating the room.
When considering if your bathroom is suitable, the same rules apply around accessibility and comfort for your cat. A beautiful downstairs powder room is not much use as a litter tray location if the door is often closed to your cat.
Consider how busy the bathroom is, too. A family bathroom used by several people every morning may not offer your cat the peace they need.
If the bathroom works for the cat, though, there is no reason the tray has to look intrusive. Keeping the surrounding floor clear and limiting other visual clutter can make a surprisingly ordinary litter tray fade into the background of the room.
Can you hide a cat litter tray?
Yes, but with an important qualification. It’s okay to hide a litter tray from view, but not okay to hide it from your cat.
There is now an entire category of furniture designed to conceal litter trays inside cabinets, benches and sideboards. Some can work beautifully in the right household, but the aesthetic solution should never make the tray harder, more cramped or less comfortable for the cat using it.
Cats need enough room to enter, turn, dig and position themselves inside a litter tray. Ideally, a litter tray should be around one and a half times the size of your cat’s body length. Keep that in mind if you’re considering buying a very compact piece of litterbox furniture.
A concealed arrangement also needs easy entry and exit, adequate internal space, ventilation, simple access for cleaning, and a location the cat is comfortable using.
The cabinet itself is secondary. It doesn’t matter how tasteful a piece of litterbox furniture is if your cat is reluctant to enter it.
The aesthetic solution should never make a tray harder, more cramped or less comfortable for the cat using it.
Don’t sacrifice accessibility for appearance
A beautifully hidden tray is no longer a good solution if your cat struggles to reach it.
Think about stairs, high entry points and awkward openings, particularly as cats get older.
A senior cat or a cat with mobility problems may find a tray with very high sides difficult to enter. This is one of those areas where the home may need to adapt over time.
The discreet tray upstairs might work perfectly for a six-year-old cat and become completely impractical at sixteen.
This is where it pays to remember that good design is not fixed. It adapts to the people and animals living with it.
In a multi-cat home, one litter tray isn’t enough
This might be one of the last pieces of advice a multi-cat homeowner wants to hear if finding a litter tray location is proving difficult.
If you have more than one cat, positioning multiple litter trays together may look neater from a style perspective. However, to the cats, several trays side-by-side may be perceived as one shared location rather than genuinely separate choices.
In order to reduce stress and prevent fighting among cats, a multi-cat household may need several sensible locations rather than one designated “litter station”.
This may not be ideal for interior design, but it reinforces a core House & Cat principle: when something is genuinely important to your cat’s wellbeing, design around it rather than attempting to decorate it out of existence.
The golden rule for a multi-cat home is to have one litter tray for each cat, plus one extra. So, a two-cat household needs three litter trays, and a three-cat household needs four.
You don’t need several elaborate litter cabinets. You need several sensible locations.
Where do you put a cat litter tray in a small house?
Smaller homes make the challenge of litter tray placement harder, but they can also force better decisions.
Look for underused edges of existing rooms rather than assuming the tray requires a dedicated space.
A nook beside bathroom cabinetry, an open area beneath a bench, the end of a hallway or a quiet corner partially screened by furniture may be enough.
Visual separation can help too. A piece of furniture, a small partition or thoughtful positioning can prevent the tray from being the first thing you see when you enter the room.
And sometimes the answer is simply accepting that the litter tray will be visible.
A clean tray sitting quietly in the corner is often less visually offensive than an oversized piece of “hidden litter box furniture” that consumes half the room.
A piece of furniture or small partition can prevent the tray from being the first thing you see when you enter a room.
Choose complementary colours and shapes
Once you have found a location that your cat is happy with, there are plenty of ways to make the area feel more considered.
Start with what surrounds the litter tray.
Keeping the floor clear, concealing litter supplies, and avoiding a collection of scoops, bags and accessories around the tray immediately reduces visual clutter.
You might position the tray beside existing cabinetry rather than in the middle of an empty wall, use a simple screen where appropriate, and store litter and cleaning supplies in nearby cupboards.
It also helps to choose a tray that doesn’t unnecessarily fight with the room in terms of colour and shape. For example, if the tray is going in a quiet corner, look for a corner-shaped tray that fits neatly in the space. If the colour of the tray is similar to the wall, it won’t immediately draw the eye.
Remember, the goal is not camouflage. It is simply to make the litter area feel like a deliberate part of the room while keeping it comfortable and accessible for your cat.
Cleanliness matters more than concealment
Another reason not to hide a litter tray too well is that you, as the cat owner, still need to notice it.
Cats prefer clean toileting areas, and litter trays require regular attention. That means daily scooping at a minimum, and a full clean and litter replacement every one to two weeks, depending on the type of litter and number of cats.
A tray buried deep inside complicated furniture can make a basic daily task irritating enough that you might be tempted to postpone it.
A good litter tray set-up should therefore be easy for both you and your cat: your cat should be able to access it comfortably, and you should be able to clean it without dismantling half the room.
That may be less exciting than a clever Pinterest litter box solution, but it is considerably more practical and useful.
The best litter tray location is the one your cat will use
There may never be a truly glamorous answer to the cat litter tray question, and perhaps there doesn’t need to be.
A home shared with a cat will and should contain evidence of that cat. Food bowls, scratching post and fur exist. And somewhere, inevitably, there will be a toilet.
The aim is not to pretend otherwise.
Choose a quiet, accessible location away from food and water. Give your cat enough space and privacy. Pay attention to the places they actually feel comfortable. Then use storage, placement and a little visual restraint to make the arrangement work with the rest of your home.
The litter tray does not have to be beautiful, but the room can still be.