The Internet is obsessed with the idea that the Internet is obsessed with cats. Perhaps it's because we're all infected with the parasite Toxoplasma, which turns people into cat-loving zombies, but that the Internet is synonymous with felines is held as an irrefutable truth. Both hold on a second. According to our information overlords at Google, dogs are more popular than cats on this here web. Behold:
The above graph is from Google Trends, and shows search volume over the last seven years or so. As you can see, "dog" handily beats out "cat" as a keyword, as does the plural form. Mindblowing.
Now, the statistician (and cat enthusiast) in you is probably searching for reasons that graph doesn't show that dogs are a bigger Internet deal than cats are. Here's a counter argument: More people are Googling "dog" because dog stuff isn't as easily visible as cats. Or, in other words, because the Internet is so flooded with cat stuff, people never actively Google it because it's already in their face. Dogs, being less popular, require more searching.
In the battle of "cat" vs. "dog," that theory might be right, as Google pulls up about 800 million more results for "cat." But in comparing the plural form, "dogs" pulls off an astounding victory, with three billion more search results. Dogs are pack animals, after all. I'm handing the win again to canines.
But what about YouTube? Turns out those corgi videos are whooping on the old cat-in-a-box clips. Look:
Once again, dogs win out. But I know you're now thinking about how it's not cat websites that people obsess over, but cat pictures. It's kind of splitting hairs, but what the hell. Let's take a look at Google Images:
Here, the cat wins the plural form, but singular "dog" obliterates "cat," and like with regular search, the pair of canine keywords handily beats the feline pair. I'd love to hear the thoughts of the irate cat lovers out there–"There are more dog pages because they're harder to take care of! And they smell!!1"–but I'm going to go ahead and call the battle over. Sorry to melt your brains folks, but turns out dogs rule the web.