Reading facial expressions in dogs

Compare that to this guys face below. (Zeus) Is this neutral, excited or contemplative? Actually this is a trick question to a point. He is an example of needing to know your dog well. Because of his misshapen mouth the tongue interferes with what we might consider a normal expression. In this particular dogs case this is his relaxed face. (and somewhat contemplative, which I will be explaining, hint a tucked lip)


For those that think he is showing a whale eye here he is with a more relaxed body posture. Some breeds have facial features that need to be taken into account. In his case loose eye lids.


The point with those photos is to show the drastic difference in the facial structure of some dogs. Because dogs do also communicate with facial expressions, along with body language, it helps if we can read them as well as their more natural bred counterparts. I hope this post will point out some tips to help accomplish that. I know when I first brought Missy our frenchie home I felt lost. I watched at her looking at me and thought to myself, I have no idea what this dog is thinking! I was used to reading akitas, with a nice big tail and long muzzle and clear signals. I had entered a whole new world of communication. Not only was her face foreign to me, she had no tail to speak of to watch either. I think it is like speaking to someone with an accent. You sort of understand what they are saying but mistakes can be made due to lack of clarity.


Pug above on left has a relaxed open mouth and soft eyes. (for this breed) The one on the right is what I would say is less relaxed. A tucked top lip and brow furrowing. (she was actually between barks)

One of the things I read by a well known behaviorist was how a dog that never gets to the point of having an open relaxed mouth during her behavior evaluation isn't truely relaxed. (at least in that context) It has been my experience in owning what some consider bully breeds, (brachycephalic) that may not always be the case. Some examples: Our pug Jenny only opens her mouth when she is warm and needs to pant. Missy rarely has an open mouth unless she is very excited or is also panting. Dash, our foster frenchie never had his mouth open unless he was hot and panting. The same for my sisters bulldog Zeus. His open mouth meant panting. Now I know that isn't a huge cross section in general but I certainly find it interesting and made note of it.

What also needs to be considered with the smushed faces is that some pant alot due to breathing issues. So looking for an open relaxed mouth is only one part of the picture. You need to take the whole dogs body language into account.

So the first step is knowing what relaxed looks like. For that particular breed or perhaps in some cases for a specific dog. Below is showing Jennys relaxed face. She has an odd ear set to begin with (for her breed) and this is her neutral position. She is also showing soft eyes. Because some of these breeds have eyes that protrude they may not look soft compared to other breeds. Some bully type breeds can also have excessive wrinkling in the forehead which can interfere with reading what is the normal. We might not be able to see excessive brow furrowing or the furrowing around the muzzle through the normal wrinkles. There is relaxed wrinkling, vs concerned or even offensive threat. In this photo her lips are also soft and relaxed.