A Mon-Sun routine chart for a new puppy, organized into four daily blocks: morning potty and feed, midday play and training, evening walk, and night wind-down. Monday is filled in as a realistic example for an 8-week-old puppy; the rest is blank for you to write in. Below the chart: feeding times by age and the 5 routine mistakes that wreck a puppy week. No email, no sign-up, print it as-is.
How to use the chart: fill in real clock times for your house, then keep the same times every day for at least a week. Puppies learn the pattern faster than they learn any command, and the pattern is what makes potty training and night sleep work. Write one schedule, tape it to the fridge, and make sure everyone in the house runs the same one.
Before you start: this is generic household-routine advice, not veterinary advice. For food choices, portion sizes, vaccines, and which outings are safe before shots are finished, ask your vet.
Four blocks a day, seven days. The block names stay the same every day; the times are yours to set.
| Day | Morning: potty + feed | Midday: play + train | Evening: walk | Night: wind-down |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mon | 6:30 out to the potty spot, 6:45 breakfast, out again 10 minutes after eating, then a morning nap | Between naps: three 3-minute training reps (name game, sit lure), out after every wake-up | 5:30 dinner, out after, then a 5-minute leash practice in the yard or hallway | Last potty trip, crate in your room, one trip out overnight for an 8-week-old |
| Tue | ||||
| Wed | ||||
| Thu | ||||
| Fri | ||||
| Sat | ||||
| Sun |
Reading the Monday example: the clock times matter less than the order. Potty on waking, food at a set time, potty right after food, nap, repeat. An 8-week-old puppy spends most of the day asleep, so the schedule runs around naps, not the other way.
A single day of good routine proves nothing; the week is where it sticks. The 8-week puppy training schedule assigns the skills themselves, one focus skill per week. When you write all seven days, weekends get scheduled too, and weekends are where most puppy routines fall apart. If Saturday looks different from Tuesday on your filled-in chart, decide on purpose whether it should.
| Age | Meals a day | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 8-12 weeks | 3-4 | Same times every day; last meal a few hours before bedtime so the night stretch is calmer |
| 3-6 months | 3 | Shift the dropped meal's calories into the remaining ones gradually |
| 6 months and up | 2 | Morning and evening, roughly 12 hours apart |
Set meal times do double duty: they make the after-meal potty trip predictable, and food keeps its value as a training reward. For portion sizes, food brands, and any diet change, ask your vet.
A crate break is planned quiet time in the crate between play or training sessions, and it is how a puppy learns to settle alone instead of rehearsing chaos. The setup that works:
If your puppy panics in the crate for more than a few days, stop and mention it to your vet or a positive-reinforcement trainer; forcing it makes the next week harder.
The same anchors every day: potty on waking, meals at set times, potty after every meal and play session, short play or training between naps, a walk in the evening, and a last potty trip before bed. At 8 weeks old most of the day is naps, so run the schedule around the naps rather than the clock.
Common guidance is 3 to 4 meals a day from 8 to 12 weeks, 3 meals from 3 to 6 months, and 2 meals from 6 months on. Portions and food choices depend on your puppy, so ask your vet.
Keep daytime breaks short, around an hour at first, and end each one with a potty trip. Overnight is different: an 8-week-old usually needs one trip out during the night, and that gets longer on its own over the following weeks.
Ask your vet which outings are safe before the vaccine series is finished; that answer changes by area. In the meantime, leash practice in the hallway or your own yard counts, and the Monday example keeps it to 5 minutes on purpose.
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