Pawshake - Experienced pet care with peace of mindLoving pet sitters who treat your pets like familyAt Pawshake, we connect pet parents with friendly, reliable and vetted pet sitters. So whether you are going away, need someone to drop in to check on your pet while you’re at work or take your dog for a sniff around the block, we’ve got a pet loving sitter for you.Loving home environments - no cages!Your pets will stay in loving home environments and be treated just like family. Pawshake pet sitters are able to cater to your pet’s needs and are also a great alternative to dog boarding kennels or catteries.Get daily updates about your pet and relax knowing that they will get plenty of love and attention while you are away.Convenient, safe and flexible pet careSimply, search for a sitter, arrange a free meet and greet and then confirm your booking online. Payments are held securely by Pawshake until the booking is complete. There are no subscription fees and you only pay for the sitter you choose. Pet parents can also leave a review at the end of each booking to share their experience with other pet parents.The Pawshake Guarantee All bookings are covered by The Pawshake Guarantee which includes veterinary coverage, Happiness Guarantee and in-house customer support.
pawshake.com (pawshake.com) has 6,520 customer reviews on Five Star Index, with an average rating of 4.7 out of 5.
Website
pawshake.com
Category
Pet Services
Location
Portola Valley, California
Listed on Five Star Index
2026
About these reviews
Replies
The company replied to 10% of reviews.
Latest
Most recent review: October 2026.
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Reviews are shown as their authors wrote them. The company can reply, but cannot edit them.
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This company cannot pay to remove reviews or change its score.
Fully recommend Pawshake. The App was easy to use. Needed a dog sitter close to a wedding that we were attending, found the perfect sitter who was amazing. The dogs were well cared for and we had regular updates during the day. We had a perfect day and so did our dogs.
KO
KOALA
Cats loved the sitters more than me.
Cats loved the sitters more than me.
SS
saurav S.
I am a pet sitter in Auckland
I am a pet sitter in Auckland. One of the my clients came for a meet and greet and their dog was quite aggressive with my cats.
He went back home and delivered a false complaint that I had asked him to do payments outside of Pawshake. He formed an entire story and Pawshake decided to believe them and disable my account. Consequently, they asked for my partners account and disabled that too without any prior communication. It was extremely rude behaviour from them. They cancelled an ongoing booking with a client I had already booked with on Pawshake. My client had to go through so much of hassle because of that.
I emailed them several times requesting thorough investigation of what had happened, they failed to communicate and in case started ignoring everything. This is extremely unfair. They started asking me question on my personal life like I am a criminal. This was extremely rude and disregards to my reputation with my clients
Response from pawshake.comSep 9, 2026
Hi Sourav,
We take allegations of policy violations very seriously, but we must clarify the facts regarding why your account and connected profile were suspended.
Our Trust & Safety team received a report from a prospective client stating that during your Meet & Greet, you explicitly requested to take the booking outside of Pawshake to bypass service fees. The client provided video recording evidence confirming this discussion of offline payment. Because you had already received a prior formal warning on your account for fee-related policy violations, immediate suspension was required to protect our community.
During our investigation, you claimed you declined the booking due to your two cats. However, these cats were not listed on your profile or disclosed to guests prior to the Meet & Greet. Furthermore, our investigation revealed multiple linked accounts operating from the same household across different addresses without full disclosure, including pet sitting being conducted at a location distinct from the address registered on your verified account.
To protect pet owners, Pawshake strictly regulates multiple accounts within a single household, particularly where care is provided at undisclosed locations or where sitters operate overlapping businesses. When an account is suspended for serious policy breaches, associated accounts at the same physical location are placed under review as a precaution.
When an account is suspended for trust and safety violations, active bookings are canceled to protect pet owners, and our team assists affected clients with alternative arrangements. Our team remained in direct email communication with you throughout the investigation to review your responses and assess the situation.
We enforce these standards consistently to ensure a transparent, safe, and trustworthy community for all pet owners and sitters.
Kind Regards
Pawshake Support
DD
Dawn D.
easy to book last minute after we had a…
easy to book last minute after we had a few cancellations on another site.
JP
Jenny P.
Do not use this company .
Do not use this company .
They do not vet or ask any of their supposed trusted dog sitters to go through any checks .
They have no experience and you do not know who is living in your home .. I was told after a very very bad experience that it was up to me to do checks .. which was way too late .
The person who I reached out to to look after my dogs has deleted their account and the paw shake team can no longer reach the dog sitter ..
instead of the dog sitter interviewed .. I instead met his wife’s parents . .. elderly .. didn’t speak English .. but wa assured they weee very experienced and had worked with pawshwke clients many many times .
We paid extra for cleaning .. we paid the website fees .. we paid extra for 5 dos not 1 .. none of which is mentioned on the website . .
The house not cleaned .
The dogs not walked at all .
Pawshake will not enter into any conversations regarding this or their responsibilities..
The pet sitters spent money on a credit card buying food and beer for themselves.. the card left for dog food and emergencies
They took food from my home on leaving .
They would not drive .. which had been previously agreed .
My home was left filthy .
Not only were these sitters demanding more money but for doing an exceptionally bad job .
Even more disappointing is that Pawshake take no responsibility no action and do not as I would expect do any security checks whatsoever ever . Do not use them .
As “Charles “ has deleted his account I can not leave a review .
Response from pawshake.comSep 9, 2026
Hi Nikki/Jenny,
We are very sorry to hear that you are unhappy, but we must address several significant inaccuracies in your review regarding how our platform operates, our terms of service, and how this situation was handled.
Pawshake operates purely as an online marketplace connecting pet owners with independent pet sitters. Sitters are not employees, agents, or contractors of Pawshake; they run their own independent pet care businesses. We believe you may be operating under a false assumption, as our terms clearly state that Pawshake makes no representations or warranties regarding the individual quality or suitability of independent sitters.
Pawshake verifies every sitter’s government identification, mobile phone number, and bank details during our manual onboarding process. However, as clearly detailed across our website, the selection and final vetting of a sitter remains the owner's responsibility. We instruct owners to use the mandatory Meet & Greet to assess suitability, verify experience, and request additional checks—such as a DBS check—for total peace of mind before booking.
Our terms strictly forbid sitters from delegating bookings to unverified third parties, as well as demanding offline cash payments for extra dogs, cleaning, or platform fee reimbursements. We have asked you for the screenshots where the sitter did this, but have yet to receive it.
Bookings must be made directly by the pet owner from their own account. Because this booking was made under a different user's profile (Alcina) and you initially contacted us from an unregistered email, our support team experienced unnecessary delays verifying who you were and locating the reservation.
Many of the serious claims in this review—are being raised publicly for the very first time here rather than through our customer support channels. We have reached out to you repeatedly in good faith, navigating changing details regarding who actually owns the dogs, and have explicitly requested written evidence or documentation to substantiate these claims.
We wait in good faith for any evidence to back up these assertions so we can properly investigate. Rather than providing the documentation requested by our support team, you chose to post a negative online review instead. We remain open to reviewing any receipts, messages, or written proof you can provide so we can take appropriate administrative action.
Kind Regards
Pawshake Support
BG
Bruce G.
Not sure what pawshake did but Angie our sitter was great.
Not sure what pawshake did but Angie our sitter was great.
SA
Sara A.
La ragazza contattata è stata molto…
La ragazza contattata è stata molto brava e davvero professionale.
AT
Arthur T.
SUPERGOOD WALKER!!!
Great comes with walker who is responsive, on the ball and very kind to my furbaby! I would totally recommend Ivan!!!