KONG Puppy vs Nylabone Puppy Chew: Which Holds Up to Teething

The short answer, because I read reviews the same way. For the months a puppy spends teething, the KONG Puppy in size Small does the most jobs at once. It is something to gnaw, something to chase, and something you can fill and freeze so a crate feels less like a cage at 6:40 in the morning. A Nylabone puppy chew does one job, and it does that job well: it gives a puppy a firm surface to work on for a long stretch with no help from you. If I could only buy one, I would buy the KONG. If my puppy were the sort to lie down and gnaw for an hour, I would buy both and not feel silly about it.

Clover came home on Sunday, April 12, 2026, at 9 weeks old and six pounds. She is a female mini goldendoodle, and I am her first person as an adult, which is to say I had read a lot and understood very little. Two days later, after she chewed the corner of the couch and a rolled sock, I ordered the KONG Puppy in Small. It has been in the rotation every day since. She is seven months old now and about 21 pounds, which puts her at the top of the range for the Small size, so I will move her up soon.

Here is the part where I am straight with you about the other side. I have never owned a Nylabone puppy chew. I know it from product listings, from the aisle at the pet store, and from my sister-in-law's dog, who has a small pile of them in her kitchen. This is not a side by side test. It is one toy I have lived with for seven months, held up against another one on paper, and I will tell you plainly where the paper version wins.

	KONG Puppy, Small	Nylabone Puppy Chew
Material and give	Soft natural rubber made for puppy teeth, so it gives when she bites down	Firm chew surface, softer than the adult line but still solid under a bite
Stuffing and food	Hollow center takes kibble, paste or a frozen mix, which is what makes crate time work	Solid piece, nothing to fill, nothing to thaw
Long chew sessions	Soft rubber gets worked faster by a determined chewer and needs a refill	Holds a long gnawing session without anything from you
Fetch and play	It has a bounce, and 2.08 ounces is light enough for a small puppy to carry	Built for chewing, not for throwing
Cleaning	The hollow center needs a warm soak before the dishwasher, and frozen kibble paste hides in the small end	Solid piece rinses under the tap in seconds
Sizing as the puppy grows	Small covers a puppy up to the low twenties in pounds, then you buy the next size	Puppy chews come in sizes too, and a growing puppy moves through them as well
Best for	Crate time, workday mornings, and a puppy who needs a job	A puppy who settles in to gnaw and does not need food to stay interested

Where the KONG Puppy Wins

The rubber is the whole argument. KONG makes the puppy line with a softer natural rubber than the adult toys, and at nine weeks that difference is the point. Clover's teeth were coming in and her gums were puffy, and she wanted pressure without pain. I spend four days a week looking at gums and teeth for a living, so I notice what a hard surface does to a mouth. A soft rubber toy lets a puppy bite down and get a little give back. That give is why she came back to it twenty times a day in April and May instead of going after the baseboards.

The hollow center is the second reason, and honestly the reason I would buy it again. The listing calls it stuffable, and I took that seriously. I soak a scoop of her kibble until it softens, mash it with a spoonful of plain pumpkin our vet said was fine, pack it into the toy, and freeze it overnight. In the morning it goes into the crate with her. That frozen toy buys me the twenty minutes I need to get dressed and out the door on a Monday, and it turned the crate from a place she tolerates into a place she walks into on her own. No firm chew can do that, because there is nothing to fill.

The measurements matter more than they sound. It is 6.3 inches long, 3.9 inches wide and 2.91 inches tall, and it weighs 2.08 ounces. That is light enough that a six pound puppy could pick it up and carry it from the kitchen to the living room, which she did constantly, and which is how it ended up under my desk more mornings than I can count. It also has a bounce, so it doubles as a fetch toy on days when a walk gets rained out. The listing says made in the USA with globally sourced materials, and it is unscented, which I appreciated more than I expected to.

Two limits I would want to know about up front. The listing says it is not water resistant, so I do not leave it soaking in a water bowl and I do not take it near the pond at the park. It goes in the top rack of the dishwasher and comes out clean. The other limit is size. Small is right for a young puppy, but Clover at 21 pounds is at the top of it, and I can see her working the small end harder than she did in June. I check the toy every Sunday for missing pieces. I have not had to retire this one, and I still plan to buy the next size up before she needs it.

Where the Nylabone Puppy Chew Wins

The firm chew wins the long session, and it is not close. I did not fully appreciate this until I watched my sister-in-law's dog. That dog takes a chew to her bed and works on it for forty minutes while the humans make dinner and nobody does anything for her. Clover takes a frozen KONG and finishes it in about twenty minutes and then looks at me like I have failed to plan. A firm chew does not run out. There is no refill, no thaw, no paste to scrape out at ten at night. If your puppy is the type who wants to settle and gnaw while you cook, that is a real advantage and the KONG cannot match it.

Cleaning is the second win. The Nylabone is a solid piece of material. You rinse it, you dry it, you put it back in the basket. The KONG has a hollow center with a narrow opening at one end, and frozen kibble paste works its way into the part your finger cannot reach. A long soak in warm water before the dishwasher is the only thing that gets it out. I do not mind, because the stuffing is the entire reason I bought the thing, but if you want a toy that goes from floor to basket without a brush and a rinse, the firm chew is easier to live with.

The third win is the puppy who does not care about food. Some puppies will not work for kibble inside a toy. Yours might be one of them. In that case a frozen KONG sits in the freezer going stale while a firm chew actually gets used, and you have spent your money on the wrong tool. This is also the better pick for a puppy whose digestion is sensitive to new food, though that is a question for your vet and not for me. I am a dental hygienist. I clean teeth, I do not diagnose stomachs.

How the KONG Actually Got Used at Our House

I want to be specific about the routine, because the routine is what makes a toy worth its space in the laundry room. I work Monday through Thursday. Dan is home three of those days, and a neighbor teenager covered the midday break in the early weeks. Mornings are mine. The KONG comes out of the freezer, goes into the crate with Clover, and I finish getting ready while she works on it. On the days I am home, it comes out in the late afternoon when she gets the zoomies and starts looking for trouble along the baseboards.

She uses it in two positions. Standing over it with both front paws, holding it still with one paw and working the small end with her back teeth. Or lying flat with it between her front legs, which is how I know she is actually tired and not just bored. At seven months she still does both, though the standing version is shorter now than it was in May. The lying down version is the one I like, because it means the toy is doing the job a chew toy is supposed to do, which is to give a puppy something to do with her mouth besides my shoes.

Care is simple. It gets rinsed after every use and goes through the top rack of the dishwasher once a week. I check it every Sunday, the same way I check her toothbrush and her slicker brush, and I have not found a piece missing. She is supervised with it, which is not a burden, because the whole point of the frozen version is that she is in the crate or on the rug next to me while she uses it. I would not hand a stuffed toy to a puppy and leave the room, and I do not think anyone should.

The one thing I would change is timing. Buying the Small on April 14 was correct for a six pound puppy, but I should have set a reminder to check the size at the six month mark. She is at the top of the range now and I can see it in how she works the toy. If your puppy is a small breed expected to land in the twenties, put a note in your phone for four months and measure her against the size chart before she starts getting frustrated with a toy that has gotten small.

Seven months of daily chewing and I have not retired this one. I still check it every Sunday, because that is what a soft rubber toy asks of you.

Who Should Buy Which

Buy the KONG Puppy in Small if your puppy is in the thick of teething and you need something that works during the hours you cannot watch a dog. It is the better tool for crate time, for workday mornings, for a puppy who needs a job, and for anyone who wants one toy that chews and fetches and can be filled. If your puppy is under fifteen pounds, Small is the right starting point. If she is already past twenty pounds and still teething, go up a size rather than squeezing her into this one, because a toy that is too small is a toy that gets chewed in the wrong place.

Buy a Nylabone puppy chew if your puppy likes to settle in and gnaw for a long stretch, if food does not motivate her, or if you want a toy you can rinse and put away without a brush. It is also the more sensible pick for a household where nobody wants to prep and freeze anything at ten at night, and that is a legitimate reason. Not every family wants a food toy in the rotation. Owning both is fine. They are not competing for the same twenty minutes of the day. One is a food toy that buys you quiet, and the other is a chew that fills time.

What I would tell a friend standing in the pet store aisle: get the KONG first, because teething arrives at the same time as crate training and crate training is the hard part. Add the firm chew once your puppy is big enough to hold one comfortably and you have figured out whether she works for food. Do not buy six of anything in the first month. You will not know what your puppy likes until you have lived with her for a few weeks, and I say that as someone who owns exactly one of these and plans to keep it that way until the size changes.