Get Real vs The Farmer's Dog: How Chewy's Fresh Food Compares
Get Real vs The Farmer's Dog compared on recipes, ingredients, plans and toppers, delivery, thawing, storage, and life stages, plus a simple way to compare cost per day.
Two fresh recipes side by side, the choice this comparison helps you make.
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Get Real vs The Farmer's Dog is a common question for owners shopping for fresh dog food, because both brands sell gently cooked, human-grade food in pre-portioned packs. The differences show up in where you buy, how many recipes you can choose from, and how flexible each plan is.
This comparison is built from what each brand publishes on its own pages. It covers recipes and ingredients, plans and toppers, delivery and storage, life stages, and how to compare cost fairly, with Chewy's Get Real as the featured option, and the description of The Farmer's Dog is a fair, factual summary of its own published pages.
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Get Real vs The Farmer's Dog: the quick comparison
The main differences start with where you buy. Get Real is sold only at Chewy and can be fed as a full meal or used to top kibble. The Farmer's Dog sells direct to your door by subscription and offers a wider protein range that includes pork, plus a shelf-stable line called Instant Fresh.
The Get Real Sampler Pack lets you try Chewy's fresh recipes before you commit to a subscription.
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- 1The main differences are where you buy, how many recipes you can choose, and how you can use the food.
- 2Get Real is sold only at Chewy and comes in three recipes: Chicken & Brussels Sprouts, Beef & Sweet Potato, and Turkey & Cranberry.
- 3The Farmer's Dog sells direct by subscription, with fresh recipes plus a shelf-stable Instant Fresh line.
- 4Both are gently cooked, human-grade, and complete and balanced to AAFCO standards.
- 5Get Real offers a dedicated 5 oz mixer pack and a sampler box for a low-commitment start.
What is better than The Farmer's Dog? That depends on what you value. If you want dog food similar to Farmer's Dog that you can order through the same Chewy account you already use, with a short recipe list and a built-in topper option, Get Real is the strongest fit among Farmer's Dog alternatives and competitors. If you want more protein choices, including pork, The Farmer's Dog offers a wider range.
How to decide between them
Start with recipes. Get Real gives you three, chicken, beef, and turkey, each with 10 ingredients or less plus vitamins and minerals, which makes it easy to match a recipe to the proteins your dog already does well on. The Farmer's Dog covers a wider protein range, so it suits dogs that need a less common protein such as pork.
Want a dog food similar to Farmer's Dog with a red meat base? Beef & Sweet Potato pairs beef with sweet potato, carrots, and spinach in a short ingredient list.
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Next, compare price per day rather than box price. Build a plan on each site with the same dog details, then divide each order total by the number of days it feeds your dog. That cost per day is the only fair way to compare two plans that ship different amounts of food, and the same math works for full meals or toppers.
Then weigh ordering flexibility. Get Real can be a full meal, a topper, or a 5 oz kibble mixer, comes in three pack sizes, starts with a sampler box, and is ordered through your Chewy account. The Farmer's Dog sizes pre-portioned packs to your dog and sells by direct subscription. Both let you pause or cancel at any time.
Recipes and ingredients side by side
Get Real keeps its lineup tight: three recipes, each with 10 ingredients or less plus vitamins and minerals, made with human-grade ingredients and gently cooked, then frozen. The Get Real Beef & Sweet Potato Recipe leads with beef and sweet potato, then adds beef liver and a few vegetables before its added vitamins and minerals.
The Farmer's Dog recipes are built around beef, chicken, turkey, and pork, and the brand says they are formulated by board-certified veterinary nutritionists. Its site publishes a full Farmer's Dog ingredients list for each recipe. Does The Farmer's Dog have grains? Its FAQ says it offers both grain-free and grain-inclusive options, including a Chicken and Grain recipe in the Instant Fresh line.
What The Farmer's Dog publishes about itself, from its public site:
- Proteins: beef, chicken, turkey, and pork, described as human-grade and gently cooked.
- Format: Fresh recipes ship frozen in pre-portioned packs, while Instant Fresh is a shelf-stable food you add water to.
- Delivery: a subscription that ships to the 48 contiguous states in insulated boxes with dry ice or cold packs, timed to arrive as you run low.
- What it publishes: portions calculated from your dog's breed, age, activity level, and ideal weight, AAFCO complete and balanced statements, and per-recipe ingredients.
- What its FAQ does not state: a separate topper plan, store availability, or how long thawed food keeps in the fridge.
How to compare Farmer's Dog fat content and Get Real's fairly:
- Read each recipe's guaranteed analysis, which both brands publish.
- Convert to a dry matter basis, because fresh foods are mostly water: divide the fat or protein figure by 100% minus the moisture figure.
- As an illustration only: Get Real Chicken & Brussels Sprouts lists an 8.5% fat minimum and a 75% moisture maximum, so 8.5 divided by 25 gives about 34%. That figure is computed from guaranteed minimums and maximums, not actual fat content.
- Apply the same math to The Farmer's Dog's published numbers before deciding whether Farmer's Dog is high in fat for your dog.
Plans, toppers, and where you can buy
Get Real lets you choose recipes and delivery frequency, and every recipe can be a full meal or a topper. The 5 oz pack is a mixer pack for stirring into kibble, while the 12 oz and 24 oz packs cover meals and larger toppers. The Farmer's Dog builds portions from details about your dog, including its ideal weight. Its FAQ does not describe a separate Farmer's Dog topper plan, so if you want Farmer's Dog toppers rather than full meals, ask its support team when you set up your plan.
Chicken & Brussels Sprouts has the fewest calories per pack of the Get Real recipes, which makes it an easy topper over your dog's current food.
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Buying channels and availability differ as well, and the ordering flexibility checklist below lines up both brands on the choices that matter once you start a plan.
| Ordering flexibility checklist | Get Real | The Farmer's Dog |
|---|---|---|
| Full meal option | Yes, portioned by your dog's plan | Yes, portioned by your dog's plan |
| Topper plan or mixer | Topper use plus a 5 oz mixer pack | No separate topper plan described in its FAQ |
| Pack sizes | 5 oz, 12 oz, and 24 oz | Pre-portioned packs sized to your dog |
| Trial option | Sampler box, subscribe later | Refund policy if your dog will not eat it |
| Buying channel | Sold only at Chewy, online | Direct subscription from its own site |
| Change, pause, cancel | Anytime | Anytime |
| Delivery format | Frozen, insulated box with dry ice | Frozen or very cold, insulated box with dry ice or cold packs |
Does Walmart sell Farmer's Dog food? The Farmer's Dog describes itself as a subscription delivered to your door, and its site does not list Walmart or other stores, so look for Farmers Dog in stores only if the brand announces it. Get Real is also online only, sold through Chewy.
Turkey & Cranberry is Get Real's most calorie-dense recipe, a good fit for big or active dogs on full fresh meals.
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To cancel The Farmer's Dog or Get Real, both brands let you pause or cancel your subscription at any time. With Get Real, the Get Real Chicken & Brussels Sprouts Recipe can also be ordered as a topper, a useful middle ground if you are not ready to switch fully.
Our comparison of dog food subscription services covers how other fresh delivery plans handle the same choices.
Delivery, thawing, and storage
Both brands ship frozen in insulated boxes. Get Real ships free in about one day with dry ice, and the box stays cold up to 8 hours after delivery depending on the weather. Move the packs into the freezer as soon as the box arrives.
Thawing differs by pack size. Get Real's 5 oz and 12 oz packs thaw in the fridge in 12 to 24 hours, and 24 oz packs take 35 to 48 hours. The Farmer's Dog thawing instructions say a frozen pack takes about 12 hours in the fridge, with cold running water as a quicker option, and the food should stay below 40°F.
Storage tips that apply to both:
- Use thawed Get Real within 3 to 5 days, and check The Farmer's Dog's pack for its own expiration date and use-by guidance.
- Keep an opened pack sealed or in a covered food container in the fridge.
- Do not serve Farmer's Dog food left out overnight or Get Real left out; Chewy says to discard food that has sat at room temperature more than 2 hours.
Puppies and life stages
All three Get Real recipes meet AAFCO nutrient profiles for all life stages, including growth of large size dogs, and Chewy says they suit pregnant and nursing dogs too. For Farmer's Dog puppy food, the brand says its Fresh recipes suit puppies, adult dogs, and seniors, while Instant Fresh is for adult and senior dogs. If you are choosing The Farmer's Dog for puppies, pick from the Fresh line. Get Real has no separate puppy formula because every recipe already covers growth, which keeps things simple if you have a puppy and an adult dog in the same home.
For both brands, portion by your puppy's expected adult size and keep up with growth checks at the vet. The Get Real Turkey & Cranberry Recipe is the most calorie-dense Get Real option for growing large-breed puppies with big appetites.
What each costs and how to compare price per day
Prices for fresh food depend on your dog's size, the recipe, and whether you feed a full meal or a topper, so neither brand's price is quoted here. For the full breakdown on the other side, see how much The Farmer's Dog costs.
- To find the cost per day, take a live quote from each brand for your dog, then divide each order total by the number of days it feeds your dog.
Is The Farmer's Dog worth it, or is Farmer's Dog too expensive for your budget? The cost per day method answers that for your own dog. Use these steps:
- Build a plan on each site with the same dog details.
- Note what each order costs and how many days of food it covers.
- Divide to get a cost per day, then compare full meal against topper use.
Safety and recalls: what to check
Is Farmer's Dog good for your dog? Both brands state their recipes are complete and balanced to AAFCO standards. Neither label replaces your own observation, so the checks below matter more than any single headline. For a closer look at the brand's safety record, read our guide to whether The Farmer's Dog is safe, and for the legal questions some readers raise, see our coverage of The Farmer's Dog lawsuit.
Claims that Farmers Dog is bad for dogs are best checked against facts. Look at the FDA recall list, the AAFCO statement on the label, and how well your dog does on the food, including energy, stool quality, and weight over the first few weeks. For a full Get Real breakdown, read our Get Real dog food review.
Get Real and The Farmer's Dog questions
Most adult dogs do well on two meals a day, so split the daily portion your plan gives you into a morning and evening meal. Puppies often need more frequent meals. The same approach works with Get Real.
Yes. When you switch between fresh foods, mix in a small amount of the new food and increase it over seven to ten days, or 10 to 14 days for sensitive dogs. Our guide to transitioning to fresh dog food has a day-by-day plan.
Yes. Get Real arrives frozen with dry ice, and The Farmer's Dog ships frozen or very cold. Make sure you have freezer space before your first box comes.
Get Real offers a sampler box as a trial order, so you can taste-test recipes before subscribing. The Farmer's Dog offers a refund policy if your dog will not eat the food.
No. Get Real ships to select markets, so check your address on Chewy when you build a plan.
Coreen Saito is a pet writer and longtime shelter volunteer with more than a decade in animal rescue. She covers cat behavior, breed care, and the small, ordinary science of sharing a life with companion animals, with a particular focus on honest takes about the products and decisions that actually matter. At home in Arizona, she's outranked by Mac (a dog with the loudest opinion in the house), Rebel (a cat who governs by quiet authority), and Meri (an orange tabby who runs the late shift and the laundry basket). She writes about all three, plus the rescues that keep coming through her life, at LifeWithMinty.com.
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A Final Word (Disclaimer)
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