Corporate pledges for cage-free egg sourcing have driven major transitions away from battery cages. Understanding what cage-free means in practice is essential for evaluating welfare progress.
The cage-free transition is genuine welfare progress, but it is not the end of the story. Moving hens from conventional battery cages eliminates the most fundamental spatial deprivation, but introduces new welfare challenges: keel bone fractures from multi-tier perch systems, injurious pecking in high-density flocks, and variable management quality that produces very different welfare outcomes between farms. A hen in a well-managed cage-free barn with good litter quality, low stocking density, and functional enrichment lives a substantially better life than a battery-caged hen. A hen in a poorly managed cage-free barn with high ammonia, inadequate perching, and chronic pecking problems may not. Consumer and regulatory demand should now shift from cage-free as a minimum standard to higher-welfare within cage-free systems.