Rabbit housing standards have been substantially revised in recent years as evidence has mounted that traditional hutch keeping fails to meet rabbits' behavioral and social needs.
Rabbit housing welfare is an area of significant discrepancy between evidence-based guidance and common practice. Traditional hutch keeping - small, confined, often solitary - fails rabbits across multiple welfare dimensions: space for locomotion, social companionship, and appropriate behavioral expression. Modern welfare guidance converges on requirements for substantially larger, complex housing with continuous access to exercise areas, social companions, and environmental enrichment. The pet industry's continued sale of inadequate hutches represents a systemic welfare failure. Welfare improvement requires both consumer education and regulatory change setting minimum housing standards.