6 Most Important Commands to Teach Your Dog

New dog owners often wonder, what commands should I teach my dog? I have listed the 6 most important but beginner-friendly commands that I continuously use with my dogs in our day-to-day lives. These commands make our lives and traveling so much more pleasant and easier.

Fortunately, all these are easy for your dog to learn and for you to teach!

The goal of teaching these commands to your dog is that when you find yourself in a chaotic or dysfunctional situation, you can effortlessly make contact with your dog and they will listen and do what you tell them to.

For example, they will sit and wait on a corner of a street with you and not rush into the traffic. Or if they find animal remains in the forest, they will leave them because you told them to.

How Long Does It Take a Dog to Learn a New Command?

Teaching your dog a new command takes time and many training sessions. The idea is that you progress a little bit every time you train together.

It takes about a few days with 15 minutes per training session for a dog to understand and remember the learned behavior. After that, you need to keep repeating those training sessions in a more advanced setting. Remember not to make the training too difficult too quickly.

Most Important Commands to Teach Your Dog:

1. Contact

Or like some people call it, name recognition. I think this is where the bonding and learning begins. In a good owner-dog relationship, the dog is not fearful or hesitant to make eye contact with its owner.

The idea is, that when you call your dog by their name or say ‘look at me’, they instinctively look at you for further instructions. This comes very handy if you happen to be in a tumultuous situation and need your dog’s attention.

How to Start:

Hold a small treat in your left hand and another treat in your right. Show both hands to your dog. Now the dog is most likely staring at your hands.

Don’t say anything at this point, but reward them as soon as the dog looks at you even for a glimpse. After some repetitions, the dog will figure out that the eye contact is what rewards them and not the hand staring. That’s when you add in the cue words like “look” or “dog’s name” and repeat that. Soon the dog will look at you when you say the word.

2. Sit

This one is probably the easiest command to teach. Many dogs that don’t know any commands often offer this behavior when a person is holding a treat. In that case, the dog has accidentally learned how to sit but the human never added the cue word with the action.

Sitting still teaches patience to impulsive dogs.

How To Start:

Hold a small treat above your dog’s head and fairly quickly the dog will instinctively sit down. That’s when you give them the reward.

Next, take a few steps away from your dog so the dog will move away from the sitting position, and then repeat the exercise.

Very soon the dog figures out that sitting is the way to get treats. That’s when you add the cue word ‘sit’ while holding the treat above you.

3. Lay Down Or Down

Telling your dog to lie down on a bus or a train makes using public transport hassle-free. Many dog trainers advise teaching this command as a part of calming down exercise.

How To Start:

Start with your dog in a sitting position. Hold a treat in your hand so the dog can smell it. Bring the treat from the dog’s eye level straight down vertically to the ground. Do that rather slowly. Keep the treat hand close to your dog. The dog wants to get the treat and will follow your hand.

Because you keep your hand close to the dog, the dog will eventually lie down when your hand (and the treat) hits the floor.

Once your dog has figured out and done that, reward them. Again, repetitions are key here. First, your dog will learn that hand movement means lying down. When the dog offers that behavior, it’s time to add the cue word ‘lay down’.

4. Come

I don’t want to be dramatic but seriously this could save your dog’s life. If your dog runs loose in a busy parking lot, ‘Come here!’ better work with ease.

Here is the key: your dog needs to learn from the start, that coming to you is the best thing decision ever. That nothing bad can happen from running to you. You should never behave in an aggressive manner when your dog comes to you! It only builds distrust between you two.

The goal is that no matter where you are and what is happening around you, your dog will always listen and come to you. It requires a lot of repetition and training in distractive situations.

How To Start:

Go to a different room with a dog toy or with treats. Yell ‘come/come here!’ with an uplifting tone. When the dog approaches and comes to you, reward them with a toy or treat.

If your dog just follows you around because they know you have something good, try the same outside in a backyard or someplace where there aren’t many distractions. Keep your dog on a long leash if there is no closed space for you to train.

Make it a small happy spectacle when they come to you. Remember, the dog needs to know that you are always a better option than any distraction in their line of sight.

Start with a short distance and no distractions. When your dog understands the basic concept of ‘come’, add small distractions with other people or dogs being around. You know if you are trying to advance too quickly simply if your dog ignores you when something more interesting is going on.

5. Stay

Just like the commands ‘sit’ or ‘lay down’, this teaches patience to impulsive dogs. Stay is one of the basic commands to teach to a dog and comes in handy in many situations.

Teach your dog to sit down first. After that, you can teach them this one.

How To Start:

When the dog is sitting down, say ‘stay’ and take one or two steps away from your dog. Take only one step if your dog tries to stand up. After taking one or two steps away from your dog successfully, return to your dog to reward them.

If your dog is being hyperactive, take them for a walk first and try again after. There is no point in teaching patience to a dog with a lot of energy.

After some repetitions, you can start increasing the radius between you and your dog. When the dog has figured out the concept, you can for example try to leave the room and come back immediately.

When you can leave and enter a room without your dog leaving its position, you can start practicing this outside. It’s more difficult for your dog to stay still outside with all those noises and smells distracting them. So start the same easy steps again outside.

6. Leave It

Also known as ‘drop it’. With this command, you are teaching your dog to stop a certain kind of unwanted behavior. ‘Leave it’ can be one of the harder ones to teach because your authority needs to be stronger than the temptation to eat or chase whatever is distracting them.

For example, if you drop a candy bar on the ground, you can tell your dog not to take it with the ‘leave it’ command. Or if your dog tries to eat something nasty from the ground when you are on a walk together.

How To Start:

Take a small treat and place it inside your closed hand. Let your dog smell your fist and they will probably try to get the treat from you. When your dog stops reaching for your hand, reward them by giving them the treat.

Take another treat in your hand and repeat the exercise. After 10-20 repetitions your dog most likely has stopped the hand sniffing and reaching. Now they have figured out that leaving the hand alone gives them a reward.

Now it’s time to add the cue word. Repeat the exercise again but this time say the cue word when your dog leaves the closed fist alone.

Try the same exercise with a dog toy. Shake the toy slightly, say the cue word, and reward when your dog stops reaching for the toy.