Dogs per person: Longyearbyen's other population

Facts last verified 2026-10-03

Walk along the coast road east of town and you’ll often hear them before you see them: the dog yards at the edge of Longyearbyen. Longyearbyen has around 2,600 human residents. It also has a second population, with four legs and very strong opinions about going for a run.

So, how many dogs?

Nobody publishes an official dog count, so here’s what we know:

• Five dog yards in and around Longyearbyen keep sled dogs for tourist trips, with several hundred sled dogs between them.
• About 600 dogs lived in Longyearbyen in 2013, and 717 at the end of 2014, in counts reported by the local press.
• Nearly 1,200 dogs is the figure a travel magazine gave in 2023, alongside about 2,400 people.

Take the middle of those numbers and you get roughly one dog for every two to four people. Either way, it’s a lot of dogs for a town this size, and many locals keep their own dog teams, or adopt retired sled dogs when their working days are over.

A dog’s life in Svalbard

• They work all year. In winter the teams pull sleds across the snow. When the snow melts in early June, they switch to wheeled carts.
• They’re mostly Alaskan huskies, not a breed so much as a type of working dog, bred for running. You’ll also meet Greenland dogs and the odd fluffy lapphund.
• You can visit them. Many dog sledding trips start with a visit to the kennel, and sometimes the puppies. See What to do in Longyearbyen.

The rules: rabies, and no cats

Rabies has been found in wild animals in Svalbard since 1980, mostly spread by Arctic foxes. Mainland Norway is free of it, so dogs come with paperwork:

• To bring a dog to Svalbard, you need permission from the Norwegian Food Safety Authority (Mattilsynet). The dog must be microchipped and vaccinated against rabies, with a blood test showing enough antibodies, as well as vaccinated against distemper and treated for fleas and ticks.
• Going back to the mainland, the dog must be vaccinated against rabies too.
• Cats and ferrets are not allowed in Svalbard at all. Longyearbyen is firmly dog territory.

What it means for you

• Don’t pet dogs you don’t know, however friendly they look, and ask the owner first.
• If you see a sick or dead wild animal, such as a fox, don’t touch it. Report it to the Governor.
• Go dog sledding. With this many dogs in town, it would be rude not to.