# HTTP Cats

20 Hacker News commenters recommended HTTP Cats and 1 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 1 of 13 months; owners who said how long report a median of 10 years (3 owners).

**Verdict:** People use it as a quick, memorable lookup for HTTP status codes, and each code comes with a cat picture that people say lightens the mood.

## Why people recommend it

- Quick lookup for HTTP status codes (9 comments): "Anytime I need to check an HTTP status code I go to http.cat. I get the answer to my question and a cat picture as a bonus." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46837152)) "It's so easy to just go to http.cat/303 to check a status code you don't know" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46831426)) "most of the time I just directly open the specific status" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46835030))
- Cat pictures lighten the mood (4 comments): "Anytime I need to check an HTTP status code I go to http.cat. I get the answer to my question and a cat picture as a bonus." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46837152)) "I pull it up during troubleshooting conference calls for inevitable lightening of mood" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46841543)) "love this lol so many images I've never seen before" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46840257))
- Memorable, easy-to-type domain (2 comments): "The name is instantly memorable, it loads immediately, and I can ctrl-f it." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46830426)) "it's so easy to memorize this domain" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46834341))
- Simple, lasting joy online (3 comments): "http.cat is a testament of how simple, fun and silly the internet was back then." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46834813)) "Thank you for maintaining a piece of simple joy for more than a decade" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46834939)) "This one endures and I love it." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46834190))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Stack Overflow](https://hackerapproved.com/p/stack-overflow.md): 235 recommend
- [MDN Web Docs](https://hackerapproved.com/p/mdn-web-docs.md): 27 recommend
- [Unicode symbol reference page](https://hackerapproved.com/p/one-clean-developer-focused-page-for-every-unicode-symbol.md): 8 recommend
- [Can I Use](https://hackerapproved.com/p/can-i-use.md): 5 recommend
- [Ralf Brown's Interrupt List](https://hackerapproved.com/p/ralf-brown-s-interrupt-list.md): 5 recommend

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "HTTP Cats", https://hackerapproved.com/p/http-cats/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).