Introduction
If your puppy is nipping at your hands, launching at every guest who walks in, or working through your favourite pair of shoes, take a breath first. None of this means you have a “bad dog,” and it doesn’t mean you’re doing something wrong. Biting, jumping, and chewing are all normal parts of how puppies grow and learn. They’re not signs of a training failure. They’re signs of a young dog figuring out the world, and they almost always fade with time, patience, and the right response from you.
This guide walks through why each behaviour happens and what actually helps, so you know what’s going on and what to do about it today.
Puppy Biting and Mouthing
What It Is
Puppies explore the world with their mouths, the same way human babies use their hands. Mouthing, nipping, and play-biting are a normal part of how puppies learn, play, and interact with everything around them. It’s not aggression, even when it stings.
True aggressive biting in puppies is rare, and it looks different from play-biting. A puppy in play mode has loose, wiggly body language: a relaxed tail, a bouncy posture, maybe a play bow. A fearful or defensive puppy tenses up, backs away, flattens its ears, or growls before biting. If your puppy’s biting consistently comes with that second kind of body language rather than playfulness, it may be worth exploring aggression and behaviour modification with a professional rather than working through it with play-based redirection alone.
Why It Happens
Teething is one of the biggest drivers. Puppies lose their baby teeth and grow their adult ones roughly between 3 and 6 months old, and chewing or biting on anything nearby, including your hands, helps relieve the discomfort.
Some puppies also arrive with less bite inhibition already in place. In a litter, puppies learn to soften their bite from their littermates: bite a sibling too hard during play, and a sharp yelp interrupts the game on the spot. Puppies who were separated from their litter early, or who came from a smaller litter with fewer playmates, miss out on some of that natural feedback loop.
Play itself can tip into biting when a puppy gets overstimulated and doesn’t yet have an off-switch. A wrestling session or a game of chase can escalate quickly, and the biting that follows is often more about excitement outrunning self-control than anything else. On top of that, if mouthing reliably gets a reaction from you, even a scolding or a raised voice, some puppies learn that biting is a great way to get your attention. From a puppy’s perspective, being told off still counts as being noticed.
What to Do
Redirect the moment your puppy’s mouth lands on skin or clothing. Swap in a chew toy right away, so the mouth has something better to do instead of just hearing “no.”
You can also mimic the feedback puppies get from their littermates. Let out a sharp “ow,” then briefly withdraw your attention: stand up, turn away, pause the play for a few seconds. This teaches your puppy that biting makes the fun stop, without any physical correction involved.
Keep your hands and feet out of play entirely. Never use them as toys, even briefly during a wrestling game, since it sends a mixed signal about what’s actually okay to bite.
Watch your puppy’s arousal level during play. If a session tends to escalate into biting, keep it shorter and calmer, and step back before things ramp up rather than waiting for a bite to happen and reacting after the fact.
If there are kids in the household, make sure everyone follows the same approach. A puppy that gets away with mouthing one family member but not another gets a confusing, inconsistent picture of what’s allowed.
Skip physical corrections altogether: no scruffing, no holding the muzzle shut, no smacking. These risk teaching fear or defensive aggression instead of bite inhibition, and they run counter to LIMA (Least Intrusive, Minimally Aversive), the training framework we use across every programme at PetCoach.
Jumping on People
What It Is
Jumping is a greeting behaviour, not defiance. Dogs naturally want face-to-face contact when they greet someone, and for a dog, jumping is simply how they reach a standing human’s face.
Why It Happens
Jumping keeps happening because, from your puppy’s point of view, it works. Eye contact, touch, even a verbal correction all count as attention, so if jumping reliably gets a reaction out of you, it gets reinforced every time it happens, whether that reaction was meant as encouragement or not.
Excitement plays a role too, especially around arrivals, departures, and visitors. Coming home after a day out, or a friend walking through the door, is often the single most exciting moment in a puppy’s day, and jumping is an easy outlet for that burst of energy.
Inconsistency across people matters a great deal here. If some members of the household allow jumping while others don’t, or if some guests laugh it off while others push the puppy away, the behaviour never fully extinguishes. Dogs are quick learners about who responds how, so a puppy can end up jumping selectively on exactly the people who tolerate it.
What to Do
The moment your puppy’s paws leave the ground, withhold everything: no eye contact, no touch, no talking. Turn away instead, calmly and without drama.
Reward “four on the floor” or a sit the instant it happens. Your puppy needs an alternative behaviour that actually gets rewarded, not just an absence of reaction to jumping. Withholding attention alone teaches what not to do; rewarding the sit teaches what to do instead.
Brief your guests before they arrive. Ask them to ignore jumping too, and to only greet your puppy once they’re calm or sitting. Consistency across every single person your puppy meets is what actually makes this stick. One enthusiastic guest who lets the jumping slide can undo weeks of otherwise solid practice.
If visitor arrivals are a particular struggle, a short management step helps in the meantime: a leash or tether near the door for the first few minutes prevents your puppy from rehearsing the jump at all while the calmer greeting habit is still being built.
Destructive Chewing
What It Is
There’s a real difference between a puppy happily working through an appropriate chew toy and a puppy going after furniture legs, shoes, cables, or anything else off-limits. Destructive chewing is the second kind, and it’s usually what owners mean when chewing becomes a genuine problem rather than just a normal part of puppy life.
Why It Happens
Teething is a factor here too, for the same reason as biting: chewing relieves discomfort, and puppies aren’t born knowing which objects are fair game and which aren’t.
Exploration plays a role as well. Puppies learn about their environment largely by putting things in their mouths, the same instinct that drives biting and mouthing in play.
Boredom or under-stimulation often shows up as chewing on whatever’s within reach. Without enough physical exercise or mental enrichment for the day, a puppy will find something to do, and a table leg or a shoe left on the floor is an easy target.
Worth distinguishing from the causes above: if the chewing specifically happens only when your puppy is left alone, and not when you’re home and supervising, that points to something different from ordinary puppy chewing. Puppy home alone training covers that scenario, and what to do about it, directly.
What to Do
Puppy-proof your space before problems start. Remove access to valuable or dangerous items rather than relying on your puppy to know better on their own.
Offer real variety in chew textures rather than a single toy on repeat. A frozen Kong can be especially soothing during the teething months, and rotating a few different textures keeps chewing interesting enough that it doesn’t wander toward the furniture instead.
Catch your puppy chewing the right thing and praise it immediately, rather than only reacting when they get it wrong. Positive attention for the toy in their mouth reinforces exactly the choice you want repeated.
Check that your puppy’s daily exercise and mental stimulation genuinely match their age and energy level. A tired, mentally engaged puppy chews less destructively simply because there’s less pent-up energy looking for an outlet.
For unsupervised time, crate or playpen management is a real safety net, not a punishment. Positive crate training walks through how to set this up properly, so your puppy is genuinely comfortable there rather than just contained.
When to Get Extra Support
Biting, jumping, and chewing almost always improve with consistency and time as your puppy matures. Most puppies grow out of all three well before adulthood, often faster than owners expect once a consistent approach is in place.
If any of these behaviours persist well past the usual developmental window despite consistent work, or start to look more like fear or aggression than normal puppy behaviour, that’s worth a professional assessment rather than continuing to troubleshoot alone. Our puppy training guide is a good starting point for the fundamentals, or you can reach out for a consultation if you’d rather have an extra pair of trained eyes on what’s actually going on.
FAQ
Is it normal for puppies to bite so much?
A: Yes. Mouthing and play-biting are a normal part of how puppies explore and learn, especially during teething. Consistent redirection usually resolves it well before adulthood.
How long does the puppy biting phase last?
A: Most puppies bite and mouth the most during teething, roughly 3 to 6 months old, and it tapers off significantly once their adult teeth come in and consistent redirection is in place.
Why does my puppy jump on guests but not on me?
A: Jumping is a learned behaviour, and dogs learn it person by person. If guests react to jumping with attention, even negative attention like pushing the puppy away, your puppy learns it works on them specifically, even if it doesn’t work on you.
How do I stop my puppy from chewing furniture?
A: Puppy-proof the space, offer a real variety of appropriate chew toys, and praise your puppy the moment they chew the right thing. Consistency matters more than any single trick.
Is my puppy’s chewing separation anxiety?
A: Not necessarily. If the chewing happens with you around too, it’s more likely ordinary puppy exploration or teething. If it only happens while your puppy is alone, that’s worth looking into separately: see our guide on puppy home alone training.
