Best budget microchip feeder for two cats

Microchip feeders are one of the most genuinely useful innovations for multi-cat households — they make sure each cat only gets their own food, which matters enormously whether one's on a prescription diet, needs portion control, or simply vacuums up everyone else's dinner. Before I point you in the right direction: how many cats do you have, are they both microchipped, and what's the main reason you need them eating separately?

That's a very common setup — one cat who treats every bowl as communal property. Good news: you don't need anything fancy for this. Can I ask, is the greedy one a fast eater too, or does he just eat a normal amount but refuses to stop at his own bowl?

Right, so she needs a feeder that physically closes when he approaches — that's the core job. My recommendation is the SureFlap SureFeed Microchip Pet Feeder. It's the original, it's built to last, and it does exactly one thing brilliantly: the lid closes the moment it detects a chip that isn't registered to that bowl. No subscription, no app, no Wi-Fi — you just programme it once with your cat's chip and it works. It runs on four AA batteries that last months, and the lid mechanism is robust enough to handle a pushy cat trying to nose his way in. For two cats you'd buy two units, which keeps the cost predictable. It's around £60–65 per feeder on Amazon UK — not nothing, but these genuinely last for years and there's nothing cheaper that does the job as reliably.

Setup is genuinely simple — you press a button, let your cat eat from the bowl once, and it learns their chip. Done in under a minute. As for him trying to force it: the lid locks down firmly and the bowl has a low-profile design that makes it awkward for another cat to reach in. Most determined cats give up quickly once they realise it's not opening. The one thing I'd add: place the two feeders in different rooms if you can, or at least a good distance apart — that removes the social pressure on your timid cat and means she can eat at her own pace without him hovering. The SureFeed alone will sort the physical access problem, but the distance helps with the anxiety side of things too.