The ten cats below come from The Guardian’s 2015 account of YouTube’s first decade. They include real animals, animated characters, and fictional personas that became widely recognizable through videos, memes, music, and repeatable comedy formats.
YouTube’s early viral culture turned ordinary home videos, animation, music, and deliberately silly characters into global cat celebrities. The ten entries below follow The Guardian’s 2015 account of YouTube’s first decade, which said the platform’s trends team considered views, subscribers, discussion, and the creativity a cat inspired—not simply current audience size. This is therefore a historical YouTube-era list, not a ranking of the ten largest cat accounts today.
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1. Maru: the box-loving Scottish Fold
Signature: Squeezing into cardboard boxes with improbable determination.
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The Guardian included Maru among YouTube’s defining cats, while Guinness World Records documented more than 325 million views for Maru as of September 22, 2016, then described him as the holder of the record for most views for an animal on YouTube. Maru died on September 6, 2025, at age 18, so he should now be remembered as one of the platform’s pioneering animal stars rather than described as an active cat creator. The Guardian’s historical list provides the contemporary context for his fame.
If Maru’s box experiments inspire you to create a safer version at home, a cardboard cat scratcher or cat lounger is preferable to assuming every shipping box is clean, stable, or free of staples and tape. That suggestion is about safe enrichment—not equipment Maru himself used.
2. Grumpy Cat: Tardar Sauce and the expression that became a meme
Signature: A permanently displeased-looking face.
Grumpy Cat’s real name was Tardar Sauce. Her distinctive expression became an international meme after a photograph spread online in 2012. A subsequent YouTube video received more than 1.5 million views in its first 36 hours, helping transform a widely shared image into a recognizable media personality.
The important correction to the joke was that Tardar Sauce was reportedly a happy cat. Her appearance was associated with feline dwarfism, not with an unhappy temperament. In other words, “Grumpy Cat” described the visual character created by the image and the internet—not her mood. YouTube amplified a phenomenon that initially broke out through a Reddit image, so it is more accurate to say the platform helped make her mainstream than to claim YouTube was the original source of her fame.
3. Simon’s Cat: the animated feline with human problems
Signature: Short animated stories about feeding time, mischief, and cat logic.
Simon’s Cat is different from the rest of this list: it is an animated character, not one filmed animal. Animator Simon Tofield launched the YouTube channel in 2007, using loose black-and-white drawings and highly recognizable cat behavior to build short-form comedy.
The character’s situations are familiar to cat owners: a cat demands food, interrupts an activity, discovers a forbidden object, or treats its human’s attention as a resource to be claimed. According to The Guardian, the channel had generated more than 640 million views and nearly 3.5 million subscribers by 2015. Simon’s Cat belongs here because YouTube was a principal distribution engine for the character’s short animated episodes.
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4. Surprised Kitten: one reaction, repeated millions of times
Signature: A kitten’s startled response while being tickled.
Surprised Kitten is best understood as a viral video and recurring internet reference rather than a carefully developed celebrity brand. The October 2009 upload appeared on the owner’s “rozzzafly” channel and was reportedly the channel’s only video. Even so, the clip’s simple reaction proved highly repeatable and memorable.
The Guardian reported that the video had passed 75 million views by 2015. Its place in YouTube history illustrates how the platform rewarded a brief, easily understood moment: viewers did not need background information, a continuing storyline, or a famous owner to understand why the kitten’s reaction was funny.
5. BaneCat: the masked supervillain
Signature: A cat in a villain-inspired mask, presented as a recurring menace.
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The character’s name can create a misleading assumption about the animal. Behind-the-scenes material reported by The Guardian revealed that BaneCat was female. The name belonged to the fictional persona, not to the cat’s biological sex. BaneCat also demonstrates how YouTube creators could turn a pet into a repeatable role: the audience returned not just for a particular animal, but for the continuing masked-villain premise.
6. Henri the Existential Cat: feline melancholy in black and white
Signature: French narration, monochrome cinematography, and existential despair.
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Henri the Existential Cat—also known as Henri Le Chat Noir—is a black cat presented in short films written and directed by William Braden. The films use French narration and a deliberately serious visual style to give everyday cat behavior an air of philosophical crisis.
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1Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitches2Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems3Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteBraden had posted clips online since 2007, but the character’s wider breakthrough came after BuzzFeed featured the videos in 2011. That path matters: Henri was not simply “discovered by YouTube.” Rather, online platforms worked together. YouTube hosted the films, BuzzFeed expanded their reach, and the character’s distinctive tone made him recognizable beyond a single clip. The Guardian also reported substantial YouTube viewership and Henri’s Golden Kitty recognition.
7. Colonel Meow: the long-haired internet dictator
Signature: A stern expression, extraordinary fur, and a mock-dictator persona.
Colonel Meow was a long-haired cat whose severe face inspired jokes about authoritarian rule. His online identity treated ordinary cat demands as orders from a tyrant, creating a character that was easy to recognize even before viewers knew the details of a particular video.
The Guardian reported that Colonel Meow’s channel had accumulated about three million views and noted his Guinness World Record for longest fur at nine inches. Colonel Meow is deceased, so his place on this list is historical. He represents an early period when a striking appearance, a memorable name, and a consistent comic persona could establish a cat as an internet character before today’s social platforms had fully developed.
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8. Nyan Cat: the pixel-art cat that flew through space
Signature: A Pop-Tart-bodied pixel cat, a rainbow trail, and an endlessly repeating tune.
Nyan Cat is not a real animal celebrity. It is an animated pixel-art character shown flying through space with a rainbow streaming behind it. The combination of simple visuals, repetition, and music made the clip instantly identifiable and unusually easy to remix, reuse, and reference.
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The Guardian reported that the original YouTube video had exceeded 120 million views by 2015. Nyan Cat’s influence also extended beyond the video itself into websites, games, clothing, and other merchandise. That broader afterlife is why Nyan Cat belongs in a list of famous “cats” even though there was no household animal behind the character: the meme became a cultural object in its own right.
9. Keyboard Cat: a brand larger than one cat
Signature: Footage of a cat appearing to play an electronic keyboard.
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Keyboard Cat originated with footage of Charlie Schmidt’s cat Fatso appearing to play an electronic keyboard. The clip became a recurring reaction meme and was later circulated through YouTube and the wider internet. Its familiar punchline was often used after an online failure or embarrassing moment: “play him off,” as though the cat were providing a musical exit.
Keyboard Cat should be distinguished from any single animal. Fatso was the original cat in the footage; the character was later represented by Bento and then another cat. The official Keyboard Cat YouTube presence identifies itself as the brand’s official channel, promotes merchandise, and lists the original video among its most-viewed uploads. If you want a keepsake tied to the character, Keyboard Cat plush merchandise is a natural option, but check the listing and licensing details before buying because not every marketplace item is necessarily official.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.10. Sparta Cat: the “Mean Kitty Song”
Signature: A music-driven comedy character built around a memorable cat video.
Sparta Cat is also associated with the “Mean Kitty Song.” Videos featuring the cat began appearing in 2007, and the character helped build the audience of the wider SMP Films channel. Rather than relying only on a cat’s appearance, the format combined an identifiable animal with a song and a comic premise.
The Guardian reported that the original song was approaching 82 million views by 2015. Sparta Cat is best treated as a recognizable YouTube-era character and song-driven meme—not as a claim that the cat currently runs one of the platform’s largest channels.
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What this list says about YouTube cat fame
These ten entries are not all the same kind of celebrity. Maru, Tardar Sauce, Colonel Meow, and the animals associated with Keyboard Cat were real cats. Simon’s Cat, Nyan Cat, and Henri were character-driven creations, while BaneCat and Sparta Cat depended heavily on fictional presentation and recurring formats. Surprised Kitten became famous through a single reaction that viewers remembered and shared.
The common thread was not simply cuteness. Each cat had a repeatable hook:
- Maru: boxes and determined physical comedy.
- Grumpy Cat: an unmistakable expression.
- Simon’s Cat: animated versions of familiar cat-owner conflicts.
- Surprised Kitten: a perfectly legible reaction.
- BaneCat: a mask and a supervillain premise.
- Henri: existential narration and visual style.
- Colonel Meow: severe looks, long fur, and mock authority.
- Nyan Cat: looping animation, music, and remixability.
- Keyboard Cat: a musical reaction format.
- Sparta Cat: a song built around a memorable feline character.
For people who want to recreate the spirit of these videos with their own pets, enrichment should come before performance. An interactive cat toy can provide play and mental stimulation, but no cat should be forced to perform, dressed up in an uncomfortable costume, or exposed to repeated handling for a video.
Editorial note: Historical view and subscriber figures above retain the dates reported by the cited sources. They should not be read as current platform totals. This article uses “made famous by YouTube” broadly: in several cases, Reddit, BuzzFeed, pre-YouTube footage, or other online communities played an important part in the cat’s original breakthrough.
Frequently Asked Questions
How were these ten YouTube cats selected?
This is a historical list based on The Guardian’s 2015 report about YouTube’s first decade. Its selection considered views, subscribers, discussion, and creativity inspired—not just current follower counts.
Are all ten entries real cats?
No. Simon’s Cat and Nyan Cat are animated characters, while BaneCat, Keyboard Cat, and Sparta Cat rely heavily on fictional or branded personas. The list includes famous feline characters as well as real animals.
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Several became known through other online routes before or alongside YouTube. Grumpy Cat first broke out through a Reddit image, Henri gained wider attention after BuzzFeed coverage, and Keyboard Cat’s source footage predates its later YouTube circulation.
The Bottom Line
The first great YouTube cats became famous by offering more than a cute face: they had a format people could instantly recognize and share. Boxes, masks, music, animation, reaction shots, and distinctive visual identities turned individual animals—and fictional cats—into enduring internet characters.
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