The American Kennel Club, which is the largest registry of purebred dogs in the world, uses registration stats to rank the most popular breeds every year and for the first time in history, 2022 has the French bulldog in the top spot.
For the last 31 years, the Lab has been the most popular, but don’t feel too bad for the breed, they’re still the second most popular. French bulldogs, known as Frenchies, have been slowly becoming more popular over the last decade, as the breed was ranked 14th back in 2012 and has since had a 100% increase in registrations. In 2021, they were number two.
French Bulldogs have pretty big health issues which is what led to Norway banning the breeding of them. Similar bans are being considered in the U.K. Veterinary associations in Canada and Australia have called for more selectivity when breeding French Bulldogs.