Beagle vs Scottish Terrier — Side by Side

	Beagle	Scottish Terrier
Lifespan	10-15 years	11-13 years
Size	Small	Small
Weight	20-30 lb	18-22 lb
Energy	High	Moderate
Grooming	Low	High
Shedding	Moderate	Low
With kids	Good with kids	With supervision

What actually separates them

Less hair on the sofa with the Scottish Terrier. More with the Beagle.
Less brushing with the Beagle. More with the Scottish Terrier.
Calmer of the two is the Scottish Terrier. The one that needs more exercise is the Beagle.
Beagle tends to live longer — 10-15 years against 11-13 years.
With young children, Beagle is the safer default — Scottish Terrier is listed as "With supervision".

The honest downside of each

Beagle

A Beagle's nose runs the dog, not the owner — bred to follow a scent trail for miles regardless of what the handler wants, so unreliable off-leash recall is a breed trait, not a training failure, and a bored, under-exercised Beagle is one of the most vocal and destructive small breeds there is.

Scottish Terrier

Scotties carry one of the best-documented cancer risks of any breed — a Purdue University study found them roughly 20 times more likely than other breeds to develop bladder cancer — a fact almost never mentioned by sellers focused on the breed's famous silhouette.

Read the full pages

Beagle · Scottish Terrier
Health problems, origin and what living with each is actually like.