Hello Kitty fans, brace yourselves—Sanrio, the creators of the beloved character, have made a revelation that has left the internet in shock. Hello Kitty, known worldwide for her signature red bow and charming whiskers, is not a cat. This bombshell has the internet reeling.
Image credits: Hello Kitty & Friends / Instagram
Sanrio’s senior vice president of marketing and brand management, Jill Koch, spoke to Today last week to mark Hello Kitty’s 50th anniversary. She disclosed that Hello Kitty is actually a little girl who lives in London with her parents and twin sister, Mimmy. “Hello Kitty is not a cat,” Jill explained. “She’s a little girl born and raised in the suburbs of London. She has a mom and dad and a twin sister, Mimmy—who is also her best friend.”
Image credits: Hello Kitty & Friends / Instagram
Jill added that Hello Kitty enjoys baking cookies and making new friends. She even has a pet cat named Charmmy Kitty and a boyfriend. The internet went into a frenzy following this revelation.
One user on X insisted, “Hello Kitty is a cat in my eyes.” Another user stubbornly declared, “It’s a girl cat and nothing will ever change my mind,” to which someone responded, “Yeah, for my own sanity and childhood, I’m sticking to that lol.” Many users echoed this sentiment, with one saying, “Hello Kitty is absolutely a cat, with a pet cat. The same way Mickey has Pluto & Goofy still exists in the same universe.”
On YouTube, a perplexed fan commented, “So, a little girl with whiskers?? How is she not a cat?! Someone help! We are being gaslit!!” Another simply stated, “I don’t care what they say; that thing is a cat.”
This isn’t the first time Hello Kitty’s true nature as a little girl has been revealed. In 2014, anthropologist Christine R. Yano clarified that Hello Kitty is a human child. “Hello Kitty is not a cat. She’s a cartoon character. She is a little girl. She is a friend. But she is not a cat. She’s never depicted on all fours. She walks and sits like a two-legged creature,” she told the LA Times.
Hello Kitty, created by the renowned Japanese designer and illustrator Yuko Shimizu while working for Sanrio in 1974, was first seen on small purses made by the company, quickly becoming one of Sanrio’s fastest-selling products. Although Yuko left the company two years later, her creation has become a global phenomenon that remains widely loved nearly five decades later.
