Breed + Health and Age Test Bundle

Embark is a research partner of Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine, with one of the world's largest dog DNA databases. That means more data behind every result — not just a bigger marketing claim.

Genetic health risks don't always show symptoms right away. Testing now means you and your vet can watch for a risk before it becomes a bigger problem.

Yes. Genetic health information is useful at any age. It's never too late to learn what's in your dog's DNA.

In your results, you’ll receive an estimated age and birthdate for your dog, plus information about how to interpret those results.

Your results will also include what we call a prediction interval—the range of dates likely to contain your dog’s true birthday. Their estimated birthday will be within this range. While there’s no way to be sure of the exact day, this is our best estimate, based on their methylation profile.

With the Age Test, 77% of dogs have a true birthday within 12 months of their estimated birthday.

This means that if one dog takes the Age Test multiple times, they may receive different estimated birthdays, but we expect 77% to fall within the same prediction interval in the test results.

DNA methylation is the most well-known type of epigenetic marker. It’s a chemical modification that doesn’t change the actual genetic code of the DNA, but can change how genes work. Methylation patterns can change with environment, lifestyle, stress, disease, or age.

As your dog ages, the level of DNA methylation changes in a predictable way. We can use the amount and position of DNA methylation as a type of “clock” to estimate age (Horvath et al. 2021).

Studying the relationship between methylation and age is a cutting-edge area of science. There are published papers showing this method works in dogs, humans, and many other mammals.

For more details, read this article explaining the science behind the Age Test.

The Age Test works best for dogs past the puppy stage. Because of how DNA methylation testing works, we don't recommend it for dogs that are likely under one year old.