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Fila Brasileiro

The breeds · working

FCI standard 225

Fila Brasileiro.

FCI 225: UTILIZATION 'Watch Dog'; Group 2, Section 2.1 Molossoid, Mastiff type; without working trial. Temperament: courage, determination, outstanding braveness; docile, obedient and extremely tolerant with children with its family; 'an unsurpassed guardian of properties, it also instinctively indulges in big game hunting and cattle herding'; natural aloofness towards strangers, especially in its own territory. CAFIB: courage, determination and valour; dislike of strangers is not hidden; in the city an unsurpassed property guard and in the country an excellent cattle dog and hunter of large animals; at shows the dog may not allow a stranger judge to touch it, and an attack on the judge is not to be faulted. Wikipedia: used as a guard dog, for cattle herding and big-game hunting, may be a companion; 'filar' means to hold or grab, so the name suggests a catch dog that bites and does not let go; bred on large plantations and cattle farms; taught to chase down jaguars and other animals; and in the eighteenth century, when slavery was legal in Brazil, used to return escaped slaves to their owners; first written standard 1946. Wikipedia: ownership is restricted by law in some countries; it lists Fiji, the United Kingdom, Norway, Australia, Hong Kong and Cyprus (illegal to own without a court exemption), Turkey (illegal to own and breed) and Trinidad and Tobago (classed as a dangerous dog). Check current local law..

Breed sets the odds. The parents set the dog. Every number here shows its source, its spread and how sure we are. Nothing on this page is a prediction about one dog.

0INHeightdogs null, bitches null. An ideal from the standard, not a range.
88–-InfinityLBWeight, all linesbreed dogs 110 lb; breed bitches 88.2 lb.

The body

What the breed is built like. Registry standards give an ideal, not a range.

Height at the shoulder

dogs 25.6 to 29.5 in · bitches 23.6 to 27.6 in

Breed clubFCI-Standard N° 225, 2016

Span covers FCI and CAFIB. No ideal printed.

Weight

dogs 110 lb · bitches 88.2 lb

Breed clubFCI-Standard N° 225, 2016

Low is the printed minimum; no maximum printed anywhere, so high is blank.

Coat

FCI 225: short, smooth, dense, close to the body; brindle, fawn and black, black mask may or may not be present; white marks allowed on feet, chest and tail tip, white markings exceeding one fourth of the body a serious fault; white, mouse-grey, dappled, black and tan and blue disqualify. Thick, loose skin with pronounced dewlaps is called one of the most important breed characteristics. Wikipedia: the CAFIB standard rejects black, mouse-grey, black and tan, blue and dappled as signs of crossbreeding, and accepts larger white markings.

Breed clubFCI-Standard N° 225, 2016

Heat tolerance

4 of 5 · FCI 225: coat short, smooth, dense and close to the body; thick, loose skin over the whole body.

DerivedFCI-Standard N° 225, 2016

Derived from a short dense coat (4). No measured data.

The work

What it was built to do in the field, and what a test or trial asks of it.

Role

FCI 225: UTILIZATION 'Watch Dog'; Group 2, Section 2.1 Molossoid, Mastiff type; without working trial. Temperament: courage, determination, outstanding braveness; docile, obedient and extremely tolerant with children with its family; 'an unsurpassed guardian of properties, it also instinctively indulges in big game hunting and cattle herding'; natural aloofness towards strangers, especially in its own territory. CAFIB: courage, determination and valour; dislike of strangers is not hidden; in the city an unsurpassed property guard and in the country an excellent cattle dog and hunter of large animals; at shows the dog may not allow a stranger judge to touch it, and an attack on the judge is not to be faulted. Wikipedia: used as a guard dog, for cattle herding and big-game hunting, may be a companion; 'filar' means to hold or grab, so the name suggests a catch dog that bites and does not let go; bred on large plantations and cattle farms; taught to chase down jaguars and other animals; and in the eighteenth century, when slavery was legal in Brazil, used to return escaped slaves to their owners; first written standard 1946. Wikipedia: ownership is restricted by law in some countries; it lists Fiji, the United Kingdom, Norway, Australia, Hong Kong and Cyprus (illegal to own without a court exemption), Turkey (illegal to own and breed) and Trinidad and Tobago (classed as a dangerous dog). Check current local law.

Breed clubFCI-Standard N° 225, 2016

Wikipedia's slavery-era use is stated as history. The CAFIB and FCI temperament lines are the breed standards' own words. The legal list is Wikipedia only (the government pages it cites were not opened); shown so a reader knows to check.

Primary game

FCI 225: big game hunting (no species named). CAFIB: large animals. Wikipedia: jaguars, taught to chase down jaguars and other animals.

Breed clubFCI-Standard N° 225, 2016

Jaguar is named by Wikipedia alone.

Also used on

FCI 225: cattle herding, guarding of properties. CAFIB: cattle work (boiadeiro) and property guard. Wikipedia: guard dog, cattle herding, companion or pet.

Breed clubFCI-Standard N° 225, 2016

How common the problems are

Evaluated dogs skew toward breeding stock; the numbers are still the best there are.

Hip dysplasia

37.9% · 742 OFA hip evaluations, current all-data, accessed Oct 12 2026; 37.9% dysplastic (mild 23.7, moderate 12.4, severe 1.8), 56.1% normal

MeasuredOrthopedic Foundation for Animals

OFA's own breed statistics. OFA-evaluated dogs skew toward breeding stock, with normal results over-represented. Hips rank 17 in the OFA table.

Elbow dysplasia

32.5% · 228 OFA elbow evaluations, current all-data, accessed Oct 12 2026; 32.5% abnormal (grade 1 19.7, grade 2 9.6, grade 3 3.1), 67.5% normal

MeasuredOrthopedic Foundation for Animals

OFA's own breed statistics. OFA-evaluated dogs skew toward breeding stock, with normal results over-represented. Elbows rank 10.

How to read this page

Every value carries a label. Measured means peer-reviewed data on many dogs. Studied means peer-reviewed, smaller or indirect. Breed club means a club or registry states it. Editorial means expert opinion with no measurement behind it. Where two good sources disagree, both are shown and neither is averaged.

Published when the entry rests on the best information available from no fewer than three independent sources, checked by a second pass that did not write it. 2 sources on this page. Found something wrong? Tell us and the correction is logged with its date.

Also called
Brazilian Mastiff, Cao de Fila

Every breed, read the same way.

The breed index grows as entries clear the standard. Gun dogs first.

All published breeds

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