My cats do not respond by name. Only kitty, kitty, kitty…
I can call my cat by name and he’ll come running from the other room, unless he’s asleep. He also knows the word “cat”.
The smart one responds either way, the less-smart one responds to neither. Sometimes I break off my kitty-kittying to remind him, “Lloyd, you’re the kitty!” but he can’t remember.
My cat only comes when I yell TREATS!
Neither. I call cats with various unspellable sounds – sibilants and trills. Even cats I don’t know react to these. You also use body language – head tilts sand hand gestures.
I’ll call my cats by name when I talk to them. Cats aren’t completely nonverbal (they certainly know the words “treats” and “out” and “moth”), but human spee ch is definitely a foreign language to them.
All three of my current feline overlords know their names and respond to them. All of my former FOs also knew their names and responded to them. Back in the days when I had indoor/outdoor cats, I would call my cats to come inside at night, and they would come when I called their names.
Both of mine know their names and sometimes answer to them – especially when food is involved. One of them gets really soppy when I say her name whilst petting her (Cammy-Cam-Cam, who’s a gorgeous Cammy cat etc 
)
It goes both ways. I’m pretty sure my cat’s just humoring me when she doesn’t burst into laughter at my stupid accent when I attempt “mrowwwrrrrrrr!”
I always thought “here kitty” was what you said to random cats that you didn’t know the name of. Hence the withering looks they usually give in response. Your own cat will usually soon teach you the magic code word (or sound, such as the opening of food containers).
We have a Snowshoe Siamese. I named her Sealy and my son named her KiKi because if I said the sky was blue, he’d swear it was yellow. We call her “cat.”
All of our cats respond to their names. Any generic summons will be met with scorn (unless you are tearing open a food envelope.)
One knows her name and responds to it.
One knows her name and several nicknames and responds to them all - BEAN! being the one I use most.
One is new and we think he knows his name, but he doesn’t really respond to us yet. He’s talkative though, and I hope to teach him to say his name one day.
Oops, didn’t know it was cats only.
My cat responds with a chirp when I call her by name, either phoebe or pheebs. It’s a very cute chirp with a rising tone and she picks her head up and tilts it to one side as if to say “yes?”
My cats all know their names. In fact, when I adopted my older orange boy (four years old when I adopted him), I mentioned that I was going to find a more suitable name than Shadow. The woman who was talking to me told me that he knows his name, and that I shouldn’t change it. She was right, although I do call him Shadowcat sometimes, and he’s OK with that.
My Siamese cat knows her name, and she knows all the other cat names, too. She’ll come to ANY name, because she figures if Charlie or Chaos or Shadow don’t show up, well, no sense in the pettings or the food going to waste. The other cats only respond to their own names, or the opening of the fridge door (there might be TURKEY or HAM coming out), or to opening a can, because the can might be cat food, or tuna (they get the water).
Both of my cats know and respond to their names. Charlie will come at a dead run when called. Ruby just saunters. She also responds to Woobs, her nickname. She usually mews back at me, too. She’s very vocal.
We use various nicknames and/or terms of endearment and/or “TREATS!!”
My cat knows his name. However, he may or may not respond to me calling his name. If he’s misbehaving and I yell, “CAT!” he knows EXACTLY what’s going on.
If he’s in my lap and I’m petting him, I talk baby talk to him and get all ooey-gooey. He tolerates that for a while, then he bites the Hell out of me and leaves.
If it’s a cold day, there will be a lump under the covers on the bed. If I call his name, the lump answers, and then he struggles out with a very annoyed look on his face.
My kids gave him to me on Valentine’s Day, 12 years ago. They got him from a shelter, and I think he’d been abused. For the first several years, he communicated mostly by taking huge chunks of flesh out of anyone who would dare to pet him.
So my kids have their own names for him. My son calls him “Shithead,” and my daughter calls him “Shitface.”
To me, he’s Zircon.
~VOW
I just call mine by his name, Shuppie. Sometimes, I’ll do a double, Shup-Shup. The double one seems to get his attention better.
Can you imagine how much we annoy cats? Beyond their names, we don’t have that much to say to them that’s interesting to a cat. I mean, there they are, sitting in a sunbeam, musing on their lives, reflecting on their deepest thoughts, and for absolutely no reason, the human in the house will interrupt them, demanding to be acknowledged. That’s it, just acknowledged. No food, no warnings of invaders, just here I am, look at me. And if the cat ignores the human’s pointless grab for attention, it’s the cat who’s the cold unfeeling animal.
Honestly, I don’t know why they put up with us.
“My” cat was a stray (who I think was left behind by my house’s previous owners). She was just “the cat that lives in the gararge” for so long I never gave her a name. Now she gets three meals a day spends every night indoors and helps me watch TV, but still hasn’t got a name. Responds best to the brandishing of food.
Typical interaction:
Cat: Runs under table, starts scratching up the good carpet…
Me: “Kitty! Stoppit!”
Cat: Stops… looks up… goes back to scratching…