What is Angora Wool?

Angora wool doesn’t fall off trees. It’s not shed naturally and gathered with care. It’s stolen - torn from the backs of rabbits who are caged, mutilated, and treated as nothing more than wool-producing machines.

These rabbits don’t get to run. They don’t get to dig. They don’t get to live.

What Is Angora Wool?

Angora wool comes from Angora rabbits - gentle, social individuals with complex personalities and strong bonds. But you wouldn’t know that from the way they’re treated.

Their ultra-soft coats have been twisted into a commodity. Found in everything from high-end fashion to fast fashion, Angora wool is sold as a "luxury fibre", lumped in with cashmere and mohair. But there's nothing luxurious about what these rabbits endure.

Live Plucking

The most common method of harvesting Angora wool is live plucking. That means restraining a terrified rabbit and ripping the fur from her skin — without anaesthetic, without mercy. This happens up to four times a year. Imagine your hair being yanked out in clumps, over your entire body, while you scream. That’s Angora.

The fur is pulled from every part of the body except the head. The rest? Torn away, leaving the rabbit bald and defenceless against the cold.

Workers have been filmed tying rabbits down, bending them into unnatural positions, and yanking their hair out by hand. The animals scream. They bleed. They don’t understand why.

The Cages Are Just as Bad

Angora rabbits are kept in tiny wire-mesh cages. Alone. Not enough room to stretch, let alone hop. Their natural behaviours - digging, foraging, socialising - are impossible.

The cages are so small they can barely move. The wire cuts into their feet. The floors become soaked in urine, and the ammonia burns their eyes.

Some die from stress. Some go mad. And when their fur yield drops? Their throats are slit. Their bodies are sold for meat.

Male Rabbits? Killed at Birth

Female rabbits produce more wool. That makes them more profitable. So most male Angora rabbits are killed as soon as they’re born - discarded like trash because they’re not profitable enough to be kept alive.

Sound familiar? It should. The egg industry does the same thing to male chicks.

The Death Toll Is Staggering

At least 50 million Angora rabbits are bred in China every year alone. Around 90% of the world’s Angora wool comes from China — where no animal protection laws apply. None. Zero. These animals can be, and are, abused without consequence.

But the problem isn’t just China. So-called “high-welfare” farms in France, for example, were exposed doing the exact same thing: tying down rabbits and ripping fur from their bodies. No matter the country, no matter the label, “humane Angora” is a marketing lie.

Bred for Exploitation

Angora rabbits have been selectively bred to produce unnaturally thick, fluffy coats. This isn’t how rabbits evolved — this is how humans made them.

The consequences? They can’t groom themselves properly. They go blind from matted fur. They ingest so much hair they get fatal blockages. They overheat easily and suffer from eye infections, skin disease, and stress-induced illness.

Their bodies aren’t built for their own coats. They’ve been genetically manipulated into suffering.

Rabbits Are Individuals, Not Raw Materials

In the wild, rabbits are clean, curious, social animals. They dig burrows, forage for food, and maintain strong social structures. They cover a square mile of territory and clean themselves constantly.

On Angora farms, they’re treated like nothing. They live in filth. They go insane from isolation. They are not seen as someone, but something.

The average Angora rabbit could live up to 12 years. On farms, they’re usually killed at 2 or 3. The second their fur production dips, they’re deemed worthless and killed. Their lives cut short not because they’re dying — but because they aren’t profitable.

Environmental Destruction

Angora wool doesn’t just kill rabbits — it damages the planet. These farms are environmental disasters, consuming land, water, energy, and feed to prop up a niche luxury market.

The Fur Free Alliance rightly calls out the fashion industry’s lies: promoting animal-derived materials as “sustainable” is false and misleading. Just like leather. Just like cashmere. Just like fur.

The Industry Knows and Still Chooses Profit

Hundreds of fashion brands have banned Angora after seeing the footage. They’ve seen the cages. They’ve heard the screams. They’ve watched the fur being ripped out of living, breathing rabbits.

And yet Angora products still make it to store shelves. Someone still signs off on that. Someone still shrugs and says, “It’s just wool.”

But it’s not just wool. It’s someone’s coat. Someone’s body. Someone’s life.

There Is No Ethical Angora. Full Stop.

It doesn’t matter how many labels you slap on it. “Responsibly sourced,” “high welfare,” “humane” — none of it changes the fact that fur is forcibly taken, rabbits are killed, and profit is put above life.

If the word “fur” is on the label, there’s blood on it too.

Your Choice Matters

This isn’t about personal taste. This is about justice.

Every time you pick up a product with Angora, you’re holding the suffering of a rabbit who didn’t want to die. You’re supporting an industry that slaughters gentle beings for fashion.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. There are countless cruelty-free, plant-derived fabrics — cotton, linen, bamboo, Tencel. There are brands committed to using only vegan materials. The alternatives are here.

We don’t need Angora. Rabbits do.

Demand Abolition, Not Reform

This isn’t a call for “better” standards. There is no ethical way to farm individuals for profit. There is no such thing as kind exploitation.

The answer isn’t higher welfare. The answer is freedom.

Freedom from cages. Freedom from plucking. Freedom from being born into a system that sees you as nothing but a product.

Don’t settle for “not as bad.” Don’t compromise someone’s life for a slightly softer jumper. Reject the entire system.

Angora rabbits are not resources. They are not sweaters. They are not mittens. They are not accessories.

They are someone. And they deserve to be left alone.