I had a hard time narrowing down which cat tree to go with because I have two 15 lb. cats and I wanted them to be able to use it. But I went with this because it appeared to have the largest surface area on all the different levels. Putting it together was easy, and right away I could tell it was sturdy. It took the cats a couple days to try it but once they understood what it was for I always find at least one of them perched on it. It was a very worthwhile buy!