Exhausted cat owner... Send help!

[Tiredbykitkat]

All help welcome!
We have a 7mth old kitten who as a family we adore. For background he is neutered and the only cat/pet in the household.
We have always shut him in the utility room over night. He has a large cat tree in there, basket, litter tray, food and plenty of toys. He seems happy enough to go in there and seems to sleep happily until.. 5am! When he miaows so loudly that everyone wakes up - even with all doors closed. One of us eventually goes down to get him out but by then we are already all awake. He's not hungry but wants to get out and see us. He comes running up to our bedroom, gives us each a nose kiss and then runs to do the same to the children eventually coming back to sit on me and purring very loudly. Now this is all very sweet and lovely, but we are all exhausted. We're not getting to sleep past 5am any morning.
We are hoping that when we get a cat flap installed in the utility room door it will help but honestly, how do others cope with early morning cat risers?
We've tried to give him free run of the house at night but it's the same story - at around 4.30-5 he'll come and wake us up (or if we keep our doors shut then he'll miaow on the landing). Any good ideas?

Cheddar used to wake me up several times a night for the first year, just for fuss. She's a bit better now she's taken to sleeping on the other pillow. But she's worse than a baby.

I was going to say it gets better as they get older but my 12 year old cat kept me awake half the night behaving like a knob last night. It's a very god job I adore him.

Without reading this fully I know he needs a friend. Its a game changer.

If there isn't a picture, there isn't really a kitten...

Well. After all the brilliant ideas on here, last night I gave him a really good play before bed, adjusted his cat tree so that the basket bit was next to the radiator and then gave him a pouch of wet food as I was shutting him in. And he slept till 6!! I feel so much better for the extra hour of sleep.
Thanks for all the ideas. This may have been a one off and I will keep the friend idea in mind and work on DH if it continues.
Sorry for no pic, I really like the anonymity of posting on here so don't really want to do that - and also I'm rubbish with technology and would probably end up posting a selfie or something daft!!
Really appreciate all the replies. Love Mumsnet.

This is your first battle of wills with the kitten, stay strong!!!

The battle we lost was boycat only drinking from a running tap 🙄

Ours has started coming in to our bed at 5 recently - she is six!

I read that when you get up in the morning, you should potter about and not feed the cat as soon as you get up. This can help stop them from pestering too early. I do this and mine don't wake me up, but it may be luck of the draw!

we got ours a pal

so now the pair of them tear about the house like a couple of lunatics and BOTH shout at the bedroom door

The only solution is to let him sleep on your pillow according to my spoilt cat

He will outgrow it which is why now I'm older I don't have kittens anymore, I just adopt cats three years plus.

Our two, one nearly six years old and the other ten months, have never done it, thank goodness.
I’m a night owl and like a lie in some mornings till 11.30am and they’re as good as good. They might wake me up getting on and off the bed or playing occasionally but no howling to get me up.

Google Jackson Galaxy

Indeed. He seems to advise playing with the cat before bedtime to wear him/her out.

Old girl 18 sleeps in my room otherwise she wails hideously all night, at around 5am sometimes earlier I get a good old bite on any exposed area to tell me is hungry. She doesn't give up either.
Kittens and old cats are the pits

My old cat used to do this, until we set an automatic cat feeder to go off at the time she woke. It stopped her meowing and she seemed quite happy until we got up then. We do the same with our current cat and no morning chorus 👍

I get subjected to kitty parkour at about 3am every morning for about half a hour I have tried lots of thing , tire him out before we go to bed feed him later / earlier , shut him in rooms , even putting him in a big crate absolutely nothing works !

You just have to ignore every night for as long as it takes!!!

If cat knows if they create enough you come then they create 🤷🏽‍♀️ ear plugs help...

Very hard to ignore a puss that is using me a spring board , he has learnt how to open the bedroom door so I need to put a heavy item behind it then he just sits there yowling to the extent that my neighbour thought he was in agony

Either you let him have the run of the house or you ignore it for as long as it takes.

Every time you cave he learns that yelling gets him results.

You need to massively up your ignoring skills.

Shut him in the room furthest from your neighbour. They learn, ours ask to go to bed and are bleary eyed and confused if we get up early.

My cat wakes me up at 4:50am every morning, by lying across my neck like a furry tabby scarf