I’m still pretty new to the game, just started last month, and actually hit 120 last week with my Hunter. One question i have though is do i need to actually feed my pet? During the whole time leveling up to 120 i never feed them once. I’ve read that I should, but wasn’t sure how old the article was on it. What do i gain by feeding them? How can I tell when i need to feed them?
Second question, I know there is no “best” pet, but are spirit beasts considered some of the better ones to have?
No you don’t have to feed it. Back in the day (or in classic) you had to feed your pet to keep it happy. You can feed it if its low on health though.
In the game today(Battle for Azeroth) there’s no need to feed your pet.
The ability to do so, still exists. You can use it to feed your pet, instantly restoring a large portion of it’s health(if missing).
As Fugger mentioned, in WoW: Classic, which is a remake of the original WoW(referred to as Vanilla by many players), you did need to feed your pet on a regular basis.
The visual of when that was needed, you could see by an icon displayed next to your pet’s unitframe.
If your pet was happy, the icon looked like a 
with a green background.
If it was hungry, the icon changed to 
something like that and also changed color to yellow.
And if the pet was very hungry, the icon became red and displayed a frowning face 
As a Beastmaster(the spec) you can tame and fight with pets that are Spirit Beasts.
In end-game content, they are considered to be very good. For PvE, they’re the default choice unless your group is missing something like Bloodlust/Heroism/Time Warp. Ferocity-pets can bring such an ability, called Primal Rage.
Spirit Beasts are of a different type, called Tenacity, and they bring certain utility and abilities that are focused more on defensives.
Specifically:
Survival of the Fittest - ability that makes you take reduced damage for a short period.
Spirit Shock - a purge-like ability that removes some magical or enrage-type effects from an enemy if used.
Spirit Mend - which is a fairly strong heal + heal-over-time effect that is usable on any friendly unit(including yourself and your pet).
In addition to this, Tenacity-pets also come with a passive percentage-boost to your total health.
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To add to this, the best Ferocity and Cunning pets in PvE are Clefthooves (due to having 2 defensive traits) and Silithids (due to having a passive run speed increase) respectively.
Spirit Beasts are the default choice for most situations but sometimes having a pet that can get to places quickly and be repositioned easily is good, in which case Cunning pets are good due to their passive runspeed increase and the Master’s Call pet ability which causes the pet to rush to your location (this is also a movement impairment break like Blessing of Freedom). Ferocity pets are used when you need a Bloodlust effect (common in M+ where your group isn’t guaranteed to have a Mage or Shaman) and also for solo content due to the high amount of passive leech for the pet.
For PvP the best pet is generally a Raptor because it’s Cunning (root break Master’s Call) and has a debuff that reduces healing taken.
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Feeding your pet has becoming a novelty ability since the day of Vanilla WoW. And when lots of people used to own Worgen as a pet before they turned into Worgs. Ahh… The memories…
I remember in Vanilla I had a coworker who lost his pet because he did not feed it enough.
I often made fun of him about it. He really got upset about it, because he loved that pet. But I would bring it up as proof that he was lazy and inconsiderate.
“Even keeping a video game pet is too much work for you,” and such.
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