Why do cartoon characters always wear the same outfits?

As P said it is about the money. Since it isn't the same person drawing the cartoons every time, they have to make it consistent with one design or maybe three or four. Take FAMGUY: The characters have their normal clothes, their church clothes, and their swimming clothes. Basic outfits for a variety or basic situations.

Cartoon Characters Outfits

No, no, no! I think cartoon characters mainly wear the same outfits to probably increase their character reception. And the artists decide on what to make those characters wear, not to what they should wear. But however, some anime shows like Soul Eater actually aren't popular in taste of outfits because of the constant changes in some scenes. One should see why anime like that are sometimes lazy in fashion sense, and just do whatever the characters are doing. But one thing in similar: IT'S THE CARTOON WORLD!!!

It depends on their artist.

In a lot of the simple type cartoons (like the ones you mentioned) artists will tend to stick to the same outfit.

In more dramatic, serious, plotted etc cartoons/animes, the characters WILL change outfits or at least have their outfit slightly altered throughout a series. Take Soul Eater or Bleach. The characters are just about always changing their outfits. (Well, in Bleach, I mean the humans, not the shinigami xP)

Hope I helped! <3

It's much easier for the illustrators. But in some cartoons, they don't always wear the same outfits. "The Weekenders" is the only one I can think of...

Money! :) The fact of the matter is that once something is drawn, it is so much quicker to re-use it for future episodes, that way the deadlines get met. Even with a hired army of inkers, or the wonders of computers, it would just take too long to do totally fresh content on shows that have to come out a week apart! So there *is* a practical reason - it's down to time and money.

Have none of you ever seen a storyboard? The artists and animators don't chose the clothes, it's the writers, directors, and producers.

Changing the characters clothes could annoy some of the audience or make them think that a drastic change in the character is in the works; this, in all likelihood, is why they never change the characters. Those who watch it, I'm sure, prefer more familiar faces in familiar designs as opposed to the same character in several.

I have no problem with it myself, because I think it would be quite irrational to change some characters clothes when they're almost undeniably going to wear them; Goku in DBZ never changes his orange & blue gi, Kenshin in Rurouni Kenshin never (or extremely rarely) changes what he wears, and while this may be because of familiarity, I think it's possible the creator would further explain why they always wear that as Akira Toriyama did with DBZ. It fits them and in my opinion, composes a part of their character.

I guess it's just because The animaters like things the way they are. But in the Simpsons, Bart used to wear a blue shirt. Then they changed the color to Orange.

Some represent the character...and some describe the character.

For example, in the anime, Ah! My Goddess, Belldandy carries out her goddess duties wearing her blue, white, and gold "battle dress."

Plus, it increases sales from merchandise and cosplay stuff.