Sleep Advice
The interventions with the strongest evidence behind them are also the cheapest, and almost nobody does them first.
This site sells nothing on this page, because the things that most reliably improve sleep are free.
A dark bedroom. Light suppresses melatonin and shifts your body clock, and this has the clearest evidence of anything here.
Morning daylight. It anchors the clock that the evening signal works against, and twenty minutes outdoors on an overcast British morning is far brighter than indoor lighting.
A consistent wake time, which is more effective than a consistent bedtime.
If sleep has been a problem for weeks
Cognitive behavioural therapy for insomnia is the evidence-based first-line treatment in the UK, and a GP can refer you, including to digital programmes. No mattress, app or supplement substitutes for it.
Pauses in breathing during sleep, gasping awake, or heavy daytime sleepiness need a GP rather than a purchase.
How sleep works
The fundamentals
When it goes wrong
Sleeping through particular situations
Life stages
Pain and recovery
Temperature is the most misdiagnosed cause
Waking hot is blamed on the mattress more than anything else, and the duvet is usually the culprit. Seven to 10.5 tog suits most modern UK bedrooms, and 13.5 is a convention from draughtier housing.
The second culprit is the protector. A cheap plastic-backed one blocks air as well as liquid, and it is the commonest reason a good hybrid mattress sleeps hot.
And clamminess is what most people describe as heat. Damp fabric against skin feels warm whatever the air temperature, so a fibre that moves moisture does more than any cooling treatment.
If you sleep hot
Light and noise
The order to try things in
Free first. A dark room, morning daylight, a consistent wake time, and getting out of bed if you have been awake around twenty minutes, which is a core part of CBT-I.
Then cheap. Duvet tog, pillow height, a breathable protector, a cotton or lyocell pillowcase. Together these cost under a hundred pounds and address most temperature complaints.
Then the mattress, which is the expensive end and the last place to look unless you wake with pain rather than simply waking.
The diagnostic that sorts the two: waking uncomfortable is a bedding problem; struggling to fall asleep is usually not.
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