🔗 Share this article

Tune into plenty of productivity experts, and you'll be tempting to convince yourself that a nap is a secret weapon: more than a sticking plaster following a bad night’s sleep, but a shortcut to enhanced cognition, a brighter outlook and maybe a faster 5k run time. Premier League footballers are all at it – as do musicians, UFC champions and business leaders. Yet, when you haven’t got a room for napping or a career that allows frequent naps, can there *honestly* sufficient advantages to a quick nap to justify the hassle? Is there a reliable way to nod off promptly? Furthermore, can you truly ensure you will get up feeling improved, rather than worse?

Identifying Your Nap Motivation

“Experts note three primary motivations for daytime sleep in the adult population,” notes a leading circadian rhythm professor. “Firstly, there's termed recovery napping, essentially what happens following poor sleep overnight. The second is prophylactic napping, where you are pre-empting insufficient sleep ahead, for example if you’re working overnight shifts. Finally, there's “hedonic napping”, which basically comes down to the wish: there is a chance to nap in the afternoon, and it's pleasant to indulge.”

The primary task to undertake, therefore, is to examine why you want to nap. “Daytime sleep can be genuinely useful when overnight rest is disturbed due to causes beyond your control – for instance, when you are a new parent, or you’re recovering after being ill or heavy physical exertion,” states a sleep expert. “Yet when you’re napping because your night sleep seems unreliable or poor, that’s often a sign your need for sleep is not where it should be. Under those circumstances, napping can become part of the problem, rather than the answer. Use napping for brief periods to address immediate needs – the focus ought to remain a strong and predictable sleep at night.”

The Optimal Nap Length

This means that naps ought not to be too extended to disrupt your overnight rest, and best shouldn’t take place after about 3pm (contingent on what time you retire at night). What's a reasonable length? Recommendations vary. From the most-cited studies about napping, experts discovered that astronauts had a boost of up to 54% in vigilance plus a 34% rise in cognitive performance post a 26-minute snooze (to be precise, this involved a six-minute sleep onset time). “I recommend setting an alarm for 20-30 minutes – the majority doze off quickly,” explains a specialist. “There’s a lot of advice around concerning the optimal amount for sleeping, however, that can cause people to feel more worried than anything else – and the worst thing you can do while aiming to get to sleep is to be anxious.”

Should you decide to nap for a longer period, steer clear of the 45-60 minute window that encourages sleep inertia, that foggy state when you wake. “Research would say it is preferable to take a longer nap of 60 to 90 minutes compared to a medium-length nap,” notes the sleep scientist. “Three-quarters of an hour is long enough to plunge you into slow-wave sleep and you’re more likely to feel sluggish when you get up – while if you extend it a little longer to a full sleep cycle, it's likely you'll to be completing a full cycle and should wake up feeling more alert. Though if you’re sleeping for a long period, it will affect the quality of your sleep that night.”

Establishing an Ideal Snooze Setting

When it comes to exact methodologies, advice differs. Certain specialists propose using similar routines you use to promote a good night’s sleep: a silent space, a supportive surface and as much darkness as possible. Others suggest that one could simply nap on the sofa with ambient lighting is available – both to discourage post-nap grogginess and to “protect” your bedroom as the place you associate with nighttime rest. “Napping is quite challenging to command,” explains a specialist. “Without any drowsiness, it becomes harder to get comfortable and practically tell yourself to go to sleep. There must be some drive there to bring the sleep on in the first place. For me, it's possible to snooze during the day and wake up naturally without a timer, however, what assists many individuals is to look for a time that they’re naturally somewhat sleepy and just gently relax into it.”

Experimentation is key, and should your choices are limited – for instance, if attempting to squeeze in some shut-eye on a train or in a soundproof office pod – it is perfectly fine to employ sleep aids. “Coaching professional sportspeople, I suggest that they don’t get used to their own bed for naps, as they’re going to have|they will