The benefits of napping

Is napping good for you?

Napping can be beneficial or disruptive depending on a number of factors, including your age, when and how long you nap, and why you nap. It's important to grasp how each of these factors affects the impact of a nap if you want to get the most out of it. 

The technical phrase for the sense of pressure to sleep is homeostatic sleep drive. Your homeostatic sleep drive is low when you get up after a good night's sleep. The pressure gradually rises during the day until we feel sleepy in the evening. Sleeping at night lowers sleep pressure, and the cycle repeats the following day.

Napping can help with the following:

• Improving learning
• Reducing tiredness
• Memory formation
• Controlling emotions

Napping may also be beneficial for people that work shifts outside of normal working hours. Due to sleep loss and circadian rhythm abnormalities, shift employment is linked to an increased risk of health consequences and injury. Planned napping enhances shift workers' alertness and reaction speed.

However, napping might be problematic for certain people. While lowering sleep pressure can help with lethargy, it can also make it difficult to fall to sleep at night. People who have problems sleeping or staying asleep at night, such as those who suffer from insomnia, should avoid napping where possible. 

Shorter naps can diminish sleep inertia (sleepiness after awakening from a nap). However, even after a brief nap, you may feel dazed, so napping may be inconvenient if you need to return to work or are immediately busy afterwards.

4 tips to take a healthy power nap

Make sure you set an alarm

Limiting the amount of time you spend sleeping will help you feel more alert and active after your nap.

We go through a variety of sleep stages every time we fall asleep. Five-minute naps were shown to be too short to go deep enough through sleep phases to provide a significant effect. Sleeping for 30 minutes or more, on the other hand, allows the body to enter deep (slow-wave) sleep. However, taking an excessively lengthy nap or waking up from slow-wave sleep can make you feel sluggish for up to an hour.

Given these factors, the optimal nap time in most cases is one that is long enough to be rejuvenating but not so long as to cause sleep inertia. A nap that lasts 10 to 20 minutes is deemed ideal. They're also referred to as "power naps" because they help you recover without making you tired.

Nap early in the day

Late-day naps can interfere with your ability to fall asleep at night. Try napping in the middle of your day.

Create good sleep hygiene and habits

Your environment should be conducive to napping in order for you to fall asleep. You may or may not have the best mattress possible depending on where you are, but napping in a dark, cool, and quiet environment is beneficial.

Try to relax

You'll stay awake if you think about the sources of your tension. Try meditation techniques if you're having problems letting go of worries and to-do lists. These can assist you in falling asleep and waking up refreshed and revitalised.