Clocking Eight Hours? This Is How Much Sleep You Really Need

Most of us don’t get enough sleep. In fact, few people think they are able to sleep sufficiently. Most of us have been told eight hours of sleep is enough and what everyone should be getting. Despite this common knowledge, many of us struggle to get that amount. But is even eight enough?

New research out of Pennsylvania seeks to update that old standard of eight hours of sleep. Their findings report that figure should actually be eight and a half hours per night to get the right amount of sleep. They added thirty minutes because, it turns out, even the healthiest and most efficient sleepers among us generally only sleep about ninety percent of the time we spend in bed. Since sleep is supposed to be a period where your body, and more importantly your mind, can rest and recharge for the next day, eight hours in bed won’t actually get you eight hours of efficient sleep. So adjusting the actual time in bed gives a little more time for actual rest, and allows you to actually get the right amount you truly need.

To get in that eight hours, make minor but consistent changes to how you schedule and approach sleep. Stick to a schedule for rest, even on weekends and holidays. Spend time before bed winding down to ease your mind into the right mode to drift off. And limit or eliminate late night stimulants and alcohol that can keep you up.

Key Points:

  • 1We’re often told that eight hours is the optimum healthy amount of sleep. But new research suggests this is a misconception.
  • 2This means even if you’re in bed eight hours before your alarm is scheduled to go off, you’ll probably get closer to seven hours of actual sleep.
  • 3He said a good way to see how much sleep you really need is to try to stick to your normal bedtime while on holidays, and see what time you wake up.


Penn State researchers have suggested that 8.5 hours of sleep is the new eight hours, Quartz reports.
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Written by HealthStatus
Medical Writer & Editor

HealthStatus has been operating since 1998 providing the best interactive health tools on the Internet, millions of visitors have used our health risk assessment, body fat and calories burned calculators. The HealthStatus editorial team has continued that commitment to excellence by providing our visitors with easy to understand high quality health content for many years.

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