Trend check
Weighted blankets
A few trials found people slept better under one, but the evidence is small and mixed. Fine for most adults; never for babies.
What’s claimed
Sleeping under a heavy blanket calms your body, so you fall asleep faster and stay asleep.
What the evidence shows
The study behind most of the excitement comes from Sweden. Researchers at the Karolinska Institutet gave 120 adults a heavy chain blanket or a light one for four weeks. Everyone in the trial had insomnia alongside depression, bipolar disorder, generalised anxiety or ADHD. Insomnia scores fell much further in the weighted-blanket group, and they stayed asleep better through the night. Daytime tiredness, anxiety and low mood eased too. People who kept using the heavy blanket for a year held on to the improvement, and those who switched to one later improved in the same way.
That is a strong result, and it is the main reason this trend has real science behind it. It also has limits worth knowing. Everyone in the trial had a psychiatric condition as well as insomnia, so it says less about people who simply sleep badly. And a heavy blanket is hard to disguise as a light one, which makes it difficult to separate the blanket itself from the expectation that it will work.
Other studies are more modest. A careful British trial gave 67 autistic children with serious sleep problems a weighted blanket and an ordinary one, two weeks each. The weighted blanket did not help them sleep longer, fall asleep faster or wake less often, whether sleep was measured by wrist monitor or by parents’ diaries. Children and parents still preferred it.
A small laboratory study in Sweden looked for a reason a blanket might help. In 26 healthy young adults, the hour before lights out under a weighted blanket brought a larger rise in melatonin, the hormone that helps time sleep, than under a light one. How sleepy they felt and how long they slept did not change. One of the authors worked for Cura of Sweden, a company that makes weighted blankets.
A 2020 systematic review that gathered the research up to 2018 found only eight studies. Its conclusion was that weighted blankets may help with anxiety, but there was not enough evidence to say they help with insomnia. The Swedish trial has added the strongest evidence since, but it is still largely one trial in one group of people.
So the verdict is some basis, and more modest than the claim. A weighted blanket may help some adults settle, especially when nights are tangled up with anxiety, but it is not a proven treatment for insomnia.
Who it might suit
Adults who find firm, even pressure comforting are the obvious group. If a heavy duvet or a long hug helps you relax, a weighted blanket may do the same. The strongest trial so far was in people whose poor sleep came with anxiety, low mood, bipolar disorder or ADHD, so that is where the evidence is best.
The usual advice is to choose one around a tenth of your body weight. That is a rule of thumb rather than something the trials compared. The laboratory study used blankets of about 12% of body weight. Comfort is the better guide: you should be able to turn over freely and push it off without effort.
It is unlikely to help if the problem lies elsewhere: a body clock out of step with your life, a partner’s snoring, pain, or a racing mind that pressure on your body can’t reach.
What to watch for
Heat. A heavy blanket holds warmth, and feeling too hot works against sleep. If you run warm, look for a lighter cover, or use it for the first part of the night and push it aside when you wake.
Cost. They cost more than an ordinary duvet. If you can, try one before you buy, or start with a heavy throw on top of your usual bedding to see whether the pressure suits you.
Expectations. If nights have been hard for weeks, a blanket is not a substitute for proper help. Cognitive behavioural therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) has far stronger evidence than any product; When to get help explains what it involves and how to ask for it.
Common questions
How heavy should a weighted blanket be?
There is no tested answer. Around a tenth of your body weight is the usual rule of thumb, but no trial has compared weights. Choose one you can move easily on your own.
Can children use a weighted blanket?
Never babies. For older children, the main trial found no improvement in sleep, although the children liked the blankets. Talk to your child’s doctor before trying one.
Will it help with anxiety at night?
Possibly. The 2020 review found the most support for anxiety, and in the Swedish trial anxiety eased alongside sleep. It is a comfort, not a treatment, so ongoing anxiety is still worth talking to a doctor about.
What to do instead
4-7-8 breathing
A dim ring to breathe with. In for four, hold for seven, out for eight.
Open 4-7-8 breathingLast checked
Sources
- Ekholm, B., Spulber, S., & Adler, M. (2020). A randomized controlled study of weighted chain blankets for insomnia in psychiatric disorders. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 16(9), 1567–1577. PMID 32536366.
- Gringras, P., Green, D., Wright, B., et al. (2014). Weighted blankets and sleep in autistic children: a randomized controlled trial. Pediatrics, 134(2), 298–306. PMID 25022743.
- Meth, E. M. S., Brandão, L. E. M., van Egmond, L. T., et al. (2023). A weighted blanket increases pre-sleep salivary concentrations of melatonin in young, healthy adults. Journal of Sleep Research, 32(2), e13743. PMID 36184925.
- Eron, K., Kohnert, L., Watters, A., Logan, C., Weisner-Rose, M., & Mehler, P. S. (2020). Weighted blanket use: a systematic review. American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 74(2), 7402205010p1–7402205010p14. PMID 32204779.
- Moon, R. Y., Carlin, R. F., Hand, I., et al. (2022). Sleep-related infant deaths: updated 2022 recommendations for reducing infant deaths in the sleep environment. Pediatrics, 150(1), e2022057990. PMID 35726558.