Eight Sleep UK Review: Unbiased and understandable.

Today we're going to be talking about all things Eight Sleep. To make this video engaging and dynamic, I thought what I do is have my girlfriend ask some questions which I would then answer.

Full disclosure: I created this video without any agreement in place with Eight Sleep. I bought the Pod 3 Cover myself, with no discount or compensation. Since then, Eight Sleep offered me a small commission if you use the shopping link below. I recommend Eight Sleep and have added the link → eight-sleep.ioym.net/PykWoN 👈

What is an Eight Sleep mattress?

The first thing to say is that actually, it's not a mattress, it's a mattress cover. So what you have is a sleeve that you pull over your mattress. It's got water tubes that run through it, and it can control the temperature of your bed, so it can go hotter, or colder.

The idea is that when you fall asleep, your body temperature drops. And you can use the mattress to facilitate this drop in temperature, and keep it cool throughout the night. And then elevate the temperature as morning comes to help you wake up.

How does the Eight Sleep Mattress work?

There's two parts to the Eight Sleep mattress, there's the hardware component and the software component. So the hardware, is the mattress cover and a unit that goes beside the bed, which is kind of like a fridge / heater, and heats up or cools down water that then flows through the mattress. 

Then you have software, which is an app on your phone. And using the app, you can control the temperature of the bed. So you can essentially have it start cold when you get in and then get colder, and then heat up or do something different. If it's really cold, in general (in winter), you could maybe just have it a bit warmer in general. Equally, if it's really hot, you can have it colder in general. So you can control this temperature gradient. And it can also have an automated mode that you have to pay extra for. So I'll get onto that in a second.

How your body temp changes over the course of a day

Is it worth how much did the Eight Sleep mattress cost?

At the moment, the Pod Three Cover (which is what I've got) is going for £2195. You could probably get a discount using a code from like the Huberman lab podcast or there are other podcasts that Eight Sleep advertise on. So that's the upfront cost. (More blogs on Huberman here.)

So then you can also upgrade to pro, which is $180 per year billed annually. And what you get in Pro is sleep tools. So this is kind of NDSR (Non-Sleep Deep Rest), meditation, soothing talk tracks, and autopilot, which is where the temperature actually predicts what it needs to be for your body and changes itself automatically, rather than following a predefined curve. And then trends and insights.

Now, I was a bit annoyed to be honest to spend £2000 on a mattress and then have a subscription on top. I kind of thought for that much money, autopilot would be included, certainly for at least a year so that you can try it. Regarding the sleep tools, you can find all of these on Spotify and YouTube. So I don't think you need those necessarily, though, I'm sure it'd be handy to have them in the app. Autopilot, I haven't tried it, but I get on quite well with manually mapping my sleep curve. Trends and insights... I don't have those. But to be fair, the data within the Eight Sleep mattress is pretty good, actually. So I'm not going to join pro just for now.

Is it worth it?

I would say yes, it is worth it. It was a good investment. Especially since we had a heatwave here in the summer. In the UK houses don't really come with air conditioning so it was hot and the Eight Sleep mattress was invaluable. And I also like to sleep with a weighted blanket over the top of my mattress as well to really seal me in but that also creates heat, but then my mattress gets cold then I can happily have a duvet and the weighted blanket as well and I feel really snug, so I would buy it again.

What happens if you HAVE A PARTNER?

This is a really interesting feature because you can actually divide the mattress up into two halves and you can have your partner download the app as well. And then you can control the different halves of the bed separately so you can each have your own temperature gradient. My girlfriend runs really hot, so she would have her side of the bed cooler than my side of the bed.

Would you buy it again? WHO WOULD BENEFIT?

I would say that it's been a good investment. Who is it for? I think it's for anyone who wants to have a better night's sleep in general, which is quite self explanatory. If you run hot, then I think it would definitely be good for you.

I know some athletes have lots of muscle mass, they definitely run hot, and I think this mattress would definitely help them stay cool.

Also, if you wake up a lot in the night, then it's going to be good for helping you enter this deep sleep as your body temperature falls, and it's gonna keep you deeper asleep for longer.

I would say if you're generally not feeling rested, when you wake up in the morning, then it's going to be good for you to have an Eight Sleep mattress. And then I'd also suggest that if you're somewhere that's very cold, or somewhere that gets very hot, then again, the mattress is going to help balance out these temperature conditions so that you can feel more comfortable for longer.

Is it safe?

I don't feel it's dangerous. Probably the most dangerous thing about it is when you get it, you have to fill it up with water. But then also some hydrogen peroxide, I guess to keep the internal workings in good condition. And sterile perhaps? I'd recommend wearing gloves when you put that in, but it is safe.

Does it look unsightly?

It’s OK. I've got a bed with solid sides. I think if you had a bed that was more of a see through frame, it'd be a lot more noticeable where it is. I think in a perfect world, I would actually have it in a cupboard. So you could just see the pipes that were kind of coming out of the hole in the cupboard and going into the mattress, that would be the most aesthetically pleasing, it does have a light on the outside that you can turn off. So if you don't want your Eight Sleep device glowing in the night, then you can turn that off.

Is the Eight Sleep unit noisy?

This is my bugbear with the Eight Sleep mattress: It's not silent. Definitely when it turns on first thing, there's a bit more noise because it's probably going through its largest shift in temperature, getting the mattress to the temperature that it needs to be.

And then equally, if you change the temperature significantly in the night, you will hear it turn on. But apart from that it is quite quiet. So what does it sound like? It sounds a tiny bit like your refrigerator is like - a low murmur.

There's a couple of times when I have gone from minus two to minus five—like a big jump in temperature that sounds a bit like a fan in your computer, it kind of does like rev up. I actually sent one back because I thought it was too noisy. They had quite helpful customer services, both through email and to the app. A bit disorganised I would say but helpful nevertheless, and willing to help. So they sent me a replacement unit, which to be honest, is much the same. So I think the reality is the Eight Sleep mattress is not silent. But I think most people would habituate to it. I'm quite sensitive to noises. And I've stuck with it. So I think it's quiet enough.

How does the app work?

Go on the thermometer. And you can see here that when I get into bed, it's minus one in the early part of the night, it's minus one in the late part of the night, it's minus one. And then it heats up to plus one in time for wakeup.

We've got this, this temperature gauge and I can kind of go up up, up, up, down, down and down. And this is what you can do in the middle of the night. So I guess if you had autopilot, you wouldn't be doing this manual operation.

What data does Eight Sleep track?

So here's a night where I scored 100. 100 is excellent. So I had 100% quality, 100% routine, and then eight hours, which it says is good.

So that 100 score is a composite of quality, routine, and time slept. Routine is about roughly going to bed at the same time and waking up at the same time. Time slept is the time between those times, but then if you oversleep, or if you under sleep, then obviously that's going to comprise time spent.

The quality is the interesting bit. So you get this graph that has your deep sleep, your REM sleep, and then when you're awake. What you're looking for is over 1hr, 10 mins of deep sleep, and over 1hr, 30 mins of REM sleep.

Now, deep sleep tends to happen in the first part of the night, and this is recovering your body more or less. And then your REM sleep happens in the morning half of the night, and this is more about your mental recovery. So you need both to feel fresh.

Then you've also got these health metrics such as heart rate, heart rate variability, and breath rate. So we can see here that my heart rate during this night's sleep was 50, my heart rate variability was 49, which is above 41, which is what it wants. And my breath rate was 13 breaths per minute.

Has Eight Sleep improved my sleep?

It helps you with the habit of getting to bed at the same time and waking up at the same time. But it also gives you awareness as to when you've done something that's compromised your night's sleep.

So for example, if you have alcohol 100% It shows up in the sleep data. If you have food too close to bedtime, it 100% shows up in the app. If you are stressed, it shows up in the app. If you do a really hard workout too late in the day, it shows up in the app. So, it helps you change your lifestyle in pursuit of a better night's sleep. And then also the mattress itself helps you get a better night's sleep.

It's a two pronged attack if you like: There's the temperature component and the lifestyle component that helps you sleep better. 

You can get an Eight Sleep with this link.