How Much Sleep Do I Need Each Night?

Getting the right amount of sleep each night is one of the best ways you can protect your body from illness. Just as easily, inadequate sleep can leave you vulnerable to a wide variety of health concerns.

Sleep deprivation — an inadequate amount of sleep that causes various health and performance issues — is a surprisingly common challenge. An estimated 33% of American adults report not getting enough rest on a regular basis. 40% of that same population reports inadvertently falling asleep in the middle of the day.

Let's explore how to establish how much sleep you need, how to avoid oversleeping and undersleeping, and how you can implement a sleep hygiene routine to improve the regularity of your rest patterns.

How Much Sleep is Enough Sleep?

Different people require different amounts of sleep.

The amount of sleep you need can change based on factors like your age, diet, and lifestyle. For example, your body might need more sleep than normal to fully recover after strenuous exercise. You may also notice yourself sleeping longer while fighting a cold or illness.

Sleep specialists typically consider a wide range of factors when determining how much sleep you need each night. Here are the suggested sleep time ranges for younger people, as suggested by the CDC in coordination with the National Sleep Foundation and American Academy of Sleep Medicine:

Newborn (0-3 months): 14-17 hours of sleep per day
Infant (4-12 months): 12-16 hours of sleep per day
Toddler (1-2 years): 11-14 hours of sleep per day
Preschool (3-5 years): 10-13 hours of sleep per day
School age (6-12 years): 9-12 hours of sleep per day
Teenager: (13-18 years): 8-10 hours of sleep per day

Younger age ranges, from newborn through preschool age, will typically take naps during the day. Total suggested sleep durations should include both nighttime and daytime sleep, including naps.

Adults also require varying amounts of sleep, according to age:

Adult (18-60 years): 7 or more hours of sleep per day
Adult (61-64 years): 7-9 hours of sleep per day
Adult (65 years and older): 7-8 hours of sleep per day

It's important to note that sleep duration isn't the only factor that impacts sleep quality. For example, irregular sleep patterns can cause daytime fatigue even if you get the recommended hours of sleep per night. Snoring and other sleep disorder symptoms could indicate a deeper challenge than the length of your nightly sleep episodes. Be sure to consult a licensed health professional if you notice one or more symptoms that compromise your sleep experience.

What Happens if I Don't Get Enough Sleep?

There's a reason why sleep is one of the most important ways to protect your health. A sufficient amount of rest is often the difference between health and illness. Sleep affects physical health in various ways, supporting systems like respiration, digestion, and immunity. It also helps heal the scrapes and bruises you might experience on a daily basis.

You might notice several factors that positively, or negatively, impact your quality of sleep. These factors can include:

Work schedule: Irregular work hours, particularly in a constantly-changing schedule, make it more difficult for your body to identify sleep and wake times.
Diet: A highly-nutritious diet rich in vitamins and minerals can create more effective sleep episodes, allowing your body to heal and recharge.
Physical exercise: Proper daily workouts can help alleviate symptoms of sleep conditions and encourage your body into natural energy production processes while you rest.
Location: Some locations feature more, or less, light exposure each day. High or low temperatures can also affect your sleep routine.
Sleep environment: Pillows, sheets, and other elements of your sleep environment can either guide the body into a restful state or keep you awake past a normal rest time.
Stress and anxiety: Anxiety is one of the biggest impediments to sleep. Racing thoughts, stress, and other mental health complications can prevent the onset of sleep and disrupt your circadian rhythm.
Electronic devices: Phones, tablets, and computers can all delay the onset of sleep, particularly if they emit blue light.

If you don't get enough sleep each night, you don't arm your body with the energy it needs to support these and other systems. You might also notice irregularities in your mood, speech, and mental clarity.

Here are a few more negative consequences of inadequate sleep:

Daytime fatigue: When you don't get enough sleep at night, your body is left without the energy it needs during the daytime. As a result, you might feel especially tired or drowsy during the day, particularly after you eat or sit. This fatigue can affect your ability to think clearly and accomplish tasks effectively.
Hormonal imbalances: Sleep helps to regulate hormone production and balance in the body. Without enough sleep, you might experience imbalances in hormones like cortisol (which impacts stress) and leptin (which impacts appetite).
Increased risk for chronic health conditions: A lack of sleep means your immune system does not receive the support it needs. This leaves your body more vulnerable to chronic conditions, and can also elevate your risk for inflammation, heart disease, and stroke.
Impaired social interactions: The mood shifts, hormonal imbalances, and irritability you might experience via a lack of sleep can also impact your social interactions. This can make you more prone to emotional reaction or overreaction, alongside an overall decrease in social well-being.

Insufficient sleep can be a major problem, one that can impact you and the people you interact with. However, oversleeping can affect your body in many of the same ways.

Is it Possible to Get Too Much Sleep?

Oversleeping — sleep episodes that last longer than are healthy or intended — also represents a sleep imbalance. Though the chronic condition of oversleep only affects an estimated 2% of people, as much as 55% of the population is known to oversleep at least once a week.

Several different possible factors can cause oversleeping. These typically include: