Benefits of sleeping in a cold room

It might seem subtle that room temperature would profoundly impact sleep, but many people who have lived through a heat wave during summer can relate. For example, have you ever had to sleep with a cold towel on top of you or downstairs in the living room where there was more air if you didn’t have air conditioning? Or have you ever woken up groggy after getting night sweats? As women transition through menopause, hormonal changes make them even more sensitive to external temperatures. Additionally, even the body temperature of a cycling woman changes slightly throughout the month. More precisely, it’s been seen to increase during ovulation.

An optimal bedroom temperature, however, goes further than simply helping you wake up more refreshed. Here are four benefits of a cool room that will make you want to dial down your thermostat tonight.

Better sleep quality

Sleeping in a cold room allows your body to release adequate amounts of melatonin and prevents cortisol (stress hormone) from rising and waking you up. Studies have shown that when you create the environment for the body to drop its core temperature throughout the night, you’ll spend more time in two of the most important restorative sleep phases: REM and slow-wave deep sleep. Additionally, you won’t have to worry about night sweats waking you up and causing sleep disturbances at night.

Fall asleep faster

Your core body temperature must drop so you can fall asleep. You will fall asleep faster when you create an environment for your body to release excess heat and support its natural circadian rhythm. A good rule of thumb to follow is if your sleep latency is between 10–20 minutes, it’s considered healthy. Insomniacs, for example, tend to experience difficulty sleeping because their bodies have a higher core temperature, which causes them to stay awake while their bodies try to cool down. This can interrupt or delay their sleep.

Better weight management

Cold temperatures activate the body’s “brown fat,” which is a very metabolically active tissue, also known as good fat. The more brown fat you have, the more white fat (the fat around your tummy) will burn. Researchers in Australia put men through a controlled sleep environment with different room temperatures. They found that following a month of sleeping in a cooler environment at 66 °F (18.8 °C), the volume of beneficial brown fat in the body had nearly doubled.

Lower risk of diseases

Because of the increase of brown fat, insulin sensitivity increases, which can be key to preventing type 2 diabetes and other metabolic conditions. The Australian study also found that during the time participants slept in the 66 °F (18.8 °C) room, they burned more calories during the day.

Furthermore, sleeping in a cool room may help to prevent Alzheimer’s disease by helping the body to tap into all the restorative stages of sleep along with acquiring the recommended seven to nine hours of slumber. A cross-sectional study published in the JAMA Neurology found that both short and long sleep durations were associated with worse outcomes for older adults, such as “greater beta-amyloid plaque burden, greater depressive symptoms, higher body mass index, and cognitive decline, emphasizing the importance of maintaining adequate sleep.”