The YouGov Sleep Study

YouGov has conducted an extensive study on the topic of sleep, looking at the attitudes, patterns, practices and opinions of Britons on this essential function.

The study is split into six parts:

Part One: Sleeping patterns

Part Two: Sleep habits

Part Three: Problems with sleep

Part Four: The impact of screens, lights and noise on sleep

Part Five: Dreams and their meaning

Part Six: Waking up habits and practices

The study was conducted on 1-5 February 2022, with a nationally representative sample of 2,512 British adults aged 16 and above.

Here are the top 12 things the YouGov Sleep Study has found:

1. One in eight Britons (12%) say that every night they have problems falling asleep.
2. More Britons are night owls (44%) than early risers (33%)
3. One in eight Britons (13%) has fewer than six hours of sleep per night. Most Britons (77%) get between six and eight hours, while 5% get more than nine hours of sleep
4. Most Britons snore: one in five (19%) report they often snore when sleeping, while around half (45%) do it sometimes. Men are significantly more likely than women to say they snore often (23% vs 15%)
5. One in five Britons (20%) sleep naked, with this being the case for a quarter of British men (25%) and one in seven (15%) British women
6. Britons are more likely to say they sleep better when alone in bed (37%) than with someone else (19%). Women (41%) are more likely than men (33%) to say they sleep better alone.
7. A quarter of Britons (24%) say they take sleeping tablets, including 13% who do so often or sometimes, and 11% who do so rarely. Women (27%) are more prone to taking sleeping tablets than men (20%)
8. A third of Britons (36%) report sometimes having an alcoholic drink before bedtime to help them sleep
9. Three in four Britons (74%) keep their phone in their bedroom at night. A quarter of Britons (26%) say they usually check their phone when they wake up in the night
10. More than four in ten (44%) Britons think dreams have meaning. Around three in ten (28%) think they don’t and 29% don’t know
11. Seven in ten (68%) report they very or fairly often feel tired when they wake up in the morning. Three-quarters (76%) of British women say they always or often wake up tired, while this applies to six in ten (59%) men
12. Four out of ten Britons (40%) say they hit the snooze button in the morning before getting out of bed

See full results here