How to nap like an astronaut

Gavin Newsham
·Contributor
Updated ·4-min read
Young pretty student woman napping on the sofa in her living room after studying
Napping can be quite divisive - are you for or against it? (Getty Images)

Napping is one of life’s greatest pleasures. In fact, it’s what we’re meant to do. As William Dement, founder of Stanford University’s Sleep Research Center, argues, human beings were designed to sleep during the day, primarily as a way of getting them out of the midday sun.

Indeed, the very fact we still all tire in the afternoon shows that we are all actually fighting our natural instinct to snooze, usually armed only with caffeine and/or sweet snacks.

Some of history’s greatest figures have been fervent advocates of the stolen snooze, including Leonardo Da Vinci, Albert Einstein, Muhammad Ali and JFK.

Winston Churchill, meanwhile, loved nothing better than getting his head down for what he called the "blessed oblivion" of a 20-minute nap, believing it "sufficient to renew all the vital forces."

The benefits of naps - and ideal length

Squeezing in a nap during the working day can bring a wide range of benefits, from improving your mood and alertness to increasing creativity and productivity. It’s also why the North American Space Agency (NASA) have long been studying the science of naps in a bid to improve the performance of astronauts and pilots, roles where sleep disruption on space missions or long flights can often impair cognitive function.

The result was that NASA determined that the ideal time for a power nap, or 'NASA nap' as they have become known, was 26 minutes and that those astronauts and pilots who took a short, strategic sleep experienced a significant boost in performance, enhanced memory and even lower blood pressure.

In 1991, Helen Sharman became the first British person to go into space when she took a Soyuz rocket to the Mir space station. She says that even though you are orbiting the earth every 92 minutes and experiencing frequent changes between light and dark in space, there are things you can replicate on terra firma if you want to enjoy a refreshing nap. "We can all benefit from NASA naps in daily life,” she explains. “So reduce light levels in the evening; don't exercise too close to sleep time and be thoughtful about what and when you eat and drink."

Sharman also suggests eliminating as much noise as possible. "It can be noisy with space station fans, so some astronauts like to use ear plugs too," she says.

Kate Mikhail is a sleep coach and author of Teach Yourself to Sleep – An Ex-Insomniac’s Guide. She believes NASA naps can be hugely beneficial for personal wellbeing, as long as you can avoid the brain moving into the deeper stages of sleep. "These kinds of naps can provide invaluable recovery time – a psycho-physiological recharge that allows the mind and sympathetic nervous system to take a break from the demands of the day," she explains.

Before you nap, you need to consider your sleep hygiene – or the way you set up for sleep.

Ideally NASA naps should be taken in the same place and at roughly the same time to establish what Mikhail calls "habitual pattern recognition".

Also find a comfortable place where the chance of sensory stimulation is reduced and maybe use an eye mask or eye shades to eliminate light.

"You may need to set an alarm, to stop you falling into a deeper sleep," says Mikhail.

The time you take your nap is key. Napping later in the day can disrupt our circadian rhythm by weakening our sleep pressure, which increases the longer we’re awake so that we are tired and ready for sleep at night.

Ideally, you need to nap between 1pm and 3pm when the body’s circadian energy dips after lunch. “Any later than this risks disrupting your sleep at night, as we need our sleep drive to build up to be strong enough for us to fall asleep easily and to stay asleep,” explains Kate Mikhail.

Your nap doesn’t have to be as long as 26 minutes either. Just make sure you do as NASA recommend and make the decision to sleep before your head starts nodding.

Research journal Sleep found that as little as 10 minutes can result in improved cognitive performance, findings backed up by NASA’s studies.

The key, however, is to ensure you don’t nap for too long. Any longer than 30 minutes, for example, and you run the risk of suffering from sleep inertia when you wake up, that sense of grogginess that can you make feel worse than when you went to sleep.

Once mastered, however, you can enjoy the many benefits of a NASA nap, whether you’re an astronaut or not.

As Sharman says: "It's just great to float off to sleep – literally."

Read more on sleep:

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