Is Hitting Snooze Bad for You? What the Research Actually Says

For most people who already snooze, the best evidence says probably not. In the most detailed lab study so far, 30 minutes of snoozing cost regular snoozers about six minutes of sleep, made no clear difference to their mood, sleepiness or stress hormone levels, and they did slightly better on some thinking tests right after getting up.

The more useful question is why you snooze. If you need it every single morning, that usually says more about how much you are sleeping than about the button.

Is hitting snooze actually bad for you?

The idea that snoozing harms your sleep or your brain is repeated everywhere, but until recently nobody had tested it. Stockholm University put it plainly when announcing its study: "It is often claimed that using the snooze button can have negative effects on sleep and cognitive processes, but there has been no direct evidence to this effect."

Their study, led by Tina Sundelin and published in the Journal of Sleep Research, brought 31 habitual snoozers into a sleep lab for two nights. On one morning they could snooze for 30 minutes; on the other they had to get up as soon as the alarm went off. Their sleep was measured with polysomnography, the same equipment used in clinical sleep studies.

The results, from the paper's abstract:

• 30 minutes of snoozing "improved or did not affect performance on cognitive tests directly upon rising compared to an abrupt awakening."
• "Snoozing resulted in about 6 min of lost sleep, while preventing awakenings from slow-wave sleep (N3)."
• "There were no clear effects of snoozing on the cortisol awakening response, morning sleepiness, mood, or overnight sleep architecture."

The university's summary adds that during the half hour of snoozing, most participants still slept for more than 20 minutes, so "their total night's sleep was barely affected." In Sundelin's words: "half an hour of snoozing does not have negative effects on night sleep or sleep inertia, the feeling of not quite being alert in the morning."

Two things are worth noticing. Snoozing meant nobody was woken from deep sleep, which is the stage that makes waking feel worst. And the benefit on thinking tests was small; the authors themselves note the evidence varied in strength.

How common is snoozing?

Very. In the same Stockholm project, 1,732 people answered questions about their mornings. The Sleep Foundation's write-up of the study reports that 69% of respondents used snooze at least sometimes.

A separate 2022 study in the journal Sleep, by Mattingly and colleagues, combined surveys with wearable sleep trackers in 450 people and found that 57% snoozed. Snoozing was more likely in people who were female, younger, more of an evening type, had more disturbed sleep, took fewer steps, and scored lower on conscientiousness.

That study also found snoozers showed lighter sleep before waking and a higher resting heart rate. But it reported that snoozers "did not sleep less than nonsnoozers nor did they feel more sleepiness or nap more often."

Why do I keep hitting snooze?

Mostly because you are tired. According to Stockholm University, "the most common reason for snoozing is feeling too tired to get out of bed when the alarm goes off." Its survey also found that snoozing is "especially common among young adults and evening people", and the paper notes that "morning drowsiness and shorter sleep were also more common for those who snooze."

So the two studies agree that snoozing is common and linked to being a night owl. They differ on sleep length: the Stockholm survey found snoozers slept slightly less, the wearable study did not. Either way, the snooze button looks more like a sign of a mismatch between your body clock and your alarm than a cause of harm in itself.

The CDC recommends 7 or more hours of sleep for adults aged 18 to 60. If you are regularly getting much less and snoozing to claw it back, the fix is the bedtime, not the button.

Who should be careful with snoozing?

The reassuring findings come with limits, and the researchers spell them out.

• The study only included habitual snoozers. As Sundelin put it: "the study only included people who are regular snoozers and find it easy to go back to sleep after each alarm. Snoozing is most likely not for everyone." If you lie awake between alarms, the results may not apply to you.
• Only 30 minutes was tested. Nothing in this research tells you what an hour of repeated alarms does.
• Fragmented sleep in general is not harmless. The Sleep Foundation notes earlier research showing that "disrupted sleep throughout the night has a negative effect on mood and cognition." A short snooze window is different from a broken night.
• Persistent exhaustion is worth a doctor's visit. The CDC advises: "Talk to your healthcare provider if you regularly have problems sleeping or notice signs or symptoms of common sleep disorders."

How long should you snooze for?

There is no official answer. The only amount the lab study tested was 30 minutes, so that is the limit the evidence covers. If you like to snooze, the simplest approach is to treat the snooze window as planned time rather than stolen time: set the first alarm at the earliest moment you would accept waking, and decide in advance the time you absolutely have to be up.

What is the real risk of snoozing?

For most people it is not your health. It is being late. The danger is the last alarm: you switch it off half asleep, roll over, and the morning is gone. That matters far more on the days when there is a train, a shift or a flight at the other end.

A practical way to keep snoozing without that risk is to make the final wake-up different from the snoozes:

1. Snooze on your phone alarm if it works for you. The research suggests it is fine for regular snoozers.
2. Make the "must be up" signal something you cannot dismiss on autopilot. A different device, across the room, or a phone call.
3. Have a fallback if even that fails, so a missed wake-up does not go unnoticed.

How ReminderIt can be your last alarm

ReminderIt places a real phone call at the exact time you choose, in a natural voice that reads your message, for example "It is 7:15. Get up now, the bus leaves at 7:40." If you miss the call, you get a WhatsApp message.

You can set it up by sending a WhatsApp message (text, voice note or photo) or on the website, and there is no app to install. A daily call at your must-be-up time sits after your snoozes, so you can keep the half hour the research says is fine and still have a hard stop. You can also set wake-up calls for a family member; they confirm first.

There is a 7-day free trial with 7 free reminder calls (3 if your number is in a country where calls cost more). After that it is one plan: $7 a month, or ₹299 a month in India, with annual and 2-year options.

The short answer

Snoozing for up to half an hour does not appear to harm regular snoozers: about six minutes of lost sleep, no clear effect on mood, sleepiness or cortisol, and slightly sharper thinking on waking. Needing it every day is a sign to look at your sleep length, and the practical risk is lateness, which a final wake-up you cannot sleep through solves.

Sources: Sundelin T, Landry S, Axelsson J, Is snoozing losing? Why intermittent morning alarms are used and how they affect sleep, cognition, cortisol, and mood, Journal of Sleep Research (abstract); Stockholm University press release You don't lose if you snooze (October 2023); Mattingly SM et al., Snoozing: an examination of a common method of waking, Sleep (2022, abstract); Sleep Foundation, Hitting the Snooze Button May Actually be Good for You (October 2023); CDC, About Sleep (recommended hours and when to talk to a provider).