As a high school student, I always get tired after school and need a nap to function my body properly. It is like a ritual to prepare myself for the test tomorrow and a time to recharge from all the stress and overwhelming school activities. However, I also want to prepare my body in an ideal state where I can focus on studying rather than getting groggy after a nap. So what is the ideal amount of hours of nap for our productive day? Let’s all be strategic.
10 Minutes Power Nap
If you are looking for quick energy, a confidence boost, and increased alertness without causing grogginess upon waking, a power nap is right for you! This short duration will support you in the milder stages of non-REM sleep, reducing sleep inertia and helping you to return to your daily work more easily with greater productivity. One drawback is that the positive impact of a power nap only lasts about 1-3 hours, which is relatively low compared to longer naps.
20 Minutes / 90 Minutes Nap
These napping times may reduce sleep inertia and lead to its quick dissipation. Also, suppose you wake up from a nap in either 20 minutes (before going into the deeper sleep) or about 90 minutes (most likely to be the end of the sleep cycle, including both non-REM and REM sleep stages). In that case, it will support memory consolidation, enhance creativity, and improve mood and sophisticated thinking skills, as you will likely awaken from the light stages of sleep. Even after a short nap, severe sleep deprivation can cause your brain to quickly transition into deep sleep, leading to longer-lasting sleep inertia and difficulties in waking up and feeling alert. One drawback of napping for 90 minutes may negatively interfere with nighttime sleep.
1 Hour Nap
As you sleep longer, your brain reaches slow-wave sleep, also known as the deepest level of sleep, typically within about 1 hour. Therefore, if you wake up in about 1 hour during deep sleep, you might not function well due to “sleep inertia,” a brief loss of orientation and a reduction in mood and/or performance after waking up from sleep. Individuals may show slower thinking, reasoning, remembering, and learning speeds, as well as shorter reaction times and worse short-term memories, and as academic students, we should try to avoid sleep inertia to maximize our learning abilities. Also, 1-hour naps negatively impact the night’s sleep. One study shows that a roughly 1-hour nap reduced nighttime sleep duration by 48 minutes and night sleep efficiency by 2.4% for healthy seniors.
However, if you are looking for a nap to improve memory consolidation and retention for learning and retaining new information, 60 minutes of sleep might be for you. Also, as rapid eye movement (REM) sleep usually happens in long naps of at least 60 minutes, an hour-long nap can boost creative thinking and emotion-processing skills.
I hope this post was helpful for you to find an effective napping duration for you productivity!