Is Snoozing Your Alarm Hurting Your Sleep? Here’s What Experts Say

My husband sets two alarms every morning: one he always snoozes, and a second that he climbs out of bed for. It thrills him to know he’s got ten extra minutes of sleep, and he finds that by doing this, it’s easier for him to get up at the real 6 AM alarm. I’ve never seen the point of it—surely the extra minutes of sleep he gets isn’t adding any beneficial rest, is it? 

Turns out, his two-alarm method is something that sleep experts regard as helpful for some, if done correctly. Instead of helping by allowing you more time to sleep, the two-alarm method affords you more time to gently wake, explains sleep medicine specialist Jade Wu, PhD.

“The process of waking up, just like the process of falling asleep, is not like an on/off switch,” Dr. Wu explains. “These things, by the nature of how they work, take some time.” To learn more about the science behind repeatedly snoozing your alarm, we tapped experts for more information.

What Happens During the Wake-Up Process

Like Dr. Wu mentioned, waking up is not an on/off switch. “It’s more of a gradual slope,” she explains. “Your body temperature is rising, your cortisol levels are rising, your blood pressure is slowly rising, your melatonin is slowly going away.

Near the end of our sleep, we become slightly more conscious before fully waking up, leading us to feel groggy and aching for more sleep. “That’s why we experience sleep inertia, which happens in the last half of the slope, where you’re conscious but groggy, not thinking very clearly, and not super energetic,” Dr. Wu adds.

Having a first snooze alarm kicks you into the realm of consciousness, but you know that you have some buffer time to lay in bed for five to 15 minutes more—and shed the last dregs of sleep inertia, which feels like an indulgence. By the time your second alarm sounds, you’re more ready to rise out of the bed and start the day.

In saying that, if your current one-alarm method works well for you, there’s no need to add a second alarm. Having just one alarm is perfectly fine “as long as you have a buffer of time after the alarm where you can gradually and fully wake up before you have to do anything really important,” Dr. Wu says.

What to Consider While Trying the Two-Alarm Method

Set Only a Maximum of Two Alarms

“I wouldn’t do more than two alarms, because then you’re just waking yourself up a bunch of times for the last stretch of your sleep,” Dr. Wu says. “If that’s happening, you might as well actually get uninterrupted, good quality sleep—even if it’s light sleep for that last bit of your night.”

Avoid Setting the Alarms too Far Apart

Limit the amount of time in between the first and the second alarm, recommends sleep physician William Lu, MD. “You definitely don’t want to be setting the second alarm an hour later,” he adds. It increases the chance that you’ll accidentally slip back into sleep, and if you’re sleeping long enough to transition into a deeper stage of sleep, it could end up being more difficult to wake up the second time that your alarm goes off, Dr. Lu explains.

Dr. Wu suggests a maximum of 15 minutes between the first and second alarm. “That way, the first alarm serves as a sort of gentle kick in your butt to start going up the slope, and then you’ll get your real alarm before you start sliding down the slope again,” she says. 

Set the Alarms on Different Devices

If you set two alarms, you may accidentally think the second alarm is the first and hit snooze again, missing your wake-up time. Dr. Wu recommends setting the alarms on separate devices, the second of which is placed further away from your bed, so you’ll have to get up to switch it off. This acts as a prompt for you to recognize that it’s the real alarm you have to get up for—and get started with your day.