By Victoria Pearson Wellness 02.06.2026

These Winter Sleep Mistakes Might Be Making You More Tired

If you’re still waking up exhausted after eight hours under the duvet, your cosy winter habits might be the culprit.

Winter has a way of making sleep feel both deeply appealing and weirdly impossible to get right. You go to bed early, you layer up like a Victorian-era child, you turn the heater on “just for a little bit”, and still somehow wake up feeling like you’ve spent the night negotiating with a ghost.

To be fair, winter tiredness is real. Shorter days and less sunlight can meddle with your body clock, which is responsible for helping you feel awake during the day and sleepy at night. Add chilly weather and an increased desire to spend every evening horizontal, and it makes sense that your sleep routine might start to wobble.

But sometimes, the things we do in the name of cosiness are not actually doing our sleep any favours. The heater blasting all night; the ultra-weighted duvet that feels heavenly for the first 15 minutes and like a furnace by 3am; the late-afternoon coffee you absolutely “needed”; the innocent little scroll that somehow turns into 47 minutes of absorbing global dread from inside your sheets.

If you’re technically getting enough sleep but still waking up tired, these are some winter sleep habits worth reconsidering.

Mistake 1: Making your bedroom too warm

There’s a fine line between “cosy winter sanctuary” and “suburban sauna”, and many of us cross it the second the temperature drops. While a warm room might feel inviting when you first climb into bed, your body actually needs to cool down slightly in order to sleep well.

At night, your core body temperature naturally dips as part of the sleep process. When the room is too warm, that process can be interrupted, leaving you more likely to toss, turn, wake up sweaty, or throw one leg dramatically out from under the covers. Research on thermal environments has found that too much heat and cold exposure can increase wakefulness and reduce REM sleep.

The aim is definitely not to sleep in a freezer. It’s to create a room that feels comfortable and not overly heated. Try warming the room before bed, then switching the heater off or lowering it overnight. Your bedding should do the heavy lifting – not the heater.

Mistake 2: Going too heavy on the bedding

While we’re on the subject: a winter bed should feel like a hug. It should not feel like you’ve been sealed into a pastry. Heavy bedding can be wonderful if you’re a cold sleeper, but if you often wake up clammy or mysteriously annoyed at your duvet, it might be working a little too hard. The materials closest to your body can influence your body temperature and overall comfort, which is why breathability matters even when it’s cold.

Instead of relying on one mega-heavy layer, consider layers you can adjust. A breathable duvet, a top sheet if that’s your thing, maybe a quilt or throw at the end of the bed. This gives you options throughout the night, rather than forcing your half-asleep self to choose between “boiling” and “exposed to the elements”.

Mistake 3: Having caffeine too late in the day

Winter afternoons are extremely dangerous territory. It’s cold, it’s dark too early, your inbox is still piling up, and suddenly a 3pm coffee feels like a necessary survival strategy. Unfortunately, caffeine is not always as done with you as you are with it. Research has shown that caffeine can reduce total sleep time, make it harder to fall asleep and affect how much deep sleep you get. One study even found that caffeine consumed six hours before bed could still have a disruptive effect.

This doesn’t mean you need to break up with coffee (horrifying suggestion, don’t want to hear about it). It just means your winter cut-off time might need to be a touch earlier, especially if you’ve been feeling wired at bedtime or foggy in the morning. Try moving your last coffee to before lunch, or swapping the afternoon one for tea, a walk around the block, or a dramatic stare out the window.

Mistake 4: Skipping morning light

One of winter’s cruellest tricks is making mornings feel like the middle of the night. You wake up in the dark, shuffle around indoors, sit under artificial light all day, and then wonder why your body has no idea what time it is.

Morning light is one of the clearest signals you can give your body that the day has begun. It helps anchor your circadian rhythm, which can in turn support better sleep later that night. Without it, your system can start to feel a little untethered – sleepy when you need to be alert, inconveniently awake when you finally want to go to bed.

The fix is annoyingly simple: get outside early. Even 10 minutes can help. Walk to get a coffee, stand on the balcony, take the long route to the bus, or sit by a bright window if outside is not happening. It’s less about becoming a morning person and more about giving your body a proper start cue.

Mistake 5: Doomscrolling under the duvet

There are few winter pleasures more seductive than getting into bed early and doing “just a quick scroll”. Unfortunately, “just a quick scroll” is one of the great lies of modern life, right up there with “I’ll only watch one episode” and “I don’t need to write that down”.

The issue is partly light exposure, which can interfere with your body’s natural sleep signals. But it’s also stimulation. Your brain is trying to wind down, and you are feeding it news alerts, TikToks, group chat developments, celebrity gossip, and a stranger’s kitchen renovation.

If a full digital detox feels unrealistic, start smaller. Put your phone away for the last 20 minutes before sleep. Charge it across the room. Swap scrolling for a book, a sleep timer podcast, or anything that doesn’t encourage your nervous system to believe it is personally responsible for solving the world before midnight.

Mistake 6: Letting your routine vanish completely

Winter is not exactly known for discipline, but your body loves rhythm. A regular wake time, a wind-down routine and consistent cues can all make sleep feel easier and more restorative. That doesn’t mean living like a wellness robot. It just means creating a few repeatable habits your body can recognise. Dim the lights, make the bed inviting, keep your bedroom cool but comfortable, put your phone away before you disappear into it, and get morning light when you can.