Is Hitting Snooze Bad for You? What Happens to Your Body Every Time You Do It

Is hitting snooze bad for your sleep? If you've ever wondered whether those extra five or ten minutes are helping or hurting, you're not alone. A 2022 study from the University of Notre Dame found that 57% of adults use multiple alarms or snooze their way through mornings.

For years, sleep experts warned that snoozing fragments your sleep and leaves you groggier. But recent research has started to challenge that idea. Some studies suggest that brief snoozing may not be harmful at all—and for certain people, it might even help.

So what happens to your body when you hit snooze? And is it worth trying to stop? Understanding how snoozing interacts with your sleep cycles can help you figure out whether the habit is working for you or against you.

How Your Sleep Cycle Works

Sleep isn't one continuous state. Your body moves through several stages throughout the night, cycling between non-REM and REM sleep.

Non-REM sleep has three stages:

• Stage N1 is the transition from wakefulness to sleep, lasting around five to ten minutes.

• Stage N2 is light sleep, where your body temperature drops and your heart rate slows.

• Stage N3 is deep sleep or also known as slow-wave sleep, the most restorative phase, which can last up to an hour at a time and returns roughly every 90 minutes.

REM sleep typically begins about 60 to 90 minutes after you fall asleep. This is when vivid dreaming occurs, brain activity increases, and your eyes move rapidly beneath your eyelids. A full sleep cycle takes approximately 90 to 110 minutes, and if you're getting a full night of rest, you'll move through four or five complete cycles.

The proportion of each stage shifts as the night goes on. Earlier cycles contain more deep sleep. Later cycles, especially in the hours before you wake, tend to be heavier in REM sleep. That final stretch of REM plays an important role in memory, focus, and mental clarity—which is part of why interrupting it can affect how you feel in the morning.

What Happens to Your Sleep When You Hit Snooze

When your alarm goes off, and you hit snooze, your body tries to fall back asleep. If it succeeds, it begins a new sleep cycle. But a new cycle takes 90 minutes or more to complete, and you only have five or ten minutes before the alarm goes off again.

The result is broken or fragmented sleep. You fall into light sleep, get pulled out, then fall back in, and get pulled out again. Instead of waking up naturally, you are interrupted over and over.

Dr. Rebecca Robbins, a sleep scientist at Brigham and Women's Hospital, explains that the final hours of sleep are usually rich in REM. Repeatedly buzzing alarms can cut into these stages, reducing the mental restoration that happens during this phase. She recommends setting your alarm for the latest time you need to wake up and getting up with that single alarm, rather than fragmenting your last sleep cycle with multiple snoozes.

Dr. Philip Cheng, a sleep expert at Henry Ford Health, echoes that concern. “Multiple alarms can prematurely pull you out of deep, restorative sleep”, he says. And if you find yourself needing to snooze past your intended wake time, that may be a sign you're not getting enough shut-eye at night.

Also Read: Why Your Brain Needs Better Sleep to Function at Its Best

Does Snoozing Make You More Tired?

That heavy, foggy feeling when you wake up is called sleep inertia. It's a normal part of the transition from sleep to wakefulness, and most people experience it to some degree. For most, it fades within 15 to 30 minutes.

Sleep inertia tends to be more intense when:

• You wake from deep sleep or REM

• You're sleep-deprived

• Your sleep schedule is irregular

Snoozing can go either way. For some people, repeated alarms extend sleep inertia by keeping them in a drowsy, half-awake state longer than necessary. One Japanese study found that participants who snoozed felt less awake immediately after getting up compared to those who woke up with a single alarm.

But other research tells a different story. A 2023 study from Stockholm University looked at people who often hit the snooze button. It found that snoozing for 30 minutes did not make them feel more groggy. In fact, it may have helped.

Participants who snoozed performed slightly better on cognitive tests right after waking. Researchers suggested that the intermittent alarms helped them avoid waking directly from deep sleep, which tends to produce the worst sleep inertia.

"Half an hour of snoozing does not have negative effects on night sleep or sleep inertia," says Dr. Tina Sundelin, lead author of the Stockholm study. "If anything, we saw some positive outcomes, like improved cognitive function right after waking."

The difference may come down to individual factors—how much sleep you got, what stage you were in when the alarm went off, and whether your body naturally transitions out of deep sleep before your wake time.

Also Read: Harvard Researchers Find that a Good Night’s Sleep Can Add Years to Your Life

Why Do People Hit the Snooze Button?

The Notre Dame study found some patterns among people who snooze regularly. Snoozers tended to be:

• Younger

• More likely to be female

• More likely to identify as evening chronotype—people whose internal clocks run later than average

That last point matters. If you're naturally a night owl but have to wake up early for work or school, your alarm is going off during what your body considers the middle of the night. The urge to snooze isn't surprising in that context. Your body simply isn't ready to be awake yet.

Sleep debt also plays a role. If you're not getting enough rest at night, those extra minutes in bed feel necessary rather than optional. Snoozing becomes a way of coping with exhaustion rather than a preference.

And then there's habit. If you've been setting multiple alarms for years, your body learns to expect them. The first alarm stops registering as the real wake-up call. It becomes a warning shot, something to acknowledge before the actual deadline arrives.

Dr. Kelly Baron, a behavioral sleep medicine specialist at the University of Utah, points out that for healthy sleepers, getting seven to eight hours of sleep, brief snoozing doesn't appear to cause harm. "This data suggests it didn't have much of an impact on sleep, and snoozing did help them wake up a little easier," she says.

Also Read: Sleepmaxxing: The Viral TikTok Trend Promising Better Sleep

How Snoozing Affects Your Circadian Rhythm

Your circadian rhythm is the internal clock that regulates when you feel awake and when you feel sleepy. It responds to cues like light exposure and, importantly, consistency. Waking up at the same time every day helps maintain a stable rhythm.

Snoozing can interfere with this if it leads to irregular wake times. If you get up at 6:30 one morning and 7:15 the next, your body has a harder time predicting when it should wake up. Over time, this inconsistency can make it harder to fall asleep at night and harder to wake up in the morning.

This is especially relevant for people who already struggle with sleep. For those with insomnia or delayed sleep phase syndrome, sleep specialists often recommend a firm, consistent wake time as one of the most effective interventions. Lingering in bed with repeated alarms can work against that goal.

Dr. Kathryn Roecklein, a sleep researcher at the University of Pittsburgh, suggests that people struggling with morning fatigue focus on their overall sleep schedule rather than relying on snooze. Getting to bed earlier and waking at a consistent time tends to produce better results than trying to steal extra minutes in the morning.

Also Read: People With Insomnia Have 51% Higher Chance of Stroke

How to Stop Hitting Snooze and Wake Up Easier

If you want to reduce your reliance on snooze, these strategies can help:

• Set a realistic alarm time. If you're setting your alarm for 5:30 but you don't truly need to be up until 6:15, you're building snooze time into your schedule. Set the alarm for when you actually need to wake up.
  
  

• Keep your sleep schedule consistent. Going to bed and waking at roughly the same time every day, including weekends, helps your body anticipate when it needs to be awake.
  
  

• Get bright light right away. Light is one of the strongest cues for your internal clock. Opening the blinds, turning on lights, or stepping outside in the morning tells your body it's time to wake up and helps clear grogginess faster.
  
  

• Put your alarm across the room. If you have to physically get out of bed to turn it off, you've already broken the inertia of lying there.
  
  

• Create a morning routine worth waking up for. A cup of coffee, a few minutes outside, music you enjoy, a good breakfast—something that makes getting up feel less like a chore.
  
  

• Address the underlying sleep debt. If you're snoozing because you're exhausted, the real fix is more sleep. Look at what's cutting into your ZZZ’s and work on that first.

Dr. Baron and other sleep specialists recommend exposure to bright or morning light immediately upon waking, a shower, or some caffeine to help speed up the transition out of sleep inertia. Light in particular sends a strong signal to your internal clock that the day has started.

The Bottom Line

Snoozing is one of the most common morning habits, and recent research suggests it's not as harmful as experts once believed—at least for people who are otherwise sleeping well.

Brief snoozing doesn't appear to significantly reduce total sleep or cause lasting problems with wakefulness. For some people, it may even ease the transition into wakefulness by preventing abrupt awakenings from deep sleep.

But snoozing doesn't replace actual rest. If you're constantly exhausted and relying on multiple alarms just to function, that's worth paying attention to. The fix isn't more snooze buttons. It's more sleep.

For healthy adults who enjoy a few extra minutes in bed, there's no need to feel guilty about it. But if you want sharper mornings and more consistent energy, a single alarm after a full night of sleep will get you further than any snooze button can.

Tired of battling your alarm every morning? The real fix starts the night before. Sip2Sleep® is a natural sleep aid that helps you fall asleep more easily and stay asleep longer—so waking up doesn't feel like such a struggle. Try Sip2Sleep today.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is hitting snooze bad for your health? 

For most healthy adults, occasional snoozing isn't harmful. Recent studies from Stockholm University and the University of Notre Dame found that brief snoozing (under 30 minutes) didn't negatively affect sleep quality or daytime alertness. However, if you're relying on multiple alarms every morning just to wake up, that may be a sign you're not getting enough quality sleep at night.

Why do I keep hitting snooze? 

The most common reasons are sleep debt, chronotype mismatch, and habit. If you're not getting enough rest, those extra minutes feel essential. If you're a natural night owl forced to wake up early, your body isn't ready to be awake yet. And if you've snoozed for years, your body has learned to expect multiple alarms before the real wake-up time.

Does snoozing make you more tired? 

It depends. For some people, repeated alarms extend sleep inertia and make morning grogginess worse. For others, snoozing helps them avoid waking directly from deep sleep, which can actually reduce grogginess. The effect varies based on your sleep quality, what sleep stage you're in, and your individual body.

How do I stop hitting the snooze button? 

Start by setting a realistic alarm for when you truly need to wake up. Keep a consistent sleep schedule, get morning light immediately after waking, and put your alarm across the room so you have to get up to turn it off. Most importantly, address any underlying sleep debt—if you're well rested, the urge to snooze fades on its own.

References:

1. Stephen M Mattingly, Gonzalo Martinez, Jessica Young, Meghan K Cain, Aaron Striegel, Snoozing: an examination of a common method of waking, Sleep, Volume 45, Issue 10, October 2022, zsac184, https://doi.org/10.1093/sleep/zsac184

2. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. (2022, March 24). How sleep works - Sleep phases and stages. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health. https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/sleep/stages-of-sleep

3. Mattingly, S.M., et al. (2022). Snoozing: an examination of a common method of waking. SLEEP, 45(10). https://academic.oup.com/sleep/article/45/10/zsac184/6661272

4. Sundelin, T., et al. (2023). Is snoozing losing? Why intermittent morning alarms are used and how they affect sleep, cognition, cortisol, and mood. Journal of Sleep Research. Stockholm University. https://www.su.se/english/news/articles/2023-10-23-you-dont-lose-if-you-snooze

5. Ogawa, K., et al. (2022). Effects of using a snooze alarm on sleep inertia after morning awakening. Sleep and Biological Rhythms. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9804954/

6. Robbins, R. Interview on snooze alarms and REM sleep disruption. TIME. https://time.com/6329920/snooze-button-sleep-health/

7. Baron, K. Interview on snoozing behavior. University of Utah Health. https://healthcare.utah.edu/healthfeed/2024/01/snooze-button-it-really-all-bad

8. Cheng, P. Interview on sleep and snoozing. Henry Ford Health. https://www.sciencealert.com/most-of-us-hit-snooze-but-what-is-it-actually-doing-to-us