Why It's Good to Sleep Next to Your Partner

Table of ContentsView AllTable of ContentsBetter Sleep QualityImproved Mental HealthIncreased Intimacy

Table of ContentsView All

View All

Table of Contents

Better Sleep Quality

Improved Mental Health

Increased Intimacy

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Deciding tosleepnext to your partner can be a pretty big step. Since we spend about one-third of our days—and our lives—sleeping,this can feel like a pretty big commitment.

While the thought of cuddling up with your partner can definitely seem cozy and appealing, you may wonder how it will affect your ability to sleep and whether sleeping next to your partner is better than sleeping alone.

In addition to deepening your physical, emotional, and spiritual connection with your partner, sleeping next to your partner can benefit your mental health in many ways, saysClaudia de Llano, LMFT, a licensed marriage and family therapist.

This article discusses some of the mental health benefits of sleeping next to your partner.

These are some of the ways that sleeping next to your partner can improve the quality of your sleep, according toSabrina Romanoff, PsyD, a clinical psychologist and professor at Yeshiva University.

From an evolutionary perspective, we are most vulnerable to attack when we are sleeping at night so there is safety in numbers, Dr. Romanoff explains. “Therefore, you may subconsciously feel more safe and protected when you’re sleeping next to your partner than when you’re alone, which can help you sleep better.”

Getting a good night’s sleep is important for your health and well-being. Not sleeping well can negatively affect your immunity, heart health, weight, memory, learning ability, and reaction time, among other things.

A 2022 study published in the journalSleepconcluded that sleeping next to your partner can offer several benefits for yourmental health, including:

Dr. Romanoff explains that poor quality sleep is the one of the main common symptoms of mental health disorders such as depression and anxiety. “Since sleeping next to a partner promotes better sleep, it reduces that symptom and, in turn, improves the disorder.”

Yes, Our Sleeping Positions Can Actually Impact Our Well-Being

Below, de Llano describes some of the ways sleeping next to your partner can improve the physical, emotional, and spiritual connection between the two of you and increase intimacy in your relationship.

Physical Intimacy

Sleeping next to your partner not only enablessexual intimacy, but also promotes physical intimacy in the form of hugging, cuddling, kissing, and holding hands.

Emotional Intimacy

In fact, research suggests that sleeping next to a partner helps improve emotional intimacy as well as emotional satisfaction in the relationship.

Spiritual Intimacy

Sleeping in the same bed can be aspiritualexperience for many couples. Apart from feeling closer to your partner, the shared experience can also help you be more in sync with each other on a physiological and spiritual level.

Research has found that partners’ heartbeats sync up when they sleep next to each other—heartbeats are electrical pulses and when you sleep next to your partner, they are transmitted to them via faint vibrations.

A Word From Verywell

Sleeping next to a partner doesn’t necessarily mean that it’ll all be smooth sailing. For instance, your partner may snore loudly, kick or fidget, talk in their sleep, experience nightmares,hog the covers, move often during the night, watch television until late, keep their phone on loud, or prefer different sleeping temperatures, says Dr. Romanoff.

However, various research studies have found that despite these factors, partners who sleep next to each other tend to experiencebetter sleep, greater intimacy, and improved mental health.

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9 SourcesVerywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Canto CB, Onuki Y, Bruinsma B, van der Werf YD, De Zeeuw CI.The sleeping cerebellum.Trends Neurosci. 2017;40(5):309-323. doi:10.1016/j.tins.2017.03.001Drews HJ, Wallot S, Weinhold SL, et al.“Are we in sync with each other?” Exploring the effects of co-sleeping on heterosexual couples' sleep using simultaneous polysomnography: a pilot study.Sleep Disord. 2017;2017:8140672. doi:10.1155/2017/8140672Drews HJ, Wallot S, Brysch P, et al.Bed-sharing in couples is associated with increased and stabilized REM sleep and sleep-stage synchronization.Front Psychiatry. 2020;11:583. doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2020.00583National Institutes of Health.REM sleep.Sprajcer M, O’Mullan C, Reynolds A, Paterson JL, Bachmann A, Lastella M.Sleeping together: understanding the association between relationship type, sexual activity, and sleep.Sleep Sci. 2022;15(Spec 1):80-88. doi:10.5935/1984-0063.20220005Elsey T, Keller PS, El-Sheikh M.The role of couple sleep concordance in sleep quality: attachment as a moderator of associations.J Sleep Res. 2019;28(5):e12825. doi:10.1111/jsr.12825National Institutes of Health.Why is sleep important?Fuentes B, Kennedy K, Killgore W, Wills C, Grandner M.Bed-sharing versus sleeping alone associated with sleep health and mental health.Sleep. 2022 Vol 45, Issue Supplement_1. doi:10.1093/sleep/zsac079.009Yoon H, Choi SH, Kim SK, et al.Human heart rhythms synchronize while co-sleeping.Front Physiol. 2019;10:190. doi:10.3389/fphys.2019.00190

9 Sources

Verywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Canto CB, Onuki Y, Bruinsma B, van der Werf YD, De Zeeuw CI.The sleeping cerebellum.Trends Neurosci. 2017;40(5):309-323. doi:10.1016/j.tins.2017.03.001Drews HJ, Wallot S, Weinhold SL, et al.“Are we in sync with each other?” Exploring the effects of co-sleeping on heterosexual couples' sleep using simultaneous polysomnography: a pilot study.Sleep Disord. 2017;2017:8140672. doi:10.1155/2017/8140672Drews HJ, Wallot S, Brysch P, et al.Bed-sharing in couples is associated with increased and stabilized REM sleep and sleep-stage synchronization.Front Psychiatry. 2020;11:583. doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2020.00583National Institutes of Health.REM sleep.Sprajcer M, O’Mullan C, Reynolds A, Paterson JL, Bachmann A, Lastella M.Sleeping together: understanding the association between relationship type, sexual activity, and sleep.Sleep Sci. 2022;15(Spec 1):80-88. doi:10.5935/1984-0063.20220005Elsey T, Keller PS, El-Sheikh M.The role of couple sleep concordance in sleep quality: attachment as a moderator of associations.J Sleep Res. 2019;28(5):e12825. doi:10.1111/jsr.12825National Institutes of Health.Why is sleep important?Fuentes B, Kennedy K, Killgore W, Wills C, Grandner M.Bed-sharing versus sleeping alone associated with sleep health and mental health.Sleep. 2022 Vol 45, Issue Supplement_1. doi:10.1093/sleep/zsac079.009Yoon H, Choi SH, Kim SK, et al.Human heart rhythms synchronize while co-sleeping.Front Physiol. 2019;10:190. doi:10.3389/fphys.2019.00190

Verywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.

Canto CB, Onuki Y, Bruinsma B, van der Werf YD, De Zeeuw CI.The sleeping cerebellum.Trends Neurosci. 2017;40(5):309-323. doi:10.1016/j.tins.2017.03.001Drews HJ, Wallot S, Weinhold SL, et al.“Are we in sync with each other?” Exploring the effects of co-sleeping on heterosexual couples' sleep using simultaneous polysomnography: a pilot study.Sleep Disord. 2017;2017:8140672. doi:10.1155/2017/8140672Drews HJ, Wallot S, Brysch P, et al.Bed-sharing in couples is associated with increased and stabilized REM sleep and sleep-stage synchronization.Front Psychiatry. 2020;11:583. doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2020.00583National Institutes of Health.REM sleep.Sprajcer M, O’Mullan C, Reynolds A, Paterson JL, Bachmann A, Lastella M.Sleeping together: understanding the association between relationship type, sexual activity, and sleep.Sleep Sci. 2022;15(Spec 1):80-88. doi:10.5935/1984-0063.20220005Elsey T, Keller PS, El-Sheikh M.The role of couple sleep concordance in sleep quality: attachment as a moderator of associations.J Sleep Res. 2019;28(5):e12825. doi:10.1111/jsr.12825National Institutes of Health.Why is sleep important?Fuentes B, Kennedy K, Killgore W, Wills C, Grandner M.Bed-sharing versus sleeping alone associated with sleep health and mental health.Sleep. 2022 Vol 45, Issue Supplement_1. doi:10.1093/sleep/zsac079.009Yoon H, Choi SH, Kim SK, et al.Human heart rhythms synchronize while co-sleeping.Front Physiol. 2019;10:190. doi:10.3389/fphys.2019.00190

Canto CB, Onuki Y, Bruinsma B, van der Werf YD, De Zeeuw CI.The sleeping cerebellum.Trends Neurosci. 2017;40(5):309-323. doi:10.1016/j.tins.2017.03.001

Drews HJ, Wallot S, Weinhold SL, et al.“Are we in sync with each other?” Exploring the effects of co-sleeping on heterosexual couples' sleep using simultaneous polysomnography: a pilot study.Sleep Disord. 2017;2017:8140672. doi:10.1155/2017/8140672

Drews HJ, Wallot S, Brysch P, et al.Bed-sharing in couples is associated with increased and stabilized REM sleep and sleep-stage synchronization.Front Psychiatry. 2020;11:583. doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2020.00583

National Institutes of Health.REM sleep.

Sprajcer M, O’Mullan C, Reynolds A, Paterson JL, Bachmann A, Lastella M.Sleeping together: understanding the association between relationship type, sexual activity, and sleep.Sleep Sci. 2022;15(Spec 1):80-88. doi:10.5935/1984-0063.20220005

Elsey T, Keller PS, El-Sheikh M.The role of couple sleep concordance in sleep quality: attachment as a moderator of associations.J Sleep Res. 2019;28(5):e12825. doi:10.1111/jsr.12825

National Institutes of Health.Why is sleep important?

Fuentes B, Kennedy K, Killgore W, Wills C, Grandner M.Bed-sharing versus sleeping alone associated with sleep health and mental health.Sleep. 2022 Vol 45, Issue Supplement_1. doi:10.1093/sleep/zsac079.009

Yoon H, Choi SH, Kim SK, et al.Human heart rhythms synchronize while co-sleeping.Front Physiol. 2019;10:190. doi:10.3389/fphys.2019.00190

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