Get on Your Back: Why Experts Say It’s the Best Sleeping Position

CR has written extensively about the benefits of a healthy sleep routine. Sleeping on your back, which is also referred to as the supine position, can help relieve the symptoms of health conditions such as allergies, asthma, and shoulder pain. It can also support spine alignment but should be avoided if you experience heartburn, chronic snoring, or obstructive sleep apnea. And if you’re pregnant, you should also consult your doctor before changing to this position.

If a decent chunk of your budget goes toward skin serums and moisturizers, you want to make sure that every drop is doing its job. In addition to preventing the formation of sleep wrinkles, sleeping on your back can help keep those products on areas of your face they were intended for rather than on your pillow or sheets. “I’ve had patients who apply acne medication on their jawline and then overnight, it gets transferred to their sensitive eye area from the pillow,” Sethi Thacker says. “Even though they’re not applying it directly on their eye area, they can get some reactions.”

Giving your skin time to absorb products you put on before going to bed is key. “I always tell my patients to do their skin care at least an hour before bedtime,” Sethi Thacker says. “So even if they do end up rolling over, the skin care has had enough time to get absorbed and it’s not rubbing all over their pillowcases.”

Experts say there are things you can do to prep your skin for a long sleep. Start by removing all of your makeup with a melting balm or face wash rather than a makeup removal wipe, Sethi Thacker says, because some wipes contain alcohol, which can be irritating. 

Another step that helps your skin absorb products at bedtime is double cleansing your face. “Use an oil-based cleanser first, followed by a face wash because that gets all your sunscreen from the day and all your product buildup off,” Sethi Thacker says. “So then, when you put your skin care on, you have a clean slate.” She recommends using products that have active ingredients like peptides and retinol for anti-aging. These ingredients can be found in serums and creams at a range of prices. 

While skin care tricks like slugging (applying a petroleum-jelly-based product like Vaseline all over your face as the last step in your skin care routine) can moisturize dry skin, simple drugstore moisturizers, applied generously over your more specialized skin care regime, can help your products stay put overnight. “After you put on all of your skin care serums and all your active products, putting a moisturizer on top to kind of seal it all in also helps,” Sethi Thacker says.

After washing your face and applying serums, Strachan recommends locking in moisture with a lipid-based product. “You hydrate something, you saturate it, and then you put oil over it so that the water doesn’t evaporate,” she says. If you’re sleeping in a dry room and the heater is on, Strachan says to make sure you use a humidifier. “What you do at night matters. You don’t want to be dehydrated, because aged skin is actually drier. Part of aging is dry skin.”

If you use a sleep mask, allow your skin time to absorb products before you put it on. “It might just absorb your cream again,” Sethi Thacker says. “The key is really to put these products on and give them enough time for your skin to absorb them. Once your eye cream is absorbed, then the mask can help keep it on.”

The hair experts we spoke with didn’t take as strong a stance about sleep positions, but they agreed that reducing friction (regardless of your sleep posture) helps keep your hair in good condition. 

The best way to prevent hair loss and breakage overnight depends on the length and texture of your hair. If you have short to medium-length hair, Sethi Thacker recommends keeping it loose on your pillow. If you have long hair, sleeping with it down might cause friction and tangling, she says, so a loose bun or braid is a better idea. For people with curly or coarse hair, Sethi Thacker recommends wearing a silk or satin sleeping bonnet to prevent tangling and friction. 

Kim Gueldner, a hairstylist and founder of Voël Hair Studio, says that minimizing hair movement is most helpful and that she likes bonnets or hair wraps for reducing breakage or hair loss. “The friction of moving around in our sleep causes tangles and breakage,” she says. “If you stay in one position all night, that is ideal but not likely for most.”

A satin or silk pillowcase is a good tool to fight hair breakage, especially if you’re a restless sleeper. Fabrics like cotton can absorb moisture and catch the cuticle of hair strands, damaging them. The smooth surface of a silk pillowcase reduces friction and, therefore, breakage. Some evidence suggests that when compared with typical cotton pillowcases, silk pillowcases absorb less moisture.

Satin, a type of weave made with silk, polyester, or rayon, is typically more cost-effective than silk. “A silk or satin pillowcase is the best option,” says Penny James, a trichologist at the Penny James Trichology Center in New York City. (Trichologists are scalp and hair specialists.) “Its surface is smooth and almost slippery, helping prevent tangles and breakage along the hair shaft.” Make sure you change your pillowcases often, James says. CR recommends washing and changing them, along with your sheets once a week.

The supine position is ideal for many, but it isn’t always possible. There are a few ways you can train yourself to sleep on your back. Pillows are your best friend here. The Sleep Foundation recommends placing one underneath your knees, another under your lower back, and then surrounding yourself with more pillows to prevent rolling over in the middle of the night. 

If you have back pain or conditions like heartburn, chronic snoring, and obstructive sleep apnea, sleeping on your back may not be the best option for you, but there are still things you can do to prevent sleep lines and hair breakage. 

Sethi Thacker suggests trying a specialty pillow designed for wrinkle prevention. These pillows are made with a divot or “little space for your face,” she says. “So when you do end up sleeping on your side or sleeping on your stomach, your face isn’t getting squished against the pillow.”

Sethi Thacker agrees that a pillowcase made from satin or silk can reduce friction on your hair and skin. “That also helps if you end up not sleeping on your back,” she says.

While you don’t always have control over your sleep positions, there are things you can do to try to get more sleep. Some products that can help you get a good night’s sleep include blackout curtains to keep light out of your bedroom, sleep earplugs that dampen noise, and a white noise machine.

“You just want to make sure, most importantly, that you get rest,” Strachan says. “Getting good sleep is actually restorative to your skin, and beauty rest is actually a real thing.”