"I slept like an Olympic athlete and my night sweats disappeared" - everything you need to know about the Eight Sleep Pod 3

The Eight Sleep Pod 3 is a miracle worker. In theory, it's just another cooling mattress topper. In practice, it uses hydro-technology to actively cool your bed down or heat it up. It saw away night sweats and ensured we slept deeply night after night, is it perfect? Almost.

These days, lots of the best mattress toppers claim to be 'cooling', offering a simple way to cool down your bedroom at night. Whilst they might naturally let your skin breathe, none of them actively change the temperature of your bed. Well, none except the Eight Sleep Pod 3.

When you lie on the Eight Sleep Pod 3 mattress topper, it subtly records all your health markers, including your heart rate, breathing rate, and body temperature. Using this data, the topper adjusts your environment to keep you in deep restorative sleep, whether that means warming up or cooling down. It's like nothing else on the market.

Those are just some of the Eight Sleep Pod 3's impressive credentials. So you won't be surprised when you hear that this is the official mattress topper for whole teams of Olympic and national athletes. In fact, the list famous people who use Eight Sleep reads like the invite to an A-list party. We thought we'd quite like to be on that list, so two of our experts have been using this since April. You have our word, it's dreamy.

Specifications

How does the Eight Sleep work?

Before we dive into the details of how I found the Eight Sleep Pod 3, it's important that you know a little bit more about how it works and why athletes have been using it for years. Essentially, the Eight Sleep Pod 3 is made up of an 'active grid' which slips on top of your mattress. This speaks to an app that controls your whole sleep environment.

The smart tech works like a fitness tracker come sleep coach. It monitors and changes a number of factors whilst you slumber. The first, and most important factor, is temperature. The Pod 3 detects your body temperature and the room temperature and it will then feed either warmed or cooled water through the grid, ensuring your body is kept at a stable, suitable temperature for sleep. 

The Pod 3 also monitors another 36 biometric and environmental factors, from heart rate, HRV, and breath rate, as well as snoring, sleep routine, and sleep quality. It then scores you on your sleep and gives you advice on how to achieve a better night of sleep. It's a lot like your other wearable fitness trackers, just bigger, and better, and you don't have to wear it to sleep. Can you see why Olympic athletes use it now?

I could go on and on about other features - this divides into dual zones, so couples can set different environments for sleep and it will vibrate (or heat) you awake - but I'll refrain from giving you an overload of information. You'll get all that further down.

Unboxing and first impressions

As you might expect, this comes with a fair amount more packaging than your average mattress topper. I was sent four, slim boxes, all neatly designed with Eight Sleep logos. It looks like a lot to unbox and, for a mattress topper, it is. However, for what the Eight Sleep Pod 3 can do, it's not much to unbox.

Almost all of the packaging was recyclable and easy to dispose of. The topper comes with some bags too, but you won't need these. Once the Pod 3 is on your bed, you won't be taking it off. 

Setting it all up was simple. The Pod 3, like any other mattress topper, tucks around the bed, you plug it in, and you fill-up the water container. It might start to sound a bit noisy, but don't worry, it's pumping water through the grid. You might hear it whirring away if it's working particularly hard, but, for the most part, this is quiet. Put it this way, lost sleep from the noise.

My only word of warning would be to get this on your bed in the right place. Whilst the water cooler isn't bulky, it needs to be positioned correctly. Eight Sleep gives you some helpful stickers to get it in position, but you'll need to check this against your personal bed. I have a storage bed, so I wanted to make sure that I could still lift up my mattress without crushing the water reservoir. Once you've secured that, it's good to go. It feels like a nice piece of kit.

Who would it suit?

We put this through two expert testers who each slept on the Pod 3 for months. One of them was me. I care a lot about my sleep and fitness, so the 'health tracking' side of the Pod 3 had a massive appeal to me. I already use SleepCycle and use fitness trackers daily, so I was really keen to see what the Pod 3 could offer me. 

If you're a biohacker or into your fitness like me, I can tell you that this is amazing. It becomes as much of a mattress topper. It's a sleep coach too, offering insights, advice, and prompts that make you aware of any bad habits that could be damaging your sleep and recovery. 

Our other tester was my menopausal mother. She won't mind me telling you this, because her sleep before the Pod 3 was terrible. She would wake up from hot flashes and night sweats regularly. She rarely slept through the night and found that it was really ruining her day-to-day life because she was just so exhausted. If that's something you suffer with, you'll know how debilitating it can feel.

After months of testing, we came to the realisation that the Pod 3 is perfect for menopausal women and those suffering from night sweats. When she started using the Pod 3, she set her bed to a chilly 12°C. The whole of her side of the mattress felt colder than the cold side of the pillow. It was refrigerator cold, which is incredible, especially since my dad could keep his half of the bed cosy and warm. I'll go deeper into the details of the cooling capabilities of the Pod 3, but if you're seriously suffering, this is an investment worth considering.

Before I walk you through who this would suit, I am morally obliged to tell you about the price. It's just under £3,000, which is enough to make anyone a bit hot and flustered. I've been - rather ironically - losing sleep over the price and whether I recommend you make the splurge.

Here's what it's come down to for me: we spend a third of our lives asleep, and then the other two-thirds of our lives are massively impacted by the quality of our sleep. I really care about getting a good night of sleep and this has me sleeping better than ever before. 

With the results that I experienced, I could easily justify the Pod 3 in the long term. My menopausal mum said that she couldn't even put a price on getting her sleep back, so she would spend the money too, but there's still no escaping that this is a big investment. If you're someone who really struggles with night sweats and heat when you sleep, it's worth investing in. You can pay in parts with Klarna, if that helps to take the sting out of the RRP.

What was it like to use?

I'll include what both our experts made of sleeping on the Pod 3, because we had very different demands placed on the topper. We've already covered what setting this up was like (easy!) and I can promise you that it's as dreamy to sleep on.

Test 1: as a cooling mattress topper

We've been working through tests of the best cooling mattress toppers on the market and I can tell you now that this is - without a doubt - the most effective one we've tested. 

As a cooling device in your bed, this is flawless. Most cooling mattress toppers have breathable structures, but the hydro-power pumped through this is like no other. My mum started sleeping between 12°C and 20°C every night for months. She plugged into the app that she suffers from night sweats and lo-and-behold, the Pod 3 was balancing out her hot flashes before she even realised one was coming on. You can set different temperatures for different parts of the night, so the mattress cools as her body warms up, balancing out any sticky, sweaty evenings.

"Before sleeping on the Pod 3, I'd be dreading sticky, sweaty nights," she said, "but I suddenly found myself sleeping right through, or only coming to a light awakening before I dropped back into sleep. Honestly, I was just relieved to have found something to tackle my night sweats. 

The Pod 3 definitely feels cold, but it does also warm up a little from your body. It's still cool enough to tackle my night sweats, but don't expect it to feel like lying in a fridge all night. I love it and, with the state I was in before, I would have paid any price for a proper sleep!"

I mentioned that the Pod 3 can split into two heat zones. I tested this out with my partner. When I climb into bed, I like it to feel cosy, but I'll quickly overheat and throw the covers off, frustrated that I'm awake (again) at 3am, whilst my partner blissfully snoozes. When we were using the Eight Sleep, we set my side of the bed to be warm to start with, but to keep me cool and asleep, whilst regulating his body temperature separately. As promised, it did just that. My side of the bed would feel a little warm to start with and then cool down, his would be crisp to hop into and then stable all night through.

We were sleeping on the Pod 3 during some of the UK's rare, but unbearable, heatwaves. I was endlessly grateful to the power of the Pod 3. Whilst everyone else was throwing their covers off and keeping the window open, I actually needed a duvet to stop me from getting too cold. It kept us both cool enough that I ended up feeling a little left out when everyone was complaining about how impossible it was to sleep.

Test 2: as an electric blanket

Cold sleepers will benefit as much as hot sleepers from the Pod 3. It can get up to 43°C, which is hotter than anyone would want their bed. I normally aim for a cosy 22°C when I hop in. 

I also set my alarm on the Pod 3 to be a heating option. Yes, your mattress-topper-cum-electric-blanket also doubles up as an alarm. There's no end to its expertise. You can choose between being vibrated awake or heated awake, both of which are gentle and natural ways to get up. I tried both and the heating just worked best for me. 

As an electric blanket, this is faultless. It has an automatic routine for heating your bed (and the app will notify you that your bed is getting ready), you can leave it on all night, adjust it mid-night, and sleep sound in the knowledge that it's a safer option than the average electric blanket.

I tested getting this up to full temperature and it was unbearably hot, even in the winter. That's proof that this is an incredible electric blanket. It's a very extravagant and expensive one, but it's a good one.

Test 3: as a dual-control topper for couples

If you've been contemplating a sleep divorce, I think I've just found your sleep mediator. The Pod 3 does an amazing job of controlling both sides of the bed, completely independently. It'll monitor and track all your biomarkers separately, heat and cool the bed separately, and log all your snoring separately too. 

One of the tests that we also always give mattresses and mattress toppers is one for motion control. The Pod 3 is supposed to emulate whichever mattress you put underneath it and I actually think that it did a great job of this, but it's also important that it can bring some motion control to the bedroom too. 

Our formal test looks like this: we fill a glass with water and then sit it in the middle of the bed. Both partners hop onto the bed, one person will move and see how the glass of water fares. In theory, it shouldn't spill a drop and, in our test, it didn't. I will have to add that my mattress is good for minimizing motion transfer anyway, but it's great that this keeps it solid too.

Importantly, over the months of testing, with me or my partner getting up for loo trips, neither of us was woken up once. Normally, both of us are roused from sleep when one gets up, but in this instance, both of us are in the clear. I can see why this would appeal to athletes and celebrities who need a good night of sleep, but they don't want to be apart from their loved ones. It's a lovely compromise.

Test 4: as a fitness tracker

This is almost the opposite of all the fitness trackers on the market, in that you don't wear it and you only get data through at night. But, that's kind of perfect, isn't it? You can take your watch off to charge and let the Pod 3 take over.

As I mentioned, I normally track my sleep using Sleep Cycle and, occasionally, my Garmin. The app is probably at the bottom of the pile for accuracy: it's nice to see, but not hugely accurate. My Garmin is really good, but the Pod 3 is even better. It gives a whole host of insights into your sleep data: your breathing, snoring, movement, core body temperature, VO2 Max, heart rate, and the list goes on. 

You get all the data presented to you, on the app, in neat, digestible graphs and tables. It really became my personality when I was sleeping on it, because there was so much information at my fingertips. 

Again, it's probably another reason why Olympians love this. Not only is it stabilizing your sleep environment, but it's also giving you all the bio-info you need to make sure that everything's working well and doing what it should be doing.

How does it compare?

Comparing the Eight Sleep Pod 3 to any other mattress topper is pointless because it's a combination of all the best mattress toppers as well as the best electric blankets, and fitness trackers too. You won't find a mattress topper that's better at cooling, but, if you want to save some money, the Panda London Memory Foam Bamboo Topper is a good, naturally cooling option that costs a lot less.

The only comparison that it's reasonable to make is to the Pod 4 Ultra. This is Eight Sleep's newer, more expensive option (by about £1,000). Essentially, the Pod 4 has better cooling technology and it's quieter, especially when it's under more pressure (in a hot room with two hot sleepers). It also claims to be 30% more energy efficient, which saves your utilities. 

Whilst it is more expensive, there are some tweaks that the team made that I think are really helpful. On the Pod 3, the controls are only accessible via the app, but with the Pod 3, you can control everything on a panel under the bed. The Pod 4 can also adjust its shape, cocooning you and holding you in the perfect position for sleep, but these are certainly luxuries that you might not need if you just want to maximise on the cooling benefits of Eight Sleep.

Should you buy it?

If it were cheaper, I would tell everyone to buy the Pod 3. No questions asked. It's combined my electric blanket, fitness tracker, cooling topper, and sleep coach into one, impressive piece of kit. I'm sleeping better than I ever have and I'm not sure how I could sleep any better. 

If you really care about the quality of your sleep, the Pod 3 is a worthwhile investment. Arguably, that should be all of us, but £3,000 might change just how much you care. I still think it's worth it, especially if you suffer from night sweats, so I think the best way to enjoy the benefits without the sting of the price tag is to buy it using Klarna and think of it as an investment.

How we test

At woman&home, we really care about our testing process. Our team of experts works hard to keep on top of all the latest and greatest sleep tech on the market. As soon as we see something that we like the look of, we do our research, check the claims, and then call it in to test.

As soon as its in the hands of our experts, we start taking notes. We check everything, from the packaging and the setting up to the maintenance and storage. We want to understand every aspect of the topper, so that you can get a holistic idea of what you're buying into.

Once it's on our beds, we get testing. We make sure to cover special features, whether that's cooling, heating, motion transfer, or different zones. We have special tests for each feature, but the best thing we can do is sleep on it. We use toppers for months, so that we have a really clear idea of what the topper is like to sleep on. All of our experts track their sleep, so that we have some data to compare how well we are sleeping on the topper with our average night of sleep.

We'll make comparisons to other toppers and similar models on the market, so you can feel like you've shopped around and got the best option for you. We let you know everything you need to know so that you can sleep soundly, knowing you've made the best possible purchase for you.