How often should you change your mattress?

A lot of recommendations get thrown around on how often you should change your mattress. While mattress companies market the life of a mattress as 8 years, we haven’t found this to be a universal rule. We recommend using your mattress as long as you’re happy with it. When it doesn’t satisfy your needs for any reason then it’s time to change.

How do I know it’s time to change my mattress?

There are some situations where it’s obvious that you need to replace your mattress. For example, if you’re going to live somewhere too far to take your current one, a spring is sticking out of it or if your mattress is sagging and is no longer properly supporting your body.

Outside of these situations when’s the right time to change your mattress? For us, we always recommend changing your mattress only when you need to. For example

Is it really dirty and does it smell?
Have your allergies worsened?
Is it noisy?
Are you waking up tired?
Is your back aching, whether it be only when you wake up or all the time?

In these situations it may be time to change your mattress.

Should you replace your mattress if it’s dirty?

If your mattress has become dirty over the years, there is little you can do about it. You will have to change it. Mattresses are extremely difficult to deep clean with the varied layers they are made up of.

In some cases stains are not a big issue. If your mattress gets too dirty or dusty it may lead to bed mites or other infestations setting in and you should look at changing as soon as you can.

While cleaning a mattress can be difficult, it is often best to try doing so before opting for the expense of replacing it. You can do this with soap and water, but try not to use too much and soak the mattress through. This can often result in a strong unpleasant smell appearing over the following days.

There are also specialised sprays and chemicals on the market which are worth checking out; they can be general cleaners or designed to work best on a specific type of soiling or stain.

Should you change your mattress if it smells?

After cleaning, if there’s still an unpleasant odour coming from your mattress, you can look to use Febreeze. This simply acts to mask smells, as opposed to eliminating their root cause. Realistically, at this point it would only be a matter of time before you have to change your mattress.

It’s worth starting to plan for changing your mattress by setting yourself a realistic budget. Do your research on which new mattress to buy and what would be best for you within your price range.

Should you change you mattress if you’re waking up tired?

Tired due to health related issues

If you are consistently waking up tired and not rested it may be that your mattress has a part to play in it. We don’t tend to realise when a mattress becomes a problem because it happens slowly over time and you simply get used to a bad night’s sleep. Never accept a bad night’s sleep as a fact of life. Good quality sleep is vital in maintaining our physical and mental health.

On the subject of health, there are many other factors that can cause you to have a restless night, such as stress, poor diet, caffeine intake, and insomnia. It is always worth seeing your GP if poor sleep is affecting your mental and physical well being, even if only slightly. You should never ignore chronic poor sleep. It could be one of a number of issues that could be quite serious.

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Mattress could be causing tiredness

However, if you’re given a clean bill of health and you still wake up feeling tired, it may be worth testing whether your mattress is the problem. While not always possible, staying in another bed for a few nights can help to ascertain if your mattress is causing the issues.

The best and cheapest way would be to visit family or friends for the weekend.
If you’ve got a hotel stay or holiday planned in the near future this would also be a good opportunity to gauge how well you sleep.

It’s important to note though that spare rooms and budget hotels often have cheaper mattresses in them, which may not give you a true picture of how a mid to high range one could improve your sleep. It’s still a worthwhile exercise to carry out. If you do have a better night’s sleep it’s time to change your mattress and start looking for a new mattress that works for you.

Should staying in another bed not be possible, look for a new mattress where the online store or shop offers a mattress sleep trial. This way you can try it properly in your own home. An important thing to note here is that you should still look for a mattress that you think will be right for you before buying.

Don’t set out with the aim of having a many mattresses delivered to your door to try for a couple of weeks. Arranging deliveries and collections would simply become too stressful and entail a lot of time waiting in the house for them. Delivery fees and collection fees can also sometimes be applied. Call the company to check the details, as some can be very strict whereas others offer a truer ‘no quibbles 100 night trial.

Should I change my mattress if I have a back pain?

When you do have back pain it’s best to first go to your GP to make sure you don’t have any medical issues. Back pain leads to worse sleep and hampers our everyday lives so it’s good to make sure your mattress isn’t the cause.

Is mattress sagging causing my back pain?

Mattress sagging or settling could be a cause of back pain. What is mattress settling? Settling usually refers to the fibres or foams in the upper “comfort” layer of the mattress losing their ability to cushion your body.

Fibres get compressed and lose their body and bounce, whereas foams lose their structure. Settling happens over a number of years and is usually why mattress companies say you should change them after a certain amount of time.

Are the springs in my mattress causing back pain?

Apart from fillings, wear and tear in the springs of a mattress can also cause a loss of support that they offer. This is particularly true for a coiled spring unit where the springs are all linked. Because they’re linked they all take the strain of your body weight throughout the night and lose their tension quicker.

With pocket springs, which work independently, it will take longer for wear and tear to set in. This is a major benefit of the pocket spring system. Not all springs are under constant pressure. They work individually as you move at night thus extending their lifespan.

Will a mattress topper help with back pain?

If the springs and fillings lose their support it is time to change your mattress. If your budget doesn’t allow at the time, a temporary solution would be to purchase a topper. However, this would only provide a temporary fix so it is worth weighing up what is most cost effective in the long run.

Should you change your mattress every 8 years? 12 years?

As we said at the start of this article, it’s not about how often you should replace your mattress. You should change your mattress when you need to replace your old mattress. Then why do mattress companies say 8 years? To be honest most companies would have some data to back it up and you’d have to ask each individual company why they state it.

The main point to consider is that there are simply too many factors to accurately predict how long a particular mattress will last in your particular circumstance.

Use the guidance we’ve provided above to judge for yourself whether you need a new mattress and follow the age old adage: “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” whilst also remembering that “Sleep is the golden chain that ties health and our bodies together”

Buying a new mattress

If you decide that it’s time change your old mattress and buy a new mattress we’ve written an article about how to choose a new mattress. It’s important to know what too look for in a mattress before you start shopping for mattresses. It will help you make an educated decision and buy a mattress better suited to you at an affordable price.

You can also see our range of natural pocket spring mattresses that we’ve designed to be comfortable and last a long time at an affordable price.