Sleep in U.S. Adults

Previously, we reported on sleep routines and tiredness in children. You may now be wondering how well adults sleep. If so, a recent report by Ng, Black, and Adjave-Gbewanyo (2026) may provide you with your answers. 

These authors used data from the 2024 National Health Interview Survey to examine sleep duration, as well as the percentage of adults who wake up feeling well-rested, who have difficulty falling asleep, and who have difficulty staying asleep. Ng and colleagues (2026) further examined these metrics as a result of sex, age, race, and Hispanic origin.

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the Sleep Research Society (Consensus Conference Panel, 2015) recommend that adults get at least seven hours of sleep to support optimal health. The recommendation was made after reviewing the literature on the relationship between sleep duration and general, mental, metabolic, cardiovascular, and immunological health; human performance; cancer; pain; and mortality. 

Ng and colleagues (2026) reported that 30.5 percent of adults did not meet the recommended sleep duration threshold of seven hours and that only 54.8 percent of adults woke up feeling well-rested on most days or every day. They also found 15.4 percent of adults had trouble falling asleep and 18.1 percent had trouble staying asleep most days or every day.

While sleep duration was similar between men and women, all other metrics varied as a function of sex, age, race, and Hispanic origin. Interested readers are encouraged to access the full report for these details.

References

Consensus Conference Panel; Watson, N. F., Badr, M. S., Belenky, G., Bliwise, D. L., Buxton, O. M., Buysse, D, et al. (2015). Joint consensus statement of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and Sleep Research Society on the recommended amount of sleep for a healthy adult: Methodology and discussion. Sleep, 38(8), 1161–83.

Ng AE, Black LI, Adjaye-Gbewonyo D. (2026) Short sleep duration and sleep difficulties among adults: United States, 2024. NCHS Data Brief. (559)1–12. DOI: