‘Sleep tourism’ promises the trip of your dreams. Beyond the hype plus 5 tips for a holiday at home

By Charlotte Gupta, Dean J. Miller, CQUniversity Australia

Imagine arriving at your hotel after a long flight and being greeted by your own personal sleep butler. They present you with a pillow menu and invite you to a sleep meditation session later that day.

You unpack in a room kitted with an AI-powered smart bed, blackout shades, blue light-blocking glasses and weighted blankets.

Holidays are traditionally for activities or sightseeing – eating Parisian pastry under the Eiffel tower, ice skating at New York City’s Rockefeller Centre, lying by the pool in Bali or sipping limoncello in Sicily. But “sleep tourism” offers vacations for the sole purpose of getting good sleep.

The emerging trend extends out of the global wellness tourism industry – reportedly worth more than US$800 billion globally (A$1.2 trillion) and expected to boom.

Luxurious sleep retreats and sleep suites at hotels are popping up all over the world for tourists to get some much-needed rest, relaxation and recovery. But do you really need to leave home for some shuteye?

Not getting enough

The rise of sleep tourism may be a sign of just how chronically sleep deprived we all are.

In Australia more than one-third of adults are not achieving the recommended 7–9 hours of sleep per night, and the estimated cost of this inadequate sleep is A$45 billion each year.

Inadequate sleep is linked to long-term health problems including poor mental health, heart disease, metabolic disease and deaths from any cause.

Can a fancy hotel give you a better sleep?

Many of the sleep services available in the sleep tourism industry aim to optimise the bedroom for sleep. This is a core component of sleep hygiene – a series of healthy sleep practices that facilitate good sleep including sleeping in a comfortable bedroom with a good mattress and pillow, sleeping in a quiet environment and relaxing before bed.

The more people follow sleep hygiene practices, the better their sleep quality and quantity.

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