Anyone who’s ever nodded off under the weight of a purring cat or snoring dog already knows how weighted blankets work. The warmth, the softness, the hefty pressure that renders you unable to fidget or indeed move. Worries subside, and you have no choice but to slide into slumber.
Studies have demonstrated some success for weighted blankets as sleep aids, but where these hefty quilts seem to excel is in alleviating anxiety – and not just according to TikTok influencers. Scientists, medics and the NHS are trialling them to comfort dementia patients, soothe neurodivergent children and even relieve chronic pain.
I’ve long been intrigued by weighted blankets. The list of maladies they’re said to soothe is like looking in the mirror (anxiety, check; restless legs when I’m trying to fall asleep, oh, very check), and I’m always open to drug-free remedies. However, being pinned down never struck me as relaxing, and weighted blankets can even be dangerous if given to the wrong person. NHS guidelines caution against their use by children with learning difficulties and mobility problems that might prevent them from removing the blanket by themselves.
To find out what these blankets could (or couldn’t) do for me, I assembled 10 bestsellers and set about cocooning myself in the name of research. Here I reveal which weighted blankets lifted a weight from my shoulders, and which ones just weighed me down.
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At a glance
Best weighted blanket overall:
Emma Hug
Best budget weighted blanket:
Silentnight Wellbeing
Best warm weighted blanket:
The Oodie weighted blanket
Best weighted blanket for kids:
OHS Minecraft
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Why you should trust me
I’ve spent three decades reviewing products, from smartphones to hay fever remedies, so I’m professionally sceptical of manufacturers’ claims to magically improve our lives by buying their stuff. I also have a solid background in napping, insomnia and swearing at alarm clocks, so I always welcome the chance to sleep on the job for the Filter.
Weighted blankets claim to directly target problems I’ve struggled with for years. I’ve been on anti-anxiety meds since the 90s, and HRT has taken the edge off my sleep issues, but some non-medicinal interventions on both counts would be most welcome.
How I tested
Weighted blankets are less diverse than mattresses or heated clothes airers. They do the same thing, and most are the same size – 150 x 200cm, a bit smaller than a double duvet (200 x 200cm). They even tend to be a uniform shade of light grey. Ranking them would require some careful nit-picking.
“Weighted” is very much a part of the product description, but I was still surprised by how heavy the blankets were. At about 7kg each, that’s 70 kilos of bedding I faced hefting up the stairs – although after reviewing so many mattresses for the Filter, carrying a few kilos of fabric felt like a day off.
I began by weighing each blanket while still in its (weightless) plastic carry case, then whipped out the tape measure. Some blankets weren’t quite the advertised weight and size, but only one came up short.
My husband and testing partner, Alan, then joined me to rate the samples on factors such as fabric softness, warmth and construction quality. To test how well the weight was distributed, we pulled each blanket over us while lying on our backs and sides, and noted how easily we could turn over in bed under it.
We also deployed dirt (a smudge of compost from a houseplant) to test the ease of spot cleaning. Some weighted blankets are machine washable, but I wasn’t prepared to test this by risking my machine. One brand I tested, Allure Bath Fashions, says blankets over 5.5kg should be washed in commercial machines, and I’m happy to follow that advice.
Then came the cocooning. We spent three cosy evenings on the sofa, wrapped in a series of test blankets and taking care not to spill TV snacks, given the aforementioned cleaning caveat. Next, we slept under each blanket for a few nights in September and October. A full-size weighted blanket isn’t big enough for two adults to share as their only bedding, so we used a 2.4-tog summer duvet underneath to ensure we were both covered.
Autumn’s night temperatures were occasionally too warm to keep the blanket on all night, but I was still able to test them as a way to soothe restless legs. Each morning, I recorded how well each one had helped me fall asleep, regulate my temperature and stop fidgeting.
After testing, I donated my sample blankets to the Southampton Hospitals Charity, which passed them on to the hospital’s Bassett Ward for dementia patients. “They were so well received,” says hospital engagement officer Shona Brooks.
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The best weighted blankets you can buy in 2026
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<em>Best weighted blanket overall:</em>Emma Hug
- What we love:Spreads weight evenly and helps control temperature
- What we don’t love:Expensive, and even more so with the brilliant cover
The generous, evenly spread weight of Emma’s blanket made it an instant favourite with me, my husband and our cat. Its soft, breathable cotton shell contains just over 7kg of glass microbeads, encased in microfibre and spread evenly among a patchwork of finely stitched squares. The overall effect is delicious, like being hugged by cosy cotton pyjamas.
Why we love it
All weighted blankets keep you warm by trapping in your body heat, but there’s a fine line between warm and overheated in bed. The Emma Hug’s cotton fabric makes the blanket feel warm without the risk of overheating or feeling clammy.
Despite its heft (7.3kg by my measure), we found it easy to move around underneath the cotton fabric without getting tangled. That said, the weight discouraged us both from fidgeting as much as normal, and this proved surprisingly soothing and soporific.
When I first tested the Emma Hug, it came with an optional silky bamboo cover, which costs an additional £40. To my despair, the cover has vanished from Emma’s website, but it seems you can still buy it elsewhere online. Good thing, too, because it not only helps protect the blanket (it’s much easier to wash and dry than the blanket itself) but it also adds a delectable extra layer of comfort. Being enveloped in heavy silken bamboo is, with apologies to my husband, the closest I’ve come to heaven while falling asleep.
Even without the cover, the Emma Hug is expensive. However, I think it justifies the cost if, like me, you need all the help you can get with sleep – especially if you have trouble regulating your body temperature.
It’s a shame that … the cotton surface of the blanket is slightly less warming than the many polyester blankets we tested, and creases more easily.
Size: 150 x 200cm
Weight (measured): 7.3kg
Material: cotton fabric with glass microbeads and polyester microfibre filling
Washing: blanket is machine washable at 30C, cover at 40C
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<em>Best budget weighted blanket:</em>Silentnight Wellbeing
- What we love:Superbly priced and wonderfully soft
- What we don’t love:The fabric might be simply too hot in summer
This charcoal-coloured comforter is the only weighted blanket Silentnight makes, and it’s a cracker – at less than half the price of the Emma or more hyped blankets, such as the Oodie.
Why we love it
Silentnight’s blanket looks magnificent and feels wonderfully soft against your skin. It’s machine washable, but if you’d rather not risk it in your machine, you’ll be glad to hear it was one of the easiest to spot clean in our dirt test. That may partly be because dark grey doesn’t show stains as easily as the more ubiquitous light grey.
At 6.9kg, the Silentnight weighs marginally less than other weighted blankets of similar dimensions. It was heavy enough to envelope me with satisfying pressure, though, and genuinely helped calm me as I laid on my side to go to sleep.
It’s a shame that … the jersey-like fabric isn’t particularly cooling. I didn’t experience any sweatiness while sleeping with it, but this blanket wouldn’t be my first choice on hot nights.
Size: 152 x 203cm
Weight (measured): 6.9kg
Material: polyester fabric with glass microbeads and polyester filling
Washing: machine washable at 40C
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<em>Best warm weighted blanket:</em>The Oodie weighted blanket
- What we love:The warmest of the bunch, and available in a range of colours
- What we don’t love:It’s quite expensive at full RRP
Made by the Australian company whose eponymous wearable blanket kept thousands of home workers toasty in lockdown, this fluffy blanket was the warmest sofa snuggler in my test. Bonus points, too, for coming in a wider range of colours and weights than its opposition.
Why we love it
The Oodie’s silky fleece fabric is a sensory delight, and I liked the high quality of details such as the stitching and well-padded squares. While Oodie weighted blankets come in various weights, they’re all the same size at 125 x 196.5cm: smaller than most, and easier to store. My Oodie never made me feel swamped, and its relatively nimble weight and size made it easy to carry between bed and sofa.
I tested a 4.5kg Oodie weighted blanket, the lightest in its range. Your blanket should ideally weigh about 10% of your body weight, and for short women like me, this can present a challenge. At under 50kg, I am officially too small for standard 7kg blankets, let alone 9kg behemoths like the heaviest in the Oodie’s range. The 9kg will feel gratifyingly heavy for larger people who struggle to get the full benefit from lighter blankets.
All Oodie weighted blankets come in a lovely cotton carry bag that’d make them an ideal gift.
It’s a shame that … with an RRP of £109, this blanket is one of the most expensive in my test, but look out for regular discounts. I bought it for £89, still steep but not unjustifiably so.
Size: 125 x 196.5cm
Weight (measured): 4.5kg (also available in 6.8kg and 9kg)
Material: polyester fabric with glass microbeads and polyester microfibre filling
Washing: hand wash or cold machine wash
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<em>Best weighted blanket for kids:</em>OHS Minecraft
- What we love:Perfectly weighted for kids with beautiful padding and stitching
- What we don’t love:It’s too light for adults, so outgrowing it is inevitable
Weighted blankets have been used to calm children with autism, but your child need not have any diagnosis to benefit from their soothing effects. This single-size blanket from OHS weighs 3kg, ideal for children weighing about 30kg or more.
Why we love it
The weight is spread evenly, so when it’s wrapped around you or laid flat over your body, it feels much lighter than, say, the concentrated 3kg of a cat in your lap. That makes it ideal for kids, who should not be given heavier blankets. “It is important that your child can move around by themselves under the weighted blanket and be able to remove [it] easily,” say NHS guidelines.
This Minecraft-themed blanket is beautifully padded and stitched, so there’s no danger of the non-toxic microbeads spilling out or being removed by inquisitive hands. It comes in a range of patterns, including space print and a swish electric blue, all with a deliciously tactile silky feel that I found quite soothing in itself. It’s by far the easiest blanket in my test to wash and dry, too.
It’s a shame that … this excellent quilt has a necessarily limited target audience. It’s not big or heavy enough to work as a weighted blanket for adults, and mustn’t be used for babies or toddlers.
Size: 100 x 150cm
Weight (measured): 3kg as advertised
Material: polyester fabric with non-toxic glass microbeads and polyester filling
Washing: hand wash recommended
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The best of the rest
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OHS fluffy faux fur
- What we love:Luxuriously fluffy and tactile
- What we don’t love:Difficult to clean, and likely won’t stay fluffy forever
Best for: looking fabulous while being swaddled to sleep
I could stroke the faux fur side of this budget blanket all day. The 4cm-long polyester fibre “hairs” create a sumptuous sea of fluff whose tactile pleasures soothed me almost as much as the blanket’s weight did. The other side is a towelling-like fleece that feels even warmer than its shagpile opposite.
Alan remarked that you could use this blanket as a rug, and now the mental image of him rolling around on it by the fireside will never leave me.
It didn’t make the final cut because … this was the hardest of all to hand clean, and I suspect it won’t remain in its glorious as-new state after years of cuddling.
Size: 150 x 200 cm (also available in 125 x 180cm); weight (measured): 7.4kg (also available 4kg and 6kg); material: polyester fabric with glass microbeads and polyester filling; washing: hand wash and air dry
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Slumberdown Sleepwell
- What we love:Good temperature control in summer
- What we don’t love:Lacks some of the cosiness factor for winter
Best for: helping you fall asleep without overheating
Slumberdown’s silky blanket seemed to melt particularly evenly across my body when I lay on my side, exerting a gentle-but-firm pressure that helped me stay still while I fell asleep.
I found the light grey polyester fabric cooling to the touch, albeit without feeling anywhere near as luxurious as the Emma’s cover. At less than half the price of the Emma blanket and cover, though, it’s an excellent alternative.
It didn’t make the final cut because … the silkiness of the fabric makes it feel less cosy than some of the others. Great in summer, perhaps less so on cold winter nights.
Size: 150 x 200cm; weight (measured): 7kg; material: polyester fabric with glass microbeads and polyester filling; washing: wipe clean
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OHS waffle fleece
- What we love:Incredibly warm and keenly priced
- What we don’t love:Perhaps too heavy for some sleepers
Best for: winter warmth without putting the heating on
Waffle fleece is already one of the warmest fabrics you can buy, and at almost 8kg, this blanket could be all the heating you’ll need this winter. OHS’s blanket was too heavy for me, and even when I lay on my side, I found myself pushing it off. I may well feel differently on freezing winter nights.
Alan adored this one, though, commenting that he just wished the colour choices could be more creative. At least OHS does give you colour choices with its weighted blankets, unlike other brands, such as Silentnight and Emma. You can choose from dark grey, light grey and beige “mink”, which we tested.
It didn’t make the final cut because … it’s too heavy for me and my decidedly non-commercial washing machine. Hand washing would take some muscle, too, so I’m glad this one spot-cleaned surprisingly well in our test.
Size: 150 x 200cm (also available 125 x 180cm); weight (measured): 7.9kg; material: polyester fabric with glass microbeads and polyester filling; washing: hand wash and air dry
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Allure Bath Fashions Slumber
- What we love:Comes in a variety of weights and sizes for all tastes
- What we don’t love:Lacks a little skin-friendly softness
Best for: smaller or larger people who find standard 7kg blankets too heavy or light
Allure’s blanket is one of the few that come in a range of lighter and heavier versions. I didn’t test the 9kg but tried both the 4kg and 7kg versions. Both had their benefits, with the 4kg offering just the right degree of hug on the sofa, while the 7kg did a better job of calming my fidgety body and restless legs in bed.
Unusually, this dark grey blanket comes with a tog rating. At 2.5 tog, it won’t overheat you on warm nights, but its enveloping pressure will help keep out the chill in winter.
It didn’t make the final cut because … this excellent-value blanket is similar to the Silentnight, but its fabric is less soft against your skin.
Size: 152 x 203cm (also available 122 x 185cm); weight: 7.3kg (also available 4kg, 5.5kg, 6.8kg, 9kg); material: polyester fabric with glass microbeads and polyester filling; washing: machine washable at 30C, but the brand says blankets weighing over 5.5kg should be washed in a commercial machine
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Lifemax microwave weighted blanket
- What we love:A weighted shawl-like blanket for targeted comfort
- What we don’t love:It’s far too small to deliver serious therapeutic benefits
Best for: draping around your shoulders or warming your feet on chilly days
And now for something slightly different. At 1.3kg and about the size of two pillowcases, the Lifemax isn’t really a weighted blanket like the others in my test. It’s essentially a wheat bag, with its contents divided between 18 quilt-like sections. After 45 seconds in the microwave, it turns into a warm, fragrant, weighted shawl. (Be careful not to overheat, as per microwavable hot-water bottles.)
Lifemax’s fluffy black comforter arrived quite late in my testing schedule, and it felt like a gift from the gods because I’d just been felled by an October cold and found it difficult to sleep. Adding this gently weighted soother to my bedtime routine genuinely helped, especially with a drop of Olbas oil on the warm fabric.
It’s a shame that … it’s too small and light to deliver the pressure of a therapeutic weighted blanket.
Size: 43 x 106cm; weight: 1.3kg; material: polyester fabric, lavender-scented flax seed filling; washing: spot clean with a damp cloth
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What you need to know
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What does a weighted blanket do?
A weighted blanket is not just a heavy blanket, or like lying under a rug. True weighted blankets are designed to feel floppy and spread their weight evenly, so they exert gentle-but-firm pressure consistently across your body.
This is a form of “deep touch pressure” (DTP), a therapy that mimics being hugged or swaddled. According to researchers, DTP can boost the body’s production of neurotransmitters, including “happy hormone” serotonin, so it has the potential to alleviate anxiety.
At least one study into DTP has used lead aprons, but the idea of being swaddled in lead doesn’t do much for my serotonin levels, so I was relieved to learn that today’s blankets use safer ingredients, such as tiny “micro” glass beads. The beads are divided evenly among quilted squares to ensure a proper spread of weight, and padded (usually with polyester microfibre) for comfort and durability.
Weighted blankets have been embraced as therapeutic tools by health organisations, including the Royal College of Occupational Therapists and numerous NHS trusts. When I delivered our test blankets to Southampton Hospitals Charity at the city’s university hospital, passing staff commented that their own weighted blankets had helped them with ADHD and insomnia. These blankets are catching on as a sleep aid, too, with a 2024 study calling them “a promising [drug-free] tool” for sleep disorders.
They may not work for everyone, though. Besides being unsuitable for those experiencing certain health problems, weighted blankets don’t feel comfortable for all users. “If you love the feeling of being tightly tucked in at night, a weighted blanket might be perfect for you,” says Hannah Shore, head of sleep science at Mattress Online. “But if you prefer a little more movement, you may find them slightly restricting. You could always use it in your wind-down routine to help you relax before you go to bed.”
How heavy should a weighted blanket be?
Your weighted blanket should be about 10% of your body weight. If you weigh 71.8kg (11st 3lb), the average weight of UK women according to the most recent NHS data, a standard 7kg weighted blanket would be heavy enough to exert therapeutic pressure, but not so heavy that it’s uncomfortable or unsafe.
Dimensions matter, too. Most weighted blankets for adults measure 150 x 200cm, the same as the sleeping surface of a king-size mattress. You can’t buy weighted blankets much bigger than this. The standard size is big enough to safely envelope one person lying down or sitting on the sofa, or two of you if you sleep in close quarters. Whatever size or weight the blanket is, never put it over your head.
What’s the best way to wash a weighted blanket?
Most of my test blankets say they are machine washable. In practice, the only items I risked in my machine were the 3kg OHS kids’ weighted blanket (on cold) and the Emma Hug’s bamboo cover (on 30C). Both washed clean and dried within two hours on my heated airer.
Full-size weighted blankets are more of a challenge. They roughly double their weight when wet, giving butch new meaning to the phrase “wet blanket”. The manufacturer Allure recommends using a commercial machine to wash blankets over 5.5kg, but check the launderette’s weight limits before you pile in.
Hand washing is an option, but again the weight may be prohibitive, especially for arms which, like mine, haven’t seen the inside of a gym for years. Sleep scientist Shore recommends a lighter approach – or a blanket cover. “If your blanket doesn’t have a cover, you can spot clean it with lukewarm water and a little detergent. Always make sure you check the care instructions first to avoid invalidating your guarantee or warranty.”
For more:
• The best electric blankets and heated throws
• The best hot-water bottles
• I tested the most-hyped sleep aids – here’s what worked
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Jane Hoskyn is a features journalist and WFH pioneer with three decades of experience in rearranging bookshelves and “testing” coffee machines while deadlines loom. Her work has made her a low-key expert in all manner of consumables, from sports watches to solar panels. She would always rather be in the woods
