Let’s get the puns out of the way first: yes, I am hot in bed; yes, I get the cold shoulder sometimes and yes, I do sometimes wake up hot and sweaty.
As a fairly typical cranky middle-aged male, these are part of the simple process of falling asleep. Like more than 30% of Americans, I struggle with sleep, intermittently being too hot, too cold or having a cat jump on my head. The BedJet aims to deal with the first two issues by quite literally adding climate control between the sheets.
The BedJet sits at the foot of your bed, sucks in air, then pipes it under your comforter or sheets, blowing over your body as you sleep. This gentle flow of air provides heating or cooling, as required, and helps remove humid air. The feeling is odd at first, but if you can handle the sensation and the rather steep price, a cool breeze on hot nights and a warm puff on cold ones is a luxurious way to fall – and stay – asleep.
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BedJet 3
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What we loved
After testing it for several exceptionally hot, humid weeks in New England, I can attest that the BedJet made me much more comfortable on most nights. While it doesn’t drop the air temperature like an air conditioner, the airflow has a cooling effect on all but the most humid nights, eliminating the clammy feeling that would usually leave me tossing and turning.
About the size of a large shoebox, the BedJet fits under the bed, puffing air into a flexible duct like you might find on a clothes dryer. The vent end attaches to the mattress with an L-shaped clamp, directing the air over the body.
Most of the controls are on the overly large and complex remote control, which lets you adjust temperature, fan speed and the timer. You can also choose between three modes: cool, heat and turbo, an accelerated heating setting for when you first get into bed. By default, it runs for 10 hours after you turn it on, but you can dial it down for naps, or up for weekend lie-ins. I do wish it had an occupancy sensor to tell when I’m in bed and activate (or deactivate) automatically.
The BedJet app unlocks even more precise control, including biorhythms, which allow you to set the temperature to change over time: cooler in the middle of the night, then warming you in the morning. My unpredictable sleep patterns weren’t a good fit for this feature, but it might be helpful if you have a very fixed sleep routine. It would also be nice if the app could adjust the temperatures based on data from a sleep tracker such as an Apple Watch, rather than a fixed timetable.
If you share your bed, you can use a single BedJet for the whole bed, or attach two for individual temperature control, which is a plus for couples with differing preferences. BedJet sent me the dual model (called, imaginatively enough, the BedJet Dual Zone), but my wife, who has neuropathy in her feet, didn’t find it comfortable to use as she can’t feel temperature changes in her feet.
What we didn’t love
The feeling of a draft under the sheets takes some getting used to, even as the owner of two cats who is used to getting jumped on and tickled at odd times during the night. It’s also somewhat uneven, often leaving my legs colder than the rest of me.
One option that helps distribute the air more evenly is the Cloud Sheet, a $139 optional two-layer sheet with a permeable bottom layer. It does a more effective job of spreading the air flow across the body, although it is still more concentrated around the feet and legs.
Several nights were just too humid to use a sheet at all, no matter how ventilated it was. The BedJet is more effective at heating than cooling, and when the humidity was really high, I found myself just throwing the sheet off in my sleep.
Pet owners will also want to consider the effect of their canine and feline companions on the airflow. My dog Jasper mistook the puffed-up sheets at the foot of the bed for a new dog bed, and rolled on to enjoy the cool air, blocking it off for me. He snoozed peacefully; I woke up in a sweat and booted his snoring butt back onto his own bed.
Jasper also made me wish the Cloud Sheet was available in colors other than white, which is never a good color for bedding shared with a dog and two cats. Mine started to collect fur and footprints after a couple of days. You can throw a sheet on top of it and still get the effect (or put it under a comforter in winter), but the oversized Cloud Sheet overhangs the sides of the bed, so it’s always visible. It is machine-washable, though, and is comfortable enough to use alone on warm nights.
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An opulent way to slumber
The BedJet definitely helped improve my sleep, but starting at $478 for the half-bed model, it’s an expensive solution. The cynic in me says that you could mostly replace the BedJet by putting a $45 fan across the room in the summer, and a $40 electric throw blanket on your bed in the winter.
But then I slip into bed, turn the BedJet on and enjoy a cool, comfortable breeze as I doze off. It doesn’t replace a fan, but it’s easier to control for maximum comfort and is more comfortable on cooler nights. I also look forward to having a similar warm air flow on cold nights in winter.
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Other pieces you might enjoy from the Filter, the Guardian’s guide to buying fewer, better things:
I tried everything to get better sleep. These five items actually helped
This Hatch sunrise alarm clock has made my mornings easier for the past five years
