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How Much REM Sleep Do You Need? (and How to Get More)

Healthy adults spend about 20 to 25% of the night in REM sleep, roughly 1.5 to 2 hours. A minutes table, how far to trust your tracker, and what actually moves it.

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NSDR.co
11 min read
Abstract sleep-stage line on a cream background

How much REM sleep do you need? Most healthy adults spend about 20 to 25% of the night in REM sleep. On 7 to 9 hours of sleep, that comes to roughly an hour and a half to two hours. If your figure comes from a watch or a ring, it's an estimate, and in lab comparisons the stage split agrees with the lab only fairly to moderately. There's no dial for REM that we'd recommend. What protects it is a full night and a steady wake time, because most REM comes in the last few hours before you wake. This guide is for adults. It covers the numbers, what REM is, how far to trust your tracker, and what moves it. It's general information, not medical advice.

How much REM sleep do you need?

Healthy adults usually spend about 20 to 25% of their sleep in REM. The Sleep Foundation puts it at about two hours a night for most adults. In minutes, the range works out like this:

Total sleep (healthy adults)REM at 20%REM at 25%
6 hours72 minutes90 minutes
7 hours84 minutes105 minutes
8 hours96 minutes120 minutes
9 hours108 minutes135 minutes

These are averages, and people vary. In the sleep studies Apple used to check its watch (166 adults), REM averaged about 21% of the night, and plenty of people sat well above or below that. The share drifts down a little in older age: Harvard Health puts it at about 17% by 80.

It also changes from night to night. After a short night, your brain tends to make more REM the next night, which is called REM rebound.

We found no guideline that sets a minimum for REM (checked 3 November 2026). The adult guideline from the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the Sleep Research Society is for total sleep: 7 or more hours a night, on a regular basis. Getting enough total sleep is also the main way to get more REM.

What is REM sleep?

REM stands for rapid eye movement. During REM your eyes move quickly behind closed lids, and your brain activity gets close to what it is when you're awake. Your breathing speeds up and turns irregular, and your heart rate rises. Your arm and leg muscles go temporarily slack, which stops you acting out your dreams. Most vivid dreams happen in REM, though some dreaming happens in other stages too.

Sleep runs in cycles that average about 90 minutes, four to six a night. Your first REM period usually arrives 60 to 90 minutes after you fall asleep and lasts around 10 minutes. Each one after that is longer, up to about an hour, so REM is concentrated in the second half of the night, especially the last few hours. Our guide to the stages of sleep covers the other three.

Why REM sleep matters

REM is linked to emotional processing, and it shares memory work with deep sleep. The US National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke says memory consolidation most likely needs both non-REM and REM sleep, which is one more reason the whole night counts, not one stage.

The sleep scientist Matt Walker calls REM "almost a form of emotional first aid". That is his lab's hypothesis, not a settled finding: REM may keep the memory of a hard day while dulling its emotional sting.

None of this gives you a cut-off. No guideline says that below a certain number of REM minutes your memory suffers, and a watch can't tell you that either.

Is your tracker's REM number right?

Read it as an estimate. Consumer devices don't record brain activity, which is how a sleep lab scores REM. Apple's watch works from movement data, for example, and Apple itself says its sleep stages "aren't intended for clinical use". In its own validation against lab sleep studies, the watch's agreement score for the four stages was 0.63 (median), and 0.68 after a 2025 software update, on a scale where 1 means full agreement.

REM in particular can come out high. In a 2026 Saudi study of healthy adults aged 18 to 45, an Apple Watch Series 7 overestimated REM by about 30 minutes on average against a home sleep study (19 people wore it). The authors said devices like these may suit tracking change over time rather than clinical measurement. In a 2024 Harvard-affiliated lab study of 35 adults, three consumer devices were similar to the lab on sleep duration, while stage-by-stage sensitivity ranged from 50 to 86%.

Devices also differ in how closely they match the lab. In a 2025 Belgian lab study of six wrist devices, agreement with the lab on stages ranged from fair to moderate (kappa 0.21 to 0.53). So two devices can give different REM figures for the same night. (If you're wondering about Apple's "Core" label, it means light sleep; see what core sleep is.)

Look at the trend over a few weeks instead, and give your total sleep figure more weight than the REM split, since total sleep is what the guideline covers. Don't chase the nightly number. In 2017 sleep researchers in Chicago described patients who came to them with sleep problems they had worked out from their tracker, in what the authors called "a perfectionistic quest for the ideal sleep". They named it orthosomnia.

What if your REM sleep is low?

First check whether it's low at all: compare a few weeks against the table above, not one night. If it really is on the low side, the usual reasons are ordinary ones:

  • A short night. REM is packed into the last hours, so a late night or an early alarm cuts it first.
  • Alcohol in the evening (more on that below).
  • A hot bedroom.
  • An irregular schedule.
  • Stress, and sleep problems that break up the night, such as insomnia or sleep apnoea.
  • Tracker error, as above.

Some medicines, including some sleep aids, can change REM too. Don't stop or change a medicine without talking to your GP or pharmacist first.

How you feel during the day is worth weighing alongside the figure. The short-term signs of too little sleep are trouble concentrating, daytime sleepiness, forgetfulness and irritability. If you feel rested, look at the trend and your total sleep before reading much into one REM figure.

How to get more REM sleep

These five are ordinary habits with some evidence behind them, starting with the most direct:

  1. Sleep longer. Harvard Health points out that most REM comes at the end of the night, so enough total sleep gets you more of it. Waking early costs REM out of proportion. Matt Walker's example: someone who usually sleeps 10 pm to 6 am and wakes at 4 am loses 25% of their sleep but, he estimates, perhaps 50 to 70% of their REM. If you have to be up at a set time, go to bed earlier. Our sleep cycle calculator helps you pick one.
  2. Go easy on alcohol. In a review of studies in healthy volunteers, alcohol delayed the first REM period at every dose. At moderate and high doses, most studies found a lower share of the night spent in REM, and the second half of the night was more broken.
  3. Keep the bedroom cool. With normal bedding, a hot room means more time awake and less deep and REM sleep. Our guide to the best temperature for sleep has the numbers.
  4. Keep a regular wake time. The Sleep Foundation says a steady schedule with room for 7 to 9 hours supports the body clock that regulates REM. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine's advice is to get up at the same time every day, weekends included.
  5. Keep caffeine early. Caffeine won't take REM directly, but it can take sleep. A 2023 review of 24 studies of healthy adults found it cut total sleep by about 45 minutes, with no significant change in REM minutes themselves, so the risk to REM is a shorter night that loses its last hours. To avoid losing total sleep, the authors put the cut-off for a 250 mL cup of coffee at 8.8 hours before bed. See how long caffeine stays in you.

We don't recommend any pill or product for more REM. If you want something for the last part of the evening, wind down for sleep with guided deep rest.

When to see a GP

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See a GP if:

  • your breathing stops and starts while you sleep, you make gasping, snorting or choking noises, or you snore loudly. If someone else has seen it, it can help to bring them with you
  • you always feel very tired during the day
  • you act out your dreams, for example by shouting, kicking, punching or leaping out of bed while asleep. A bed partner is often the one who notices. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine advises getting a sleep doctor's advice if you suspect this
  • you've had trouble sleeping for months, changing your habits hasn't helped, or it's making it hard to cope
  • your tracker numbers are making you anxious about sleep

For ongoing sleep problems, CBT-I (cognitive behavioural therapy for insomnia) is the recommended first treatment. Ask your GP.

If you're struggling, talk to your GP. UK: Samaritans 116 123. US: 988.

This is general information, not medical advice. NSDR is not a treatment for any condition.

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FAQ

How much REM sleep do you need each night?

How much REM sleep you need each night has no official figure. Healthy adults typically get about 20 to 25% of the night as REM, which the Sleep Foundation rounds to about two hours. Getting 7 or more hours of total sleep is the main way to protect it.

How much REM sleep is normal?

For healthy adults, about 20 to 25% of the night is normal REM sleep. That's roughly 84 to 105 minutes on 7 hours and 96 to 120 minutes on 8. It varies from person to person and night to night.

How much REM and deep sleep do I need?

Adults typically get about 20 to 25% of the night as REM and about 10 to 20% as deep sleep, so together roughly 30 to 45% of the night. Neither has an official minimum. Our guide to how much deep sleep you need covers the deep sleep side.

Is 90 minutes of REM sleep enough?

Ninety minutes of REM sleep sits inside the typical range for a 6- or 7-hour night and just under it for 8 hours (96 to 120 minutes). It isn't a clinical threshold. Your total sleep and how you feel during the day are worth weighing alongside the REM figure. If your nights are short, sleeping longer is the most direct way to get more. See is 6 hours of sleep enough.

Is 2 hours of REM sleep good?

Two hours of REM sleep is at the top of the typical range for an 8-hour night and inside it for 9 hours. The Sleep Foundation gives about two hours as what most adults need.

Does alcohol affect REM sleep?

Yes, alcohol affects REM sleep. It delays your first REM period at any dose, and at moderate to high doses it lowers the share of the night spent in REM in most studies. It also breaks up the second half of the night, when most REM happens.

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