Picking a Quality Mattress
We all could benefit from better sleep and the answer is often requires just a short trip to the mattress store to replace our old mattress. Purchasing a mattress is an important investment and often represents a difficult choice. Should you get an innerspring mattress, an air mattress or a foam mattress? For my money, only one stands out as the clear choice.
For a good night’s sleep on any mattress, several variables come into play including the bed’s firmness, its affect on pressure points and, a less measurable variable, general comfort. Every mattress manufacturer aspires for perfection in all three areas but must inevitably make sacrifices in their pursuit.
Looking first at innerspring mattresses we find compromises in terms of price. The inclusion of high-end construction and padding will help with pressure point discomfort. Additionally, spring density (the number of springs in a mattress) may be increased for greater comfort. Each of these steps, however, comes with an increase in price. The more comfortable, the more expensive the bed becomes.
An alternative to an innerspring mattress is the foam mattress by such companies as Tempur-Pedic. These can represent a substantial step up in terms of comfort relative to cost. These beds are forgiving on pressure points but come with their own drawbacks. Absent sufficient padding, foam mattresses can feel confining and movement restricting.
In addition, both innerspring and foam mattresses have the downside of only providing ideal comfort for one sleeper. The level of firmness afforded by the mattress may be ideal for you, but not at all comfortable for your partner. Sacrifices like that are what can lead to one person or the other always waking up grumpy. The only real solution is the purchase of two separate mattresses or beds.
My preference is an air mattress bed which tends to have the best qualities of the other two offerings and some additional benefits. In particular, I like (and own) a Select Comfort bed which you may better recognize as a Sleep Number bed. Don’t confuse this with an air mattress you might use at the pool or for camping. The Sleep Number bed is a high-quality everyday mattress.
Like foam mattress beds, Select Comfort’s Sleep Number beds perform exceptionally well in terms of pressure point comfort. Neither air mattresses nor foam mattresses rely on inner springs. This means comfortable and even distribution of pressure over your entire body and no uncomfortable pressure on sensitive joints.
The addition of a topper or pad is key to making both foam mattresses and air mattresses comfortable. In the case of an air mattress, you don’t want to sleep on the cold vinyl of a bare bed. But foam mattresses require the topper for legitimate comfort (to avoid that cocooning sensation I mentioned) while air mattresses only really need the topper to separate you from the material of the mattress itself. The topper isn’t required to adjust the bed’s firmness or softness.
Also in line with several quality foam mattresses, quality air mattresses offer substantially improved sleep quality according to several university and independent studies. The two run about even in this regard depending on the particular study you review. Even enough, anyway, to rate them a draw in this regard. But there’s one thing that sets the Sleep Number bed apart from the pack.
The real benefit to Sleep Number beds is their adjustable firmness offering and the fact that it is independent on either side of the bed. While this may not be a critical feature to single sleepers (though even they might have times when a softer or firmer setting may become preferable) couples will understand the benefit. Having your own setting allows you to sleep in complete comfort without requiring a sacrifice on the part of your partner.
If we assume equal levels of comfort, pressure point accommodation and support, the prices tend to run up from foam mattresses to air mattresses and, finally, innerspring mattresses as most expensive. However, all things being equal, you’ll really only be saving money on a foam mattress if you enjoy sleeping alone. For couples, a quality air mattress like the Sleep Number bed with independent firmness adjustment is the hands down winner.