5 Expert-Backed Ways To Sleep Deeper Tonight & Every Night

Curious to learn what a dietitian eats for dinner to get better sleep? Or how a psychologist calms down mental chatter at the end of a long day? Our sleep series, The Wind Down, asks wellness experts of all kinds to spill what their precious pre-bed hours actually look like.

These routines are inevitably shaped by guests' respective industries, sleep histories, and personal preferences. But they do share a few key commonalities that you can implement in your own bedroom.

As a dermatologist and psychiatrist Amy Wechsler, M.D., writes in her routine, "I know that we heal in our sleep when our cortisol is at its lowest." If her heart is racing and her mind is restless at the end of a long day, she'll take it as a sign of elevated cortisol levels. To come back to balance, she'll call on a cortisol-lowering routine and do the abdominal breathing exercise demonstrated in the clip below.

There's a reason nearly half of those featured on The Wind Down wear an Oura ring to bed every night: By collecting data on how much time you spend in various sleep stages, sleep trackers can help you better gauge your sleep quality—and your overall health.

"After buying an Oura ring so I could monitor my sleep more precisely, I saw a direct correlation between the nights I got the least deep sleep and higher sugar readings on my continuous glucose monitor (CGM)," precision medicine doctor Florence Comite, M.D., notes in her routine.

They can also help you identify the amount of time you need in each sleep stage in order to feel your best and plan your evenings accordingly. "My goal is to fall asleep in less than five to 10 minutes and spend 25 to 40% of the night in deep sleep and 15 to 25% in REM sleep. Since I wear a sleep tracker, I know I usually get my best deep sleep prior to 1 a.m. and the best REM sleep from 3 to 6 a.m.... so if I go to bed too late, it will cut into my deep sleep, and if I get up too early, I lose REM sleep," writes functional medicine doctor Jill Carnahan, M.D.

A handful of experts note that they take supplemental magnesium (an essential mineral) before bed to further support relaxation and help them fall asleep faster.

Other sleep supplement callouts include GABA, a neurotransmitter responsible for relaxation and rest, and triphala, an antioxidant-rich Ayurvedic herbal formula.

One thing most of them don't reach for nightly? Melatonin.

From researchers juggling multiple studies to doctors with a full patient list, the experts featured in this series are busy and don't work the typical 9 to 5. While it's best to avoid computer time at night for the sake of sleep, this just isn't realistic for them.

For the nights they do have to work, many Wind Down guests have a smart hack to keep it from disrupting sleep: They set an alarm and once it goes off, they have to log off for the evening.

Unsurprisingly, some Wind Down routines are packed with the latest and greatest sleep gadgets (case in point: Molly Malloof, M.D.'s "biohacker tool room"). Some recent favorites among featured guests include the ChiliPad smart mattress topper, Apollo sleep wearable, ShiftWave zero-gravity recliner chair, and HigherDose PEMF mat.

But no matter how high-tech these routines get, they always come back to the basics, too: The experts featured note that the best way to improve sleep is simply to go to bed and wake up at roughly the same time every day. With sleep, like with so much else, consistency is key.

Sleep is deeply personal, and no two people will have the exact same pre-bed routine. That's what makes it so fun to experiment with new sleep strategies and find ones to make your own.