Mattresses come in varying sizes, constructions and have their own pros and cons that make them more appealing to specific sleepers. There’s a mattress out there with your name on it — you just need to do a little research to find the best mattress for you.
With so many to choose from, finding “the best mattress” can be a bit overwhelming. As such, our team of expert testers (they do a lot of sleeping on the job) sought out our top favorite choices for the best beds of 2023, each addressing a specific sleep type and need: sleeping positions, health concerns, comfort levels, and more.
The 10 Best Mattresses of 2023
- Best Memory Foam Mattress of 2023 :NectarStarting at $399 Shop Now
- Best Hybrid Mattress of 2023 :Brooklyn Bedding SignatureStarting at $599 Shop Now
- Best Mattress for Back Pain of 2023 :WinkBeds ClassicStarting at $1149 Shop Now
- Best Firm Bed of 2023 :Saatva ClassicStarting at $935 Shop Now
- Best Soft Mattress of 2023 :Layla HybridStarting at $1299 Shop Now
- Best Budget Bed of 2023 :Tuft Needle OriginalStarting at $745 Shop Now
- Best Cooling Mattress of 2023 :Purple OriginalStarting at $799 Shop Now
- Best Pillow-Top Mattress of 2023 :Bear Star HybridStarting at $1248 Shop Now
- Best Organic Mattress of 2023 :Avocado Green MattressStarting at $1399 Shop Now
- Best Mattress for Pluz-Size Sleepers of 2023 :Helix PlusStarting at $949 Shop Now
Compare the Best Mattresses of 2023
Best Memory Foam Mattress of 2023
Nectar could be the most popular memory foam mattress online. It’s affordable, comfortable, and usually comes with free pillows. They also have monthly payment options with Affirm.
Why Nectar wins as best memory foam mattress
Nectar is truly the best memory foam mattress we have reviewed this year and belongs on our best mattress of 2023 list. If you are looking for a memory foam mattress that’s affordable, then Nectar is your pick. We like to compare it to the TempurPedic mattresses as far as feel goes, but it’s much more affordable.
It doesn’t come with all of the features of more expensive beds, but it’s not supposed to. Nectar is designed to be a good value for memory foam lovers who want a slow-responding, conforming mattress feel.
Nectar’s best features
- It’s about 11” thick, has a thick poly foam layer for support and memory foam for comfort with a gel-infused cover. This gives Nectar a viscous, traditional dense foam feel.
- It’s firmer to start but softens as you lay down on it. We rate it at around a 6/10 or between a “medium” and “medium-firm.”
- We think it’s about the right firmness level for all sleeping positions.
Best Hybrid Mattress of 2023
Why The Brooklyn Bedding Signature Hybrid bed wins as best hybrid mattress
The Brooklyn Bedding Signature Hybrid mattress is one of our favorite hybrid beds. We love the fact that sleepers will get to choose their firmness level and the overall quality of the best. There is no question, it’s a nice bed. The brand manufactures their own mattresses in Brooklyn Bedding factories, cutting out the middleman and making the bed more affordable than comparable beds.
Why do we think it’s the best mattress? It is of tremendous value. Sure, it’s a really nice mattress, but the #1 reason to get a Brooklyn Signature Hybrid mattress is the combination of price and quality.
Brooklyn Bedding Signature Hybrid’s best features
- The Brooklyn Bedding Signature Hybrid comes in three firmness options (Soft, Medium, and Firm), making it a good option for all sleeping positions, including side sleepers.
- Its 10” hybrid construction makes it suitable for all body types, from petite to heavy.
- It’s more neutral-feeling and responsive than memory foam, making it easy for combination sleepers to switch positions.
Best Mattress For Back Pain of 2023
WinkBed is a thick, durable hybrid mattress that includes a comfortable Euro pillow top. It achieves hotel-luxury quality and maximum support while maintaining a very reasonable price tag.
Why WinkBed wins as best mattress for back pain
WinkBed is a hotel luxury mattress with a heavy-duty construction. It’s one of the thicker hybrid beds we’ve tested, and the company puts it through a rigorous simulation that mimics the pressure of a 350 lb sleeper over 20 years to ensure it’s extra durable. Combined with its supportive hybrid construction and multiple firmness options, we think back pain sufferers of all sizes can find relief with a Winkbed.
Yes, the price tag is more expensive than the average online mattress, but WinkBed is certainly not your average online mattress.
WinkBed’s best features
- WinkBed measures 15” thick. It has a fluffy/airy pillow-top giving it an extra cozy and bouncy feel.
- It’s even available in four models: Softer, Luxury Firm, Firmer, and WinkBed Plus.
- The “Softer” model is designed for those that want a lot of pressure relief, namely side sleepers and individuals with neck or shoulder pain, upper back pain, etc.
- The “Luxury Firm” option is the most popular given that it can work for all sleeping styles. The “Firmer” model is just for back and stomach sleepers who suffer from back pain, and we think they will indeed love this mattress.
- We expected this bed to cost way more than it actually does — especially after discounts.
Best Firm Bed of 2023
Saatva Classic is the original innerspring mattress online. It comes in three firmness options, all of which have coils for support and a fluffy pillow top. Two of those options are on the firm side of the spectrum, and we think they’re extremely comfortable.
Why Saatva wins as best firm bed
Saatva just has a luxurious aesthetic and is a really supportive, comfortable mattress. It’s great for those that want a mattress that feels like a familiar innerspring mattress, with the added plus of a soft pillow-top. We also love how it offers three firmness options, where two out of the three are firm and supportive.
Saatva’s best features
- Saatva has two layers of coils which aren’t seen very often in the industry. It makes it one of the more supportive beds we’ve seen here.
- Add a fluffy Euro-top cover, and the mattress feels supportive but also cloud-like and airy.
- The cover is made with organic cotton, an eco-friendly material that’s more breathable than regular cotton.
- It even comes in three comfort profiles: Plush Soft, Luxury Firm, and Firm. The “Luxury Firm” is the most popular model, and it’s about a 7/10 on our firmness scale, which is a “medium-firm.”
Best Soft Mattress of 2023
Layla Hybrid is a memory foam mattress that has a “Soft” side and “Firm” side, along with pocket coils for support. Both sides offer ample pressure relief, and the feel of the mattress is seriously cloud-like.
Why Layla wins as best soft mattress
As much as we like the original Layla mattress, the Layla Hybrid is our favorite. Unlike other beds on the market, Layla Mattress is meant to be flipped, offering two mattress firmness levels in one bed (medium vs. medium-soft). Along with that and its superior, light and airy memory foam feel, we had to give it a spot on our best mattress list for the top soft mattress.
Layla Hybrid’s best features
- The “soft” side is really soft, plush even. We rate it at around a 2-3/10 on our firmness scale, and it’s just about as soft as the Casper Nova Hybrid.
- The “firm” side is only a little firmer at about a 5/10 and still offers plenty of pressure relief. Especially if you weigh over 230 lbs.
- The Layla Hybrid is one of our favorite soft mattresses for side sleepers. It offers a great deal of compression and pressure relief.
- Supportive for all body types because of its hybrid construction.
Best Budget Bed of 2023
Tuft & Needle is quite possibly the most popular budget mattress online. The bed is comfortable and accommodates all types of sleepers because of its middle-of-the-road firmness and very neutral feel.
Why Tuft & Needle wins as best budget bed
If you are on a budget but want a nice mattress, the original Tuft & Needle mattress is your bed.
The Tuft & Needle Original is highly affordable (around $895 for the queen) and is nearly universally accepted as comfortable. It isn’t slow-responding like memory foam, nor is it expensive and extra bouncy like latex foam. We think most people who try it can sleep comfortably.
Tuft & Needle’s best features
- The T&N mattress has a soft foam feel and is around a “medium” on our scale.
- It’s suitable for all sleeping positions because it provides a nice balance between pressure-relieving and supportive.
- Tuft & Needle is a very reputable brand, and you can rest assured that your foam mattress won’t fall apart like other cheap foam mattresses.
- It’s really the best bed for a guest room, teens, kids, college students and adults on a strict budget.
Best Cooling Mattress of 2023
The Original Purple mattress is one of the most sought-after beds online. It’s completely unique and is a great option for those that are interested in trying something new. It’s one of the only beds to feature Hyper-Elastic Polymer, a proprietary comfort material.
Why Purple wins as best cooling mattress
Purple is totally unique (in a good way) and definitely not your average mattress. But what makes Purple so “unique?” It all has to do with Hyper-Elastic Polymer, a gel-like material that’s the main comfort layer on all of their beds. By design, it’s one of the most breathable beds we’ve tested and is accommodating to all sleeping positions.
Purple’s best features
- If you can envision a 6’ x 7’ Dr. Scholl’s insole, that’s essentially what Hyper-Elastic Polymer is.
- We think it’s around a medium on our firmness scale, making it ideal for any sleeping position.
- The Hyper-Elastic Polymer forms a Purple Grid covered with air pockets. The amount of airflow in this mattress is second-to-none, and as a result, it sleeps fairly cool.
- If you weigh over 230 lbs, you can opt for the Purple Hybrid Premier, which is built to be more supportive than the original for heavier sleepers.
Best Pillow-Top Mattress 2023
Bear Hybrid is a pillow-top mattress with a fluffy neutral feel and pocketed coils for support. The pillow-top gives it a light and plush feel, while the coils provide ample support for all body types.
Why Bear Hybrid wins as best pillow-top mattress
The Bear Hybrid mattress offers a great bang for your buck. It has a durable hybrid construction and accommodating firmness level, with a unique pillow-top cover that you don’t come across too often in the industry. It’s light, airy, and is also supposed to promote better rest and recovery! We’re big fans of the Bear mattress here, and our boss-man Jeff sleeps on one every night.
Bear Hybrid’s best features
- We rated it around a true “medium” or 5/10 on our firmness scale. As such, it should work for stomach, back, and side sleepers equally.
- The Bear Hybrid has an upgraded cover that’s made with Celliant, which is a textile that’s approved by the FDA as a “general wellness device.” Celliant is supposed to, among other things, help with circulation and restful sleep.
- Its hybrid construction and 8” pocketed coils will make it durable, supportive, and long-lasting.
- Even though it’s not the most affordable mattress on this list, we think it offers a great value.
Best Organic Mattress of 2023
The Avocado Green Mattress is the most sought-after natural/organic mattress online. It’s supportive, comfortable, and constructed with high-quality materials that are sourced from nature and certified organic.
Why Avocado wins as best organic mattress
No doubt about it, Avocado is the most popular natural and organic mattress. It uses certified organic latex responsibly sourced from tropical rubber trees, certified organic wool, and certified organic cotton. You can’t get any greener than the Avocado Green mattress. All in all, the Avocado Green Mattress is a comfortable mattress that’s durable, resilient, and responsive.
Avocado’s best features
- The design of Avocado is fairly straightforward –– it has recycled steel pocketed coils for support, coupled with organic Dunlop latex foam, fluffy cotton, and wool in the comfort layer.
- By default, Avocado measures about 11” thick, but you can pay a little more for an optional pillow top, making it 13” thick.
- The 11” model is truly firm, whereas the 13” model is a medium-firm.
- It has a bouncy and responsive feel that’s also more breathable than memory foam and polyfoam.
- Avocado offers great support for back, stomach, and combination sleepers. It might be a little too firm for strict side sleepers.
Best Mattress for Pluz-Size Sleepers of 2023
The Helix business model is to make a mattress for every body and sleeper type. They have beds that range from soft to firm and just about every other firmness level you could think of. The Helix Midnight model is their most popular, but a Helix Sleep Quiz will match you with your perfect bed.
Why Helix wins as best mattress for plus-size sleepers
The Helix Midnight mattress wins our pick for best mattress for plus-sized sleepers because of its comfort and support. It’s plush enough to make sure you aren’t hurting when you wake up, but it’s also supportive enough to make sure your spine is aligned.
We generally recommend any mattress from Helix –– they have an entire suite that ranges in feel, firmness, and price. They offer a number of soft beds and firm beds, as well as those in between. Moonlight is extra plush and pressure relieving, while Helix Dawn is extremely supportive and firm.
Helix’s best features
- It’s not just that Helix makes finding a mattress easy, they also make darn good beds. All of them are hybrid mattresses with a mix of various foams.
- All mattresses have a hybrid construction that’ll support all body types.
- They make a bed that’s specifically designed for heavy individuals—and that is Helix Plus.
- All beds have a more neutral-foam feel, so we think most people will find it comfortable — especially if you don’t like memory foam.
Finding the Best Type of Mattresses for You
Now that you’ve had plenty of time to see our top picks for the best mattress, we thought it might be helpful to guide you through everything you should consider to find YOUR dream mattress.
Let’s start with the most popular type of mattresses:
The Best Mattresses for Your Sleeping Position
Next, we want to talk to you about how your sleeping position impacts which bed you should buy. There are three core sleeping positions: side, stomach, and back. The most important mattress factor that comes in to play for your sleeping position, is firmness. Not every sleeper can sleep on a firm mattress or a really soft one.
Considerations for Finding Your Best Mattress
There are a few more things you should keep in mind when you’re looking for your next mattress. We also recognize that certain individuals are shopping for a mattress based on body type, age, and relationship status.
Temperature neutrality
If you’re a hot sleeper, then this is a big factor for you. Thankfully, there are more brands than ever that are paying attention to a colder sleeping experience. Aside from active cooling technology, there are certain materials that sleep cooler than others. Traditional memory foam tends to sleep pretty warm. But even memory foam have had some big improvements when it comes to trapping heat. If you sleep hot, look for a hybrid mattress or something special like Purple.
Chronic pain
Whether because of existing conditions or lifestyle choices, living with pain means you need different things from your mattress. Especially if you have back pain, your mattress is going to need a certain level of support to not leave you tense and stiff when you wake up. That’s not to say that you can’t have a soft or comfortable mattress. That’s why we like hybrid mattresses for people with back pain.
Weight
For instance, one of the most common questions we field is with regard to the best mattress for heavy people and advice surrounding the overall support of the mattress. The short answer is that large and overweight people should be choosing extra-supportive beds, most of which have coils. There are even certain beds that are specifically made for people that weigh above 300 lbs.
If you sleep with a partner
When it comes to finding a mattress for couples, we have to temper expectations a little. Finding the right bed for one person is tough, but two different people is a real challenge. Oftentimes, the best mattress for couples is one that appeals to the more sensitive sleeper. In other words, if one person has back pain and the other is perfectly healthy, it makes more sense to choose a mattress to help with the back pain. You can also purchase a mattress with a hybrid construction and medium firmness level to accommodate all sleeper positions and body types, or a split king bed so you can each choose what firmness level you want.
Age
Best mattresses for kids
We also get questions about mattresses for kids. Our full guide goes into great detail on what’s important for your children, but most of the time, it comes down to finding an accommodating, affordable mattress that has the necessary certifications such as CertiPUR-US.
Best mattresses for seniors
With regard to finding a mattress for seniors, it’s difficult to offer specific advice because health conditions often drive much of the selection process. All we can say is that support is important, but you also need to balance it with cushioning. Also, the setup and delivery process is another consideration, especially if the senior needs assistance with setting up the new mattress. This is why we tend to favor beds with white glove delivery for older folks.
The Slumber Yard has been around since the beginning of the bed-in-a-box craze. Our team has personally tested over 175 mattresses so far, and we keep more than 150 beds in our office so we can compare them (and take afternoon naps).
How We Test The Mattresses
When testing mattresses, we evaluate the following factors:
- Construction: We cut mattresses open to see what’s inside and how it’s made.
- Feel: We check if it has a stuck-in-the-mud memory foam feel, or if it’s more of a neutral foam or a plush pillow top, etc.
- Firmness: We have our own firmness scale and evaluate how that may vary depending on your body and sleeper type.
- Pressure relief: We test what’s the sweet spot for different body and sleeper types.
- Support: and how that changes by body/sleeper type
- Edge Support: This is important for couples who share a bed. Would you roll-out of the bed or can you sleep confidently close to the edges?
- Motion Isolation: We use the water glass test to see how the bed fares with motion transfer. This is another important factor for couples that don’t want to wake up one another when they move.
- Temperature Regulation: We use a temperature gun to evaluate if the bed warms up, stays neutral or actively cools while you are sleeping.
- Noise: This could be an issue in beds with coils or innerspring.
- Off-Gassing: Some beds could have a smell for a few weeks after unpacking, and we try to warn you about it.
- Company policies: We also take into account policies such as shipping, returns, trial period and warranty.
- Value: We look at a bed’s price in the context of what it offers in terms of features and quality of materials and construction.
In the mattress industry, there is a pretty wide range of prices available. Hybrid mattresses tend to be a little pricier because of the materials they are made with. That said, if you’re a sleeper on a budget, you can still get a high, quality mattress for an affordable price point. You can easily get a mattress for under a $1,000 if that’s your budget.
We can’t disregard that big holidays do tend to draw mattress deals –– like Presidents Day, Labor Day and of course Black Friday. That said, you can get hundreds off your next mattress all-year long. Most brands vary their sales all year, and here at Slumber Yard, we’ve always got deals you can use to knock hundreds off your price point.
The best mattress for you will depend on your preferences, sleeper style, and body type. Some people will prefer a traditional innerspring feel, while others will want something new and innovative like Purple. We think that plenty of the beds on your best mattress review are the best.
Many of the mattresses-in-a-boxes on the market are good. In fact, most of the mattresses you see in a store can also be found as a bed-in-a-box. At this point, there’s very little difference between a legacy in-store mattress and an online mail-order mattress
In our experience, side sleepers usually prefer softer, more plush bed surfaces because they cradle the curves of your body, whereas firm beds push into your pressure points. Side sleepers will be able to find a bed that suits their needs in every category –– innerspring, hybrid and all-foam.
If you live with back pain, then you know how important your mattress is. The best mattress for people with back pain will promote healthy spinal alignment. Medium-firm to firm mattresses tend to do this the best because they don’t let you sink far enough into the bed and throw your alignment off.
Why Trust Us
Get the kind of sleep you’ve only dreamed of with some help from our team of mattress experts. We personally test more than 175 of the best sleep solutions from over 60 leading brands on site, so you can be sure you’re getting unbiased reviews, fair comparisons and personalized recommendations.
