Eight Sleep Pod Review

Eight Sleep Company Polices

Like most online mattress companies, Eight Sleep offers very friendly customer policies. First, The Pod comes with free shipping. The mattress arrives rolled-up and compressed in a black box and the accompanying tech comes packed in a separate box. Now given The Pod isn’t your typical bed-in-a-box, the setup process is a little more involved, but honestly, it’s really not that bad. It took our team here about 15 minutes to set up the entire system. Here’s a look at the setup process.

Once the boxes are delivered, Eight Sleep offers customers a 100 night risk-free trial period. Essentially this means you can test out The Pod for about three months before making a final decision on whether you want to keep it or not. If you find you’re sleeping well on The Pod, great, the mattress comes backed by a 10 year warranty. The technology component of the system (Active Grid and Hub) are only backed by a two year warranty, though. With any warranty (especially a large purchase like a mattress) you should read the fine print. You can see what the full warranty entails on the company’s website.

If, during the trial period, you decide The Pod isn’t the right bed for you, no problem, the company offers free returns. Just contact Eight Sleep customer service and they’ll take care of you. They’ll schedule a time for the bed to be removed from your home free of charge. Once the pick-up occurs, the company will then issue you a full refund. It’s as easy as that. Okay, enough about about company policies. Let’s get into the actual mattress (literally).

What Is The Pod Mattress Made Of?

Before we get into all the fancy technology the Pod has to offer, let’s focus on the actual composition of the mattress. In short, The Pod is an all-foam bed that is comprised of four separate layers. Here’s a quick breakdown of the layers from bottom to top.

• 6″ High-Density Support Foam – This layer is made of a dense polyfoam. It serves as the foundation for the bed.
• 2″ Transition Polyfoam – As its title implies, this layer functions as a soft transition from the firm support foam below.
• 2″ Responsive Polyfoam – This is true comfort layer for the mattress.

Sitting on top of the comfort layer is Eight Sleep’s removable Active Grid, which is the feature that makes the Pod so special. We’ll dive deeper into what the Active Grid actually does in the next section.

Lastly, wrapping the layers of foam and special technology is a removable knit cover. It gives the bed a modern look, however, you should refrain from machine washing it. Instead, if the cover gets dirty, you should spot clean the dirty area with some mild detergent and water. If you’re a clean freak and the thought of a stain on your mattress sends you into a tizzy, you might want to check out the Eight Sleep Mattress Protector. Just keep in mind that mattress protectors can hurt breathability.

What Makes The Pod Special?

There are three main features that set the Pod apart from other beds, including other “smart” mattresses.

• Fluid-based thermoelectric system — fancy way of saying it provides heating and cooling.
• Sleep tracking — just like a Fitbit, the Pod will track the quality of your sleep.
• Smart features — It has a smart alarm and integrates with IFTTT and other smart home products.

Heating/Cooling System

Let’s discuss heating and cooling first because this is truly the standout feature for the Pod. You can manually set the temperature of the mattress (per side) and also allow the bed to change temperature based on your sleep stage. So, if you want to heat/cool the mattress while you watch TV, you can do that. If you like to sleep cool/hot at night, you can make sure that the bed reaches your desired temperature. Here’s a look inside the companion mobile app.

As you can see in our screenshot above, the app allows you set a different temperature for bed time, deep sleep, and the morning. You can also set particular days and times to have the Pod regulate temperature.

But, does the heating/cooling feature work well? And how does it work? Firstly, yes, it works well. When you heat the mattress you can certainly feel the surface warming up to a cozy temperature. When you switch on cooling, you can likewise feel the bed cooling down. It won’t get as cold as the Brooklyn Bedding Aurora mattress, but it will get colder than the standard surface temperature.

How does the “Fluid-Based Thermoelectric System” actually work? The bed comes with a Hub that looks like a desktop computer (shown above). Attached to the mattress is a spine that runs from the Hub to the Active Grid cover. This feeds hot, cold, or neutral-temperature water into the cover. You won’t feel the water—and it feels nothing like a water bed—but the water is the cooling and heating agent. In fact, the cover has little veins that pull through the water. You can certainly feel the little veins in the cover, but you can’t tell whether they contain water or not.

Sleeping Tracking & Smart Home Integration

Similar to the standard Eight Sleep Smart Mattress, the Pod will track your sleep, among other things. By default, the system will provide you information about your prior night’s sleep, including an overall sleep quality score as well as more targeted metrics such as awake time, sleep time, sleep stages (i.e. light, deep, REM sleep), respiratory rate, and more. Below is a screenshot of the sleep tracking screen in the mobile app.

In addition to tracking your sleep, the Pod also integrate with IFTTT (shown above), which in turn provides you access to all sorts of other smart home products and companies. For example, the Pod can be setup to work with Philips Hue lights, Amazon Alexa device, smart switches, and many other smart home products.  A few uses cases are:

• Having your coffee maker start brewing when your Eight Sleep Smart Alarm goes off.
• Turn on your Hue lights when the Smart Alarm goes off.
• Request that Alexa warm your bed.
• Turn on bed warming when the temperature drops below a certain threshold.

The list goes on, but you get the idea: it’s a smart mattress, too.

Pod Pricing & Coupon Code

The retail price of the Pod is more than your average bed-in-a-box mattress. But then again, it’s not your average bed-in-a-box, so a premium price is to be expected. If all you’re looking for, however, is a comfy foam bed, there are plenty of alternative mattresses that cost under $1,000. Enough beating around the bush—here’s a look at the current selling price of the Pod:

Is it worth it? That’s up to you, of course. At ~$2,200 for a queen size bed, that puts the Pod on the level of the Casper Wave and New Purple 2/3/4. The Pod is certainly an interesting concept, but you have to be invested in the heating/cooling feature to want to give it a go. After all, features such as sleep tracking and smart alarms can be found on $100 Fitbit activity trackers.

What Does The Mattress Feel Like?

When we tested out the Pod mattress, we found it had a firm neutral foam feel to it due to the multiple layers of polyurethane foam in its construction. It’s comfortable, but you don’t sink down into its layers like you would on a memory foam mattress, especially since it’s more on the firm side of the spectrum. Where exactly did we rate the Pod? After laying on it, we think the mattress feels like a medium-firm. It’s firm, but not to the point where it was lacking pressure relieving qualities.

Keep note, however, we base our rating off the perspective of an average sized individual. So the Pod might feel a little different to you if you’re a petite or heavy set individual. As a rule of thumb, the heavier you are, the softer a mattress is going to feel.

We do want to remind you of The Pod’s Thermoelectric System, which are the veins you can noticeably feel, running through the top cover of the mattress. Some people may get used to the feeling after a short while, others might lose sleep over it. So if you’re not open to sleeping on a mattress with a feeling you’re not familiar with, you might want to pass on the Pod.

Sleeper Type Analysis

Similar to the way car shoppers look for a vehicle that’ll accommodate them and their lifestyle the best, folks should look for a mattress that suits their sleeper type the best. Side sleepers should consider a softer mattress to make sure they get adequate pressure relief on their sides, while back and stomach sleepers should look for something slightly firmer to make sure their spine remains in alignment while they sleep.

Since the Pod lands at a medium-firm on our spectrum, we’d say this bed is most ideal for stomach and back sleepers. We also think heavy side sleepers will find the mattress accommodating, because they press into the layers more than petite individuals who exert less pressure. The Pod is an acceptable mattress for combo sleepers as well, because it’s responsive, and has a good balance between being supportive, but also pressure relieving.

For those of you who are petite to average strict side sleepers, you may want to consider a softer mattress. If this is the case for you, we encourage you to check out our post on the best mattress for side sleepers and pressure points.

Suitable Body Types

Earlier, we mentioned how a person’s body weight affects the overall feel of a mattress. With that being said, we don’t think the Pod is the best mattress for individuals over 250 lbs. Instead, we usually recommend a hybrid mattress; a bed that incorporates coil and foam. They’re more durable and supportive than your average all-foam mattress, and they ultimately last longer too. So for those of you who are more heavy set, head over to our post on the best mattresses for heavy people.

Considerations For Couples

If you’ve ever shared your bed with a loved one, you know how it feels when they get up to use the bathroom or get a glass of water in the middle of the night and they wake you up. That’s why couples should look for a mattress with good motion isolation. When it comes to the Pod, it’s pretty good at limiting motion transfer, meaning couples won’t disturb their partner as much when they get out of bed at night.

Couples should also purchase a mattress with good edge support, which means you’re able to lay at the edge of your bed without feeling like you’re moments away from falling off. Typically, all-foam mattresses either get satisfactory marks in this category, or they’re flat out not good. We thought the edge support on the Pod was pretty decent, so overall, it’s a pretty good mattress for couples to sleep on.

Additionally, The Pod has a feature we haven’t seen in many other mattresses, which is its split temperature setting we mentioned earlier. We think couples will find this particularly appealing, because someone who sleeps hot can rest comfortably with the setting at a lower temperature, while their significant other who sleeps cool can adjust their side of the bed to be warmer.

Eight Sleep Pod Review Verdict

The Pod by Eight Sleep is undeniably unique, and one of, if not, the smartest mattress we’ve ever slept on. But just because it’s high tech, doesn’t mean it’s the best mattress for everybody.

We recommend the Pod to folks who really want to take advantage of its smart features, specifically the temperature control settings. This mattress is also a good choice if you’re not particularly price conscious, otherwise you can purchase a Fitbit along with a more affordable cooling mattress and call it a day.

If you’re on a budget, a petite side sleeper, an individual over 250 lbs, or somebody who sleeps completely temperature neutral, we wouldn’t recommend you jump at the chance to purchase this bed. We suggest you take a look at one of our other many full-length mattress reviews, or browse through our comparisons where we discuss which beds are better for whom.