Nearby times
When to go to bed for a 5:25 AM alarm
Sleep runs in cycles of roughly 90 minutes, and most adults take about 14 minutes to fall asleep. Waking at the end of a cycle feels far better than waking in the middle of one, so these bedtimes are counted back from 5:25 AM in whole cycles. Five or six cycles is the range most adults do well on.
| Fall asleep by | Sleep | 90-min cycles |
|---|---|---|
| 8:11 PM | 9 h | 6 · recommended |
| 9:41 PM | 7.5 h | 5 · recommended |
| 11:11 PM | 6 h | 4 |
| 12:41 AM | 4.5 h | 3 |
How much sleep you get with a 5:25 AM alarm
| If you go to bed at | You get | Verdict |
|---|---|---|
| 9:00 PM | 8 hours 25 minutes | ✓ enough |
| 10:00 PM | 7 hours 25 minutes | ✓ enough |
| 11:00 PM | 6 hours 25 minutes | short |
| 12:00 AM | 5 hours 25 minutes | too little |
| 1:00 AM | 4 hours 25 minutes | too little |
5:25 AM is a very early start
This is the alarm of early shifts, first flights, pre-work training sessions and anyone who wants the house to themselves for an hour. At this hour the room is dark for most of the year in the northern hemisphere, so a gradual-volume sound and a lamp on a plug timer make it far easier than a single loud blast.
A 5:25 AM alarm leaves 2 hours 35 minutes before 8:00 AM and 3 hours 35 minutes before 9:00 AM. Subtract your commute and you have the time that is actually yours in the morning.
Set it the night before, put the phone or laptop out of arm's reach so you have to stand up to stop it, and keep the screen on with night mode so the clock is readable without lighting the room.
Sunrise and your 5:25 AM alarm
Waking in daylight is easier than waking in the dark. Check where 5:25 AM falls against sunrise where you are; the calculation runs in your browser and your location is not sent anywhere.
Every hour
Tips for a 5:25 AM alarm
- Set it now, then press Test sound once at the volume you will sleep with. A silent-mode phone or a muted laptop is the number one reason alarms fail.
- Turn on night mode and place the screen where you can see it but not reach it. Standing up to stop the alarm ends the snooze loop.
- Leave this tab open. On desktop it rings from the background; on a phone keep it in the foreground with the screen on (this page keeps the screen awake).
- Use the bedtime table above rather than a fixed "eight hours"; waking at a cycle boundary matters more than the exact total.