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Listening at home⏱️ Estimated reading time: 12 min
On this page: Overview
Key Takeaways
Start with daylight, the main obstacle. Keep light low from the journey home onwards, go to bed soon after you get in, darken the bedroom with heavy curtains or blackout blinds, cover your eyes with a sleep mask and keep to the same sleep window on every run of nights.
It helps create darkness for daytime sleep. A mask covers the light that still gets past curtains at the edges, under the door or through a skylight, which is why HSE lists eye shades alongside heavy curtains and blackout blinds for shift workers.
Ideally both. Blackout curtains or blinds keep most daylight out of the room, which matters when you get up for the toilet or a drink. The mask is the last layer for the light the window covering misses, and it travels with you if you sleep somewhere else.
A regular sleep window, a cool room, no alcohol before bed and no caffeine in the last few hours of the shift. If daytime noise wakes you too, add earplugs. If sleep problems carry on despite a good routine, speak to your GP or your occupational health service.
You finish a night shift at 7.30am, and by the time you are home the sun is well up. A sleep mask for shift workers is one answer to that problem, but it works best as the last step of a routine that keeps light low from the moment you leave work. Your body is ready for bed. The room, the street and the sky are telling it that the day has started.
At Bollsen, we make hearing protection trusted by 1,000,000+ people and a mulberry silk sleep mask for the light half of the same problem. When night workers compare notes on forums, the answer that comes up again and again is a stack of layers: “night mask, ear plugs, dark curtains”. People stack layers because no single one covers the whole day.
Why is daylight the biggest problem for sleep after a night shift?
Daylight is the body clock’s strongest signal that it is daytime, so sleeping after a night shift means sleeping against that signal, while darkness supports the body’s natural melatonin release. The brighter the room, the harder the bedroom is working against you.
The Health and Safety Executive puts it plainly: “Daytime sleep is usually lighter, shorter and of poorer quality than night time sleep”, and it is more often disturbed by warmth and daytime noise (HSE, hints and tips for shift-workers). Most adults need 7–8 hours of sleep in every 24, and the day gives you fewer dark hours to fit them into.
The Sleep Foundation names exposure to sunlight, “especially if you have multiple windows in your bedroom”, as one of the main obstacles to sleeping in the day (Sleep Foundation, daytime sleeping). For the science behind the body clock, our guide to how light affects sleep explains why even dim light at the wrong time registers with the brain.
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Life+★ 4.7 · 3,700 reviewsLife+★ 4.7 · 3,700 reviewsMusic SoundPRO★ 4.8 · 514 reviewsWatersafe+★ 4.8 · 684 reviewsLife+★ 4.7 · 3,700 reviewsWho sleeps in daylight in the UK?
Anyone who works through the UK night period, which for most workers runs from 11pm to 6am, ends up sleeping while it is light outside for much of the year. The Society of Occupational Medicine sets out that definition and what good employer support for night workers looks like (SOM, good sleep practice for night workers).
NHS nurses, doctors and healthcare assistants on 12-hour nights often hand over around 7.30 to 8am. Warehouse, delivery and logistics staff finish early-hours shifts at 6am, often in the first light. Care workers on waking nights come home as everyone else is leaving for work.
The season changes how hard this is. In London the sun rises before 5am in June, so the whole journey home is in full daylight. In December sunrise is around 8am, which gives some night workers a dark drive home in winter and none at all in summer. SOM’s guidance also lists sleep education and access to sleep masks as part of good employer support.
Should you wear sunglasses on the way home after a night shift?
Wearing sunglasses on the way home cuts the bright morning glare at the point when you are trying to stay sleepy, which is why a pair of sunglasses for the journey home appears in so many shift-work tip sheets. They are for daytime glare, not tiredness.
Studies of night nurses have paired darker mornings on the way home with one fixed, dark sleep period starting soon after the shift. That is the logic of the whole routine: less light on the journey, less light in the house, then darkness in bed.
One caution matters more than any tip. HSE warns that driving to and from work can be risky, “particularly after a long shift, a night shift”, and suggests public transport or a taxi instead. Sunglasses do nothing for drowsiness, so if you feel sleepy at the wheel, stop.
Once you are home, keep the house dim. Leave the big kitchen light off, skip the bright bathroom mirror light and go to bed as soon as you reasonably can, while your body is still primed for sleep.
How dark does a bedroom need to be for daytime sleep?
Darker than most people expect, because a bedroom at about 30 lux, which feels fairly dark by day, was bright enough to show up in the sleep recordings of night-shift nurses compared with a room under 5 lux.
In a crossover laboratory study, 31 female night-shift nurses slept during the day once under about 30 lux and once under 5 lux. In the brighter room, the recordings showed lower sleep-spindle activity in light sleep and less slow-wave activity in the last sleep cycle (Yook et al., 2024). The group was small, young and female only, and the authors could not separate the effect of light from the body-clock mismatch and lost sleep.
A room that looks dim when you walk in from a sunny street can still let in enough light to register, so the goal is as dark as you can make it, not just darker than outside.
How do you build a darkness routine for daytime sleep?
A darkness routine stacks layers: dim light on the journey home, a dim house, blackout curtains or blinds, sealed edges and a sleep mask as the last layer over your eyes. Each layer catches some of the light the one before it misses.
HSE recommends “heavy curtains, blackout blinds or eye shades to darken the bedroom”, and the Sleep Foundation says blackout curtains keep most outside light out while an eye mask “may also be effective”. Shift workers on forums say the same thing from experience: even thick curtains are not always enough, because daylight creeps round the sides and over the top of the pole.
| Darkness layer | What it blocks | What it misses |
|---|---|---|
| Sunglasses on the way home | Morning glare on the journey | Nothing once you are indoors; daytime use only |
| Dim lights at home | Bright kitchen and bathroom lights before bed | Daylight from windows in other rooms |
| Blackout curtains or blinds | Most daylight through the bedroom window | Gaps at the sides, the top and underneath |
| Sealed edges (overlap, wraparound rail, tape) | Light leaking round the window covering | Light under the door, skylights, standby LEDs |
| Sleep mask | The light that still reaches your eyes | Noise; needs a strap that stays put |
Curtains darken the whole room and a mask darkens your eyes, so they do different jobs. Our article on sleep mask vs blackout curtains compares the two in detail, but for daytime sleep after a night shift, most people do best with both.
For the mask layer, our Deep Sleep Mask is designed for total darkness in natural mulberry silk, with no cotton, and an adjustable Velcro strap that will not degrade or pull hair. Set the strap firm enough to stay put through a long day sleep and turning over, without pressing on your eyes.
How do you look after a mask you wear every day?
A mask worn for 6–8 hours on four or five days a week needs washing regularly, and the Deep Sleep Mask is washable at 30 °C, so it can go in the machine with the Velcro closed rather than being a hand-wash-only item.
Many night workers keep two masks and alternate them, so one is always clean on a run of nights. The mask folds flat, so a spare fits in a locker or work bag for a nap on a break or a day sleep somewhere other than home. The silk also reduces friction on the skin around the eyes, which you notice when the mask is on your face for most of the day.
How do you keep a regular sleep window on rotating shifts?
Pick a fixed sleep window for your run of nights, for example 9am to 4pm, and keep to it on every night-shift day. HSE’s advice is that once you have found a sleep schedule that suits you, “try to keep to it”.
The Sleep Foundation suggests going to sleep and waking at the same times every day, which is hard on a rotating rota. A realistic version is an anchor: the same core hours on night-shift days, and a shorter nap before your first night if you are switching over from days.
Two habits protect the window. The Sleep Foundation advises avoiding alcohol altogether if you plan to sleep during the day, and stopping caffeine three to four hours before bed, which usually means the last coffee well before the end of the shift.
Keep the darkness routine the same as well. Curtains drawn before you go to bed, the mask on the bedside table and the room cool, so the same steps happen in the same order every morning.
What if daytime noise wakes you too?
Daytime noise is the other half of the problem for many people sleeping after nights, from school runs and deliveries to a neighbour’s lawnmower, and a mask does nothing about sound. Our guide to earplugs for daytime sleep covers the noise side of shift work in full, and our article on using a sleep mask and earplugs together explains how to wear both comfortably. If you want both in one order, the Deep Sleep Duo pairs the Deep Sleep Mask with our Life+ earplugs for a dark, quieter daytime bedroom.
When should you speak to a GP or occupational health about sleep?
If you still struggle to get to sleep or stay asleep after several weeks of a good routine, speak to your GP or your occupational health service. The NHS advises seeing a GP if changing your sleep habits has not helped, if you have had trouble sleeping for months, or if it is affecting your daily life in a way that makes it hard to cope (NHS, insomnia).
Under the Working Time Regulations, employers must offer night workers a free health assessment before night work starts and regularly afterwards, as the Society of Occupational Medicine’s guidance also sets out. It is a good moment to raise sleep, the pattern of your rota and any support your employer offers.
Start with the light. Keep the journey home and the house dim, get the bedroom as dark as you can, and let the mask cover what the curtains miss. The Deep Sleep Mask is £39.95 in Navy Blue, Rose Quartz or Triple Black, with free UK delivery over £35 and our 40-day money-back guarantee, so you can try it across a full run of nights.
His connection to hearing protection stems from personal experience with sound sensitivity during live events and work in noisy environments, an issue that made him more aware of the long-term risks of unmanaged noise exposure. Today, as both a communicator and a user of BOLLSEN products, he is passionate about raising awareness around the importance of proactive hearing care.
At BOLLSEN, he develops data-driven marketing campaigns, writes SEO-focused articles, and manages communication channels that connect customers with practical knowledge about hearing protection. His work ensures that BOLLSEN’s message—prioritizing health, performance, and sustainability reaches a global audience in an engaging and trustworthy way.
Passionate about writing since childhood, Timotej combines creativity with a strong analytical approach, continuously testing new ideas in digital marketing, performance advertising, and social media. He believes in learning through innovation and collaboration, balancing leadership with openness to new perspectives.
Beyond his professional role, Timotej is committed to a healthy lifestyle and finds inspiration in fitness, sports, and quality time with friends. His personal passion for well-being aligns with BOLLSEN’s core values, making his work not only a career but also a cause he deeply believes in.
