It depends on the person, but most health experts agree that the ideal temperature for sleep is around 65 degrees Fahrenheit or 18 degrees Celsius. In the summertime, it can be hard to maintain this chilly temperature in your bedroom, especially if you don't have an air conditioner or turn off your AC at night to save money on your energy bill. Here are some simple sleep hacks that you can use during the hot summer months to keep cool and minimize sweat while you're trying to snooze.

10 sleep cooling hacks other than AC

Health Tips

1. Freeze your sheets and pillowcases

An hour or two before you go to bed, toss your sheets and pillowcases in the freezer, and no, they won't come out stiff as a board. They will stay icy long enough to help you fall asleep without feeling overheated.

2. Also throw your socks in the freezer

Along the same lines as freezing your linens, you can also freeze your socks for cooling relief. Extremities like your fingers, feet and toes are sensitive to temperature changes and play a role in regulating temperature. Keeping your feet cool can help cool down the rest of your body.

3. Use house fans to make your own AC

Fans are much more energy efficient and budget friendly than an air conditioner. They use about 1% of the electricity that AC does. So, take advantage of fans and strategically place them around your room. Try placing a fan next to your bedside with a bowl of ice water in front of it. The ice will create cold air that the fan will blow toward you. Next, face a window fan outwards to blow the hot air from your bedroom outside.

Best Cooling Mattress Topper: $295 at Saatva

4. Use a wet towel layer

Lay a damp towel on your bed over your sheets to give your body some cooling relief while you fall asleep. I recommend that you lay a dry towel underneath the wet one to avoid soaking your mattress with water, which can damage the foam in your mattress. The towel won't stay cold for the entire night, but it should stay cool enough that you can drift off to sleep.

5. Don't sleep in the nude

You may see advice on the internet suggesting that you should sleep in the nude to stay cool. That might work if you sleep cool, but it won't do much for you if you get sweaty. If you're hot, it's beneficial to wear lightweight pajamas (such as cotton) that can wick the moisture away. Otherwise, your body is free to sweat all over your sheets.

6. Use cooling bed linens

If a new mattress is out of your budget, you can opt for cooling sheets or pillows for relief. Search for sheets made with breathable fabric like organic cotton, linen, or bamboo. Bamboo absorbs sweat and helps you stay cool, and organic cotton does a great job of wicking away moisture.

Best Cooling Pillow: $103 at Amazon

7. Consider a cooling mattress

Many mattresses retain heat, especially beds made with standard memory foam. A mattress with cooling technology can actually make a big difference in how comfortable you sleep. It can either provide extra airflow and breathability or offer an actively cool-to-the-touch sensation that draws heat away from you, like Brooklyn Bedding Aurora.

Best Cooling Mattress: $2,265 at Brooklyn Bedding

Watch CNET sleep expert Owen Poole review the best cooling mattresses of 2025.

8. Block out the daytime sun and heat

Blackout curtains can prevent your bedroom from getting too hot during the daytime, especially in the summer. Not only do they keep your bedroom dark, but they also reflect heat, stopping it from entering through the windows, which can also help cut down your electricity bill.

9. Sleep on the first level of your home

The bad news for people in two-story homes or an upper-level apartment is that hot air rises, so the top story of your house will be warmer than the bottom floor. But you can beat the heat a little by sleeping on the bottom story of your home when you need relief.

10. Drink ice water before bed

Drink a significant amount of water before bed to try and counteract the night sweats. Also, avoid alcohol before bedtime as it can promote dehydration, making it more difficult for your body to regulate temperature and keep you cooler.

For more, check out our guide to natural sleep aids, the best way to take a power nap and how to train yourself to be a back sleeper (and why you should). If all else fails, these are our picks for the nest portable AC units.

Don't Get Burned: Tips to Avoid an Overheated Phone

Fall brings cooler weather to much of the US, but even chilly outdoor temperatures don't guarantee that your phone won't heat up indoors. Fast processors, demanding games and even charging adds heat to your phone. If it gets too hot, it may shut down abruptly, potentially damaging the battery, shortening its lifespan and reducing the time you can use it before needing to recharge.But there's no need to get hot and bothered, especially when you know these easy ways to keep your iPhone or Android phone from overheating.

Heat doesn't just come from the outside environment.Your phone's processor has to work a lot harder when you do something like play graphics-intensive games, which can generate more heat than usual from within your device.And playing these games can also drain your battery quickly, so it's natural to want to plug into power.However, this combination of high processing and charging increases the heat generation even more, leading to overheating.

It's normal for a phone to heat up while it's charging -- the phone's surface dissipates that heat away from the inside by design. But if you're using a bulky case, the heat could get trapped. If the phone seems to be heating up too much, remove the case before charging.

Video recording is resource-intensive, capturing and storing multiple megabytes of data per second and usually processing that footage at the same time. Even expensive mirrorless cameras capable of shooting high-quality video hit thermal ceilings (or have add-on fans to dissipate the heat). If you're recording lengthy clips, you may need to pause for a few minutes between them to allow the phone to cool down.

It's just a power charger, so why not get the cheapest one? Be wary of amazingly low prices, because they're often attached to knock-off products that don't include safety electronics for regulating power throughput and preventing overheating. Better to pay slightly more and get a recommended USB-C charger or power bank you know you'll be able to trust.

Manufacturers like to boast how bright their phone screens can get, allowing you to see your display clearly even in direct sunlight. Pushing the intensity of those pixels to 1,000 or 2,000 nits of peak brightness is great for reading what's on the screen, but sustaining that level uses more power and generates more heat than when you're inside or in the shade.Plus, direct sunlight delivers radiant heat to items like metal and glass, increasing the temperature of your device. If you need to use your phone for an extended period of time during sunny, hot days, find some shade to protect both it and you.

It sounds like the worst sort of overly general advice: Make sure your device's software is up to date. And yet it's usually good advice, especially in this case. For example, a bug in iOS 17, plus a problem with apps including Instagram and Uber, caused many iPhone 15 Pro phones to overheat. Apple soon released iOS 17.0.3 to fix the problem. (The current version is iOS 17.6.1, which adds new features as well as bug and security fixes.)Note that it's normal for a phone to warm up during and after a system update as the software optimizes data in the background. However, this is a temporary temperature elevation.

If you can't avoid the heat and often find yourself waiting for the phone to cool, consider buying an inexpensive thermal phone pouch to store it in. Using materials designed to protect astronauts from temperature extremes, a pouch will reflect direct sunlight and heat away from the phone. Thermal pouches also work at the other end of the spectrum, protecting your phone from cold weather such as when you're skiing.

If you don't want to expose the phone to the sun, what about keeping it in a car while you're frolicking on the beach? Setting aside the risk of having it nabbed in a break-in, cars turn into hotboxes on sunny days, which can easily push past the recommended operating temperatures. It's better to take the phone with you.

If overheating becomes a frequent problem -- and the phone isn't exposed to the other situations mentioned in this gallery -- a faulty or failing battery might be the cause.First, see what the phone is telling you: on the iPhone, go to Settings > Battery and check Battery Health. On Android go to Settings > Battery > Battery Diagnostics (Pixel) or Settings > Battery and device care (Samsung). If the functionality is degraded, it might be time to schedule a battery replacement.And if the phone is bulging, cracked or shows other signs of a swollen battery, turn it off and contact the company's support programs immediately. That's a less likely circumstance, but with lithium-ion batteries, you don't want to mess around with safety.

The information contained in this article is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as health or medical advice. Always consult a physician or other qualified health provider regarding any questions you may have about a medical condition or health objectives.