Sleep Diary

Who this is for

A night per line, written the next morning. Each row takes the times you went to bed, put the light out, woke and got up, your own estimate of the hours you slept and how often you woke, and how you felt in your own words; the workbook and the browser version average the hours you wrote.

Anyone who has been asked to keep a sleep diary before an appointment, people whose nights have gone wrong and who want to see the shape of it, shift workers, new parents and anyone curious whether a bad week was as bad as it felt.

What this helps you track

• When you went to bed, put the light out, woke and got up, night by night
• Your own estimate of the hours you slept, and how many times you woke
• How you felt on waking, in the words you would use
• What was different about the day before — late meal, travel, a worry
• The average of your own estimates over the sheet

How to use it

1. Write your name and the period the sheet covers, and whatever the person who asked for the diary said to note, in their words.
2. Fill in each line in the morning, not at night: the times as near as you can, an honest guess at the hours asleep, and the number of times you remember waking.
3. Describe how you felt on waking in your own words — groggy, fine, wide awake at four — and keep using the same words so entries compare.
4. Use the notes for anything that might have mattered: a late meal, alcohol, a cold, a long journey, an early alarm.
5. The average and the totals are worked out in the browser and the workbook. On paper, leave them; a clinician would rather see the rows.
6. Take the whole diary to the appointment if there is one, and let whoever asked for it read it.

Formats

• Printable PDF (A4 and US Letter)
• Fillable PDF with form fields
• Fill in online, saved in your browser
• Excel / Google Sheets workbook

The printable is laid out inside a box that fits both A4 and US Letter, so the two files are identical and neither one is scaled. The fillable PDF has real form fields. The workbook uses plain formulas only — SUM, IF, COUNTIF and the like — so it opens in Excel, LibreOffice and Google Sheets without anything breaking, and every calculated cell is grey so you can see which figures it worked out.

How to print

Download the A4 or US Letter file to match the paper in your printer, open it in a PDF reader and print at 100% — not "fit to page", which shrinks the writing space. Both files leave a 14 mm margin, which clears the unprintable edge on home printers. To print the online version with your entries in it, use the Print this sheet button, which prints only the sheet and none of the page around it. More on printing.

Questions

How many hours of sleep should I be getting?

This sheet does not say, and carries no recommended figure anywhere. The only numbers on it are the ones you write, and what they mean for you is a question for whoever you see about your sleep, not for a template.

Do I need a watch or a tracker?

No. The hours column is your own estimate, and the times are as near as you can remember. A diary of honest guesses is what most people are asked to keep; if you have a device, you can copy its figure in and say so in the notes.

What is the average for?

It is the average of the hours you wrote, over the rows on the sheet. It is a description of your own entries and nothing more — the sheet does not compare it with anything.

Can a partner or carer fill it in?

Yes, and it is worth saying so in the notes, because what a partner saw and what you remember are both useful and not always the same.