Consumer Electronics

Eight Smart Mattress

Editor Rating: Excellent (4.0)
Eight Smart Mattress - Consumer Electronics
US Street Price$999.00
  • Pros

    Very comfortable. Sleep tracker works with any mattress. Measures lots of sleep metrics. Warms each side of bed. IFTTT compatible.
  • Cons

    Sensor strip might be felt through the cover. Occasional data delays in testing. Smart Alarm requires phone nearby.
  • Bottom Line


It's no secret that getting a good night's sleep is good for your health. The sheer number of sleep-monitoring fitness trackers attest to the fact that we are becoming more and more concerned about the amount and quality of sleep we get. The Eight Smart Mattress digs a bit deeper than most wrist-worn trackers. It's a memory foam mattress paired with a sensor-equipped cover, with prices starting at $999 for a full size bundle, putting in on par with the Sleep Number it. After sleeping on it every night for the past couple of months, I feel both better rested and more aware of the rest I am getting. That makes it an Editors' Choice.

The Mattress

The mattress starts at $699 for a full size model, or $999 when bundled with a tracker. A queen goes for $799 solo or $1,099 with a tracker, while a king is available for $949/$1,249. No matter the size, the mattress is made of (from top to bottom) a layer each of reactive foam, memory foam, transition foam, and support foam. These layers are more dense the further down you go, which makes for a soft, contouring sleep surface that also supports and distributes body weight evenly. Any kind of base is fine to use, and Eight includes a 10-year limited warranty on top of a 100-night trial with free returns.

I prefer a very soft mattress, while my husband likes a firmer sleeping surface. We've never tried a foam mattress, and I was a little concerned about the Eight's "medium" firmness. When I first laid down, it did feel a bit too firm for my own comfort. If I had tried this mattress out on a showroom floor, I would have dismissed it as being too firm, but it turned out to be the perfect density for both my husband and me. My only complaint is that I hated rolling out of bed every morning because I was so comfortable.

Eight Smart Mattress

Smart Cover

Eight sets itself apart from other smart mattress companies by selling the sleep tracker separate from the mattress—you can buy it on its own at $399 for full and queen size models (king goes for $419). The tracker is a layer that wraps over the mattress like a cover. This approach is great, because it means you can use whatever mattress you want and just pop the tech layer over the top. It has sensors that span the top of the mattress, right around chest level. The tracker is water resistant and can work with just about any type of mattress other than split adjustable bases.

The tracker senses your sleep patterns, connects with compatible smart home devices via If This Then That (IFTTT), and can even warm each side of the bed independently from the other. A cord comes out from under the upper left corner of the cover and runs to the hub (which connects via Wi-Fi), which in turn plugs into the wall. Once the Smart Cover is in place and the hub is plugged in, it's ready to track your sleep via the mobile app.

App and Features

Eight's free app is where you see all the collected data. If you share a bed, you can also see the information gathered from your partner if they choose to share it with you in the settings. The interface is well-designed and easy to navigate.

The app opens to an analysis of last night's sleep. You'll see a timeline of your night, which includes time to bed, time asleep, room temperature, bed temperature, tosses and turns, heart rate, respiratory rate, and more. That's a lot more detailed than the information you get from most fitness trackers, which simply tell you how long you were in bed.

Eight Smart Mattress

The Eight does much more than tell you how well you slept last night. You can manually switch between Day and Night modes in the app, which can trigger any combination of functions using IFTTT. For example, setting the Eight to Night mode can turn off your Philips Hue lights, turn your Nest thermostat down to a cooler temperature, and activate your connected security system. Switching back to Day mode can reverse these actions and/or trigger any number of new ones.

The Smart Alartm feature detects when you're in a light sleep (within a window of time you designate) and wakes you at the moment you'll be most refreshed. You'll need to keep your phone nearby, as the alarm will sound on your device, as opposed to a built-in vibration function. That alarm can also trigger actions, like firing up your connected coffee maker.

The app learns about your sleep over time and can help suggest conditions in your home most conducive to restful slumber. And it has a variety of white noise tracks and sleep meditations to help you fall asleep if you're having trouble, as well as a sleep experiment to help you find out how many hours you need per night to feel your best.

Getting a Good Night's Sleep

My husband and I were both immediately impressed with the foam mattress. He had been struggling with back pain from our spring mattress, and I was in my second trimester of pregnancy, experiencing all the aches and pains that come with it. I had no issues sleeping comfortably from the start (aside from a strong chemical smell coming from the mattress, which was gone in a few days), and after about a week, my husband's back pain was gone. The foam doesn't make me feel any warmer than other sleep surfaces I've tried. And since my husband can warm his side of the bed, I can set the house temperature much cooler for my comfort.

The sleep tracker's strip of sleep sensors run across the top of the mattress at chest level. When I first lay down, I can feel it. It's no more uncomfortable than a wrinkle in the sheets, though, and my husband doesn't feel it at all. It's not enough to bother me, even though I'm known for Princess-and-the-Pea levels of pickiness when it comes to bed comfort.

Eight Smart Mattress

To test the IFTTT integrations, I programmed Eight's Smart Alarm to create a new Trello card documenting the time it wakes me up every day and to turn on our living room lights. It worked perfectly, and I have zero complaints on that front. The app did experience a couple of data processing delays, which meant that my previous night's sleep data didn't show up in full until later in the day.

A Sound (Sleep) Decision

There's no shortage of smart mattress options on the market. The fact that Eight's sleep tracker is removable means you can enjoy all the smart capabilities without being committed to the company's mattress. Don't get me wrong, I love the mattress, but this makes it far more more approachable than other options on the market, some of which are priced in the several thousands of dollars (like the Kingsdown Sleep Smart Intuitive). The Sleep Number It bed goes for the some price, but all of the tech is in the mattress itself, so it isn't as versatile. It addition, the Eight mattress tracks more metrics and offers more smart device interactions than any other sleep solution we've tested. That makes it an Editors' Choice in our book.