Blue light can disrupt your circadian rhythm and affect how well you sleep.
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Key takeaways
Blue light glasses are sometimes touted as a fix for your sleep cycle.
Find out if they can actually help you improve your sleep.
What you do in the hours before your head hits the pillow can dramatically impact the quality of your sleep.
And, as many people give in to the temptations of technology right before bed, devices can play a problematic role in your sleep cycle.
But how, exactly, does this happen? And is there a solution?
Blue light and sleep
The problem with sleep and tech is largely the result of the ‘blue light’ in many of your favourite devices.
Blue light refers to the invisible waves of light that emit from certain energy-powered things, including TVs, computer monitors, smart devices and even the sun.1
This blue light can sabotage your sleep by disrupting your ‘circadian rhythm’, your body’s inbuilt clock that tells it when to wake and when to rest.
According to Bupa Optometrist Karen Makin, exposure to blue light suppresses the body’s natural release of the essential night-time hormone melatonin.
“If you think back to caveman times, humans woke with the sun and went to sleep when the sun went down,” Makin says. “This is a perfect example of the circadian rhythm being regulated by blue light.”
In fact, as one study found, 2 hours of blue light exposure before bed can not only disturb your sleep, but also shorten your sleep time and leave you feeling tired the next day.2
Can blue light glasses help?
Deceptively regular looking, blue light glasses contain light-blocking lenses that filter out blue light waves.
They claim to help alleviate symptoms of eye strain and eye fatigue. And, as some research suggests, they might help you drift off and stay asleep.3
“Rather than the blue light from the device entering our eyes, the lenses block or absorb this wavelength of light and prevent it from passing through to our eyes,” says Makin.
But how effective the glasses actually are at helping you sleep (without needing to power off your devices before bed, that is) is inconclusive.
One 2020 review of different studies revealed that, while results are varied, blue light glasses appear to be useful for some sleep disorders or for people who suffer from delayed sleep phase syndrome.4
As Makin points out, there’s no harm in giving them a go to see if your sleep quality improves.
And if they don’t work? Well, that next episode on your binge-list might just have to wait until tomorrow.
At Bupa, trust is everything
Our health and wellbeing information is regularly reviewed and maintained by a team of healthcare experts, to ensure its relevancy and accuracy. Everyone's health journey is unique and health outcomes vary from person to person.
This content is not a replacement for personalised and specific medical, healthcare, or other professional advice. If you have concerns about your health, see your doctor or other health professional.
1Newsom, R. & Singh, A. (2024). Blue Light: What It Is and How It Affects Sleep. Sleep Foundation.
2Green, A., Cohen-Zion, M., Haim, A., & Dagan, Y. (2017). Evening light exposure to computer screens disrupts human sleep, biological rhythms, and attention abilities. Chronobiology International, 34(7), 855-865.
3Hester, L., Dang, D., Barker, C. J., Heath, M., Mesiya, S., Tienabeso, T., & Watson, K. (2021). Evening wear of blue-blocking glasses for sleep and mood disorders: a systematic review. Chronobiology International, 38(10), 1375-1383.
4Shechter, A., Quispe, K.A., Mizhquiri Barbecho, J.S., Slater, C., & Falzon, L. (2020). Interventions to reduce short-wavelength (“blue”) light exposure at night and their effects on sleep: A systematic review and meta-analysis. SLEEP Advances, (1)1, zpaa002.
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