I've used the Oura ring to track my sleep for 6 months — here’s how I'm now getting a full 8 hours

I’ve had my Oura Ring Gen 3 for six months now, and in that time, my daily sleep and readiness scores have come to dictate what I get up to from day to day. Do I need to take it easy and rest up or can I go hell for leather and role play as Wonder Woman? Oura lets me know as soon as I wake up.

Oura Oura Ring Gen 3: was $249 now $199 at Amazon

The Oura Ring Gen 3 had helped me to regulate my irregular sleep patterns by giving daily feedback on metrics. the ring also tracks workouts and daily activity, all bundled into actionable insights to help you feel your best.

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I get far more out of Oura than any other fitness tracker I've tried, like the Apple Watch Series 10 and the AmazFit Bip 6. I find the feedback you get from Oura to be fully actionable, and I can build on the feedback. And that’s exactly what I’ve done.

Noticing patterns with tags

The key to getting actionable feedback from Oura is adding tags in the app. It gives the app insights into my daily life, and tells me what I am doing that’s impacting my sleep scores. Pretty cool, right?

I don’t add tags for absolutely everything because that would be a lot of work! But if I'm feeling slightly under the weather, go for a long run, drink alcohol or do anything out of the ordinary, I’ll make sure to note it.

The app also lets you know what sort of things have effected other users. So if you have a rough night, it will prompt you to add a tag that may have contributed to the tossing and turning.

For me, this meant I can actively avoid activities I know are going to keep me up at night, but also keep doing things that have given me high sleep scores. So let’s get into what I've found out.

Eating late increases heart rate

This is one I never would have thought about before using the Oura Ring. If I eat a meal or even a small, carby snack less than three hours before I head to sleep, I can be sure to have a disrupted night.

Eating late can disrupt the sleep-wake cycle of the body, and Oura flags this in the app as a main cause for a restless night.

Late exercise disrupts sleep

I have always been one for an evening run rather than an early morning gym class, but that’s all changed since using the Oura Ring.

Exercising late at night can mean your body takes longer to wind down before drifting off to sleep, giving you fewer hours than you need. Oura says that even exercising one to two hours earlier can help you to see positive changes.

So I took this advice on board and started doing my exercise in the morning and doing gentle yoga in the evening, so I was still getting some movement but at a lower intensity.

Alcohol consumption

Alcohol at social gatherings is the norm for many people so it will come as no surprise that Oura says it is the tag most used by its members.

Alcohol increases your resting heart rate, putting stress on the body. So after a few beers you’re probably going to be waking up every few hours, therefore massively disrupting your sleep stages.

As part of the Community discoveries feature on the Oura app, I can see that a tag of ‘No alcohol’ decreases resting heart rate scores by an average of 3%. Adversely, tagging ‘Party’ increases heart rate by an average of 6%. This seemingly small increase is enough to disrupt sleep and offset you for the next day.

Cool sleeping environment

Everyone knows that in the height of summer it is pretty much impossible to get to sleep. Especially between trying to kick off your sheets and finding the perfect balance of cozy and cool.

But I had this confirmed to me by my ring as on nights where I had the air conditioning in my room set to around 67ºF I had restful, deep sleep and woke up with high sleep scores.

On the other end of that, as the weather has become warmer on the way to summer and I don’t have the air conditioning on I wake up in the middle of the night and struggle to get back to sleep.

Hormonal cycle

The Oura Ring measures your temperature while you sleep to give cycle predictions. During different phases of your cycle HRV (heart rate variation) and core body temperature are affected. These can have a direct impact on your sleep and readiness.

Through feedback from what many would call the best smart ring, I have been able to recognize when in my cycle I need to take it easy to ensure my HRV is impacted as little as possible, making for a restful sleep. This is also true for finding where I can put a little more effort into my workouts without it impacting my readiness scores.

How I used Oura to sleep better

By looking at my own metrics, and the metrics from community discoveries, I have been able to get consistent sleep and readiness scores. Of course, there are days when lower scores can’t be helped, but my feedback is far less erratic and the prompts from the ring have helped me to build a successful routine.

By exercising and eating my evening meals earlier, staying cool at night, being mindful of alcohol consumption and of where I am in my cycle, I am getting my eight hours regularly… and I feel so much better for it.

More from Tom's Guide

• I wore an Oura Ring for an entire year — what I like and don't like
• I ditched my Apple Watch for an Oura Ring for a month — here's what I learned
• Don't fall for the Oura Ring 4 upgrade — the Ring 3 has the same sleep tracking tech and is $150 cheaper