How Long Should Your Baby’s Nap Be?

Find out how long your baby’s nap should ideally be from 0-13 months old. Get tips for how to help baby sleep longer and see what typical parents found their baby’s nap lengths to be.

As you work to set up a solid routine with your newborn or baby, you will no doubt wonder how long your baby should be sleeping for each nap of the day. This post will walk you through how long naps should ideally be. It will also share reasons for short naps and how to address those issues.

Nap Lengths for Newborns

Newborns typically sleep a lot. People often worry more that their newborn is sleeping too much rather than not enough.

With that said, I did have a newborn who seemed to fight sleep with every ounce of energy he had, so I know that there are newborns out there who are not just sleepy.

With your newborn, you want to follow an eat/wake/sleep pattern. So you will feed baby, have “playtime”, then do nap time. For a newborn, playtime might only be able to be as long as you changing your baby’s diaper before the nap starts. That is very normal.

>>>Read: How To Accurately Calculate Baby Wake Time Length

Something very important for solid newborn naps is to keep your newborn awake during feedings and not allow little power naps during the feed.

Your newborn should typically eat every 2.5-3 hours during the daytime. Naps should be between 1.5-2.5 hours long. As your newborn learns to sleep, naps might just be around one hour long. Make sure you understand my hierarchy of sleep for newborns and how to prioritize your sleep goals.

Newborn naps should typically be 1.5-2.5 hours long each.

Poll Results

Here are poll results from this blog for nap lengths for newborns. These polls were taken on this website.

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 0-2 weeks? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes: 9 votes (8%)
1 hour: 5 votes (4%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 2 votes (1%)
1 hour 30 minutes: 16 votes (15%)
2 hours: 31 votes (30%)
2+ hours–baby would sleep all day if I let him!: 38 votes (37%)

Total of 101 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 3-4 weeks? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes: 15 votes (11%)
1 hour: 10 votes (7%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 10 votes (7%)
1 hour 30 minutes: 22 votes (16%)
1 hour 45 minutes: 9 votes (7%)
2 hours: 32 votes (24%)
2 hours +–baby still wanted to sleep all day: 36 votes (27%)

Total of 134 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 5-6 weeks? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes or less: 13 votes (9%)
1 hour: 17 votes (12%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 13 votes (9%)
1.5 hours: 35 votes (25%)
1 hour 45 minutes: 14 votes (10%)
2 hours: 36 votes (25%)
More than 2 hours: 12 votes (8%)
Baby basically didn’t nap: 0 votes (0%)

Total of 140 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 7-9 weeks? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes or less: 21 votes (17%)
1 hour: 16 votes (13%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 11 votes (9%)
1.5 hours: 27 votes (22%)
1 hour 45 minutes: 18 votes (14%)
2 hours: 21 votes (17%)
More than 2 hours: 7 votes (5%)

Total of 121 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 10-12 weeks? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes or less: 32 (22%)
1 hour: 18 (12%)
1 hour 15 min: 13 (9%)
1.5 hours: 27 (19%)
1 hour 45 min: 19 (13%)
2 hours: 26 (18%)
More than 2 hours: 10 (7%)

Total of 145 votes

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Nap Lengths for Babies

As your baby gets older, desired nap lengths don’t really change a whole lot. Your baby will drop naps. Your baby will extend the schedule so feedings are further apart.

As your baby starts to be ready to drop a nap, a nap will often shorten. For example, when your baby is around 4 months old, they will be ready to drop the fourth nap and move to 3 naps a day. As your baby gets ready to drop the fourth nap, that fourth nap will tend to be more of a catnap and be only 30-60 minutes long.

From that point forward, you will have 3 naps a day. That third nap might always be just 30-60 minutes long until you drop it, or it might be the average 1.5-2.5 hours long for a while and then shorten over time.

So as you look at typical nap length for a 3-12 month old, keep in mind that a catnap will usually be shorter than the first two naps.

Getting your baby’s wake window (or wake time length) down correctly will be imperative to your baby taking long enough naps.

Baby naps should typically be 1.5-2.5 hours long each. This excludes tha catnap, which is typically 30-60 minutes long.

Poll Results

Here are poll results from this blog for nap lengths for babies. These polls were taken on this website.

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 3-4 months (13-16 weeks)? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes: 44 votes (26%)
1 hour: 16 votes (9%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 11 votes (6%)
1.5 hours: 44 votes (26%)
1 hour 45 minutes: 13 votes (7%)
2 hours: 27 votes (16%)
2 hours or more: 9 votes (5%)

Total of 164 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 4-5 months (17-22 weeks)? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes: 30 votes (24%)
1 hour: 16 votes (13%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 14 votes (11%)
1.5 hours: 23 votes (18%)
1 hour 45 minutes: 17 votes (13%)
2 hours: 19 votes (15%)
2 hours or more: 3 votes (2%)

Total of 122 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 5-6 months (22-26 weeks)? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes: 15 votes (11%)
1 hour: 18 votes (13%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 20 votes (15%)
1.5 hours: 37 votes (28%)
1 hour 45 minutes: 10 votes (7%)
2 hours: 19 votes (14%)
2 hours or more: 10 votes (7%)

Total of 129 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 6-7 months? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes: 24 votes (11%)
1 hour: 26 votes (12%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 26 votes (12%)
1.5 hours: 59 votes (26%)
1 hour 45 minutes: 18 votes (8%)
2 hours: 48 votes (21%)
2 hours or more: 24 votes (11%)

Total of 225 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 7-8 months? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes: 12 votes (7%)
1 hour: 16 votes (9%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 17 votes (10%)
1.5 hours: 44 votes (27%)
1 hour 45 minutes: 20 votes (14%)
2 hours: 44 votes (27%)
More than 2 hours: 12 votes (7%)

Total of 165 votes

Poll Results: What was the average length of naps for baby ages 8-9 months? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes: 9 votes (8%)
1 hour: 7 votes (6%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 12 votes (11%)
1.5 hours: 33 votes (29%)
1 hour 45 minutes: 16 votes (14%)
2 hours: 27 votes (24%)
More than 2 hours: 9 votes (8%)

Total of 113 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 9-10 months? (approximate)

Results:
5 minutes: 9 votes (7%)
1 hour: 11 votes (8%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 40 votes (31%)
2 hours: 59 votes (46%)
More than 2 hours: 11 votes (8%)

Total of 130 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 10-11 months? (approximate)

Results:
45 minutes: 5 votes (5%)
1 hour: 9 votes (9%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 31 votes (32%)
2 hours: 47 votes (48%)
More than 2 hours: 5 votes (5%)

Total of 98 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 11-12 months?

Results:
45 minutes: 14 votes (8%)
1 hour: 14 votes (8%)
1 hour 15 minutes: 15 votes (9%)
1.5 hours: 49 votes (28%)
1 hour 45 minutes: 17 votes (10%)
2 hours: 52 votes (30%)
more than 2 hours: 14 votes (8%)

Total of 174 votes

What was the average length of naps for baby ages 12-13 months?

Results:
45 minutes: 10 votes (3%)
1 hour: 31 votes (9%)
1.5 hour: 128 votes (38%)
2 hours: 120 votes (36%)
2.5 hours: 42 votes (12%)

Votes: 331

Sleep Regressions and Disruptions

While 1.5-2.5 hours long is the ideal nap length for your baby throughout the first year, there are many times your baby will take shorter naps. This is very predicatable and normal.

Sleep Regressions

There are many sleep regressions throughout the first year. These are usually tied to a major milestone being developed by your baby. Simply put, a sleep regression is a time when your little one has a change in sleep patterns. Common ages for a sleep regression are:

• 4 month sleep regression
• 8-10 month sleep regression
• 12 month sleep regression
• 18 month sleep regression
• 2 year old sleep regression

>>>Read: Sleep Regressions: Causes, Ages, and What to Do

If you have a newborn who sleeps well all day but gets fussy in the evening, it is probably witching hour.

Growth Spurts

You will also find sleep disruptiosn come during a growth spurt, especially in the newborn months. Basically, a growth spurt is when your baby is growing more rapidly than typical. Infants already grow at an incredible rate, but during a growth spurt, they grow even faster.

Growth spurts typically happen every 3-4 weeks. There can also be one around age 10-14 days old. The exact ages can vary, but they typically happen around 2-4 weeks, then 4-6 weeks, 3 months, 6 months, 9 months, 12 months. A growth spurt length can range, but you will probably find it is 3-7 days long.

>>>Read: Baby Growth Spurts: Everything You Need To Know

Pain and Sickness

Part of living in this world is facing pains and sicknesses. Your baby’s sleep might get disrupted for teething pain or from a sickness she has. Some babies may have trouble sleeping because of reflux or an allergy. When this happens, you want to do what you can to alleviate the cause for pain or discomfort.

Practicing New Skills

When babies are learning new skills, they sometimes take the opportunity to practice this budding skill during nap time instead of sleeping. This leads to them being overly tired and taking short naps. New skills are being learned ALL THE TIME! This can be learning to babble to learning to stand. Read How to Stop New Skills from Disrupting Naps and Sleep for help with this situation.

45 Minute Intruder

If your baby can’t seem to make it past the 45 minute mark for their nap, it is the 45 minute intruder. You have a lot of options for how to address this. Read about the 45 minute intruder and how to stop it here.

Reader Nap Questions

Susanne said: My son is 7 weeks old. He is on a 2.5/3 hour combo schedule. His optimal wake time is 40-60 minutes in length. He currently only naps for 40-60 minutes. If he is only awake for 40-60 min then he should be napping for 1.5-2 hours. What am I doing wrong? He wakes from his naps crying. I will let him cry, but he usually cries for longer than 20 minutes, which indicates to me it is hunger (because I use CIO other times and he usually only cries 10-15 minutes if he is not hungry). I breastfeed and give him a full feeding because he seems content after the feedings. He is gaining weight well so I am not concerned about my milk supply or him not getting enough to eat. Any suggestions on how to get him to nap longer? Could my son be a short napper? Or is this the 45-minute intruder?

Babywise Mom said: Susanne, Could be the 45-minute intruder. There is a growth spurt at 6 weeks, so that could be it. Also, see the blog “growth spurts”.

Ashley said: My son will be 10 weeks old tomorrow and he is somtimes having a hard time napping. There are 2 parts to my question. First, he is on a 3 hour schedule and it seems to be working fine as far as feeding. However, his awake time is only about 1 hour. So that means he sleeps for 2 hours before his next feeding. I know BW says that naps should be about 1.5 hours on a 3 hour schedule. Are his 2 hour naps too long? Should I try to force him to stay awake longer? I feel like he will jsut get fussy if I do. He also is not sleeping through the night yet. He only wakes up once per ngiht b/t 10:30pm and 7:00am. Do you think his long naps could be contributing to not sleeping through the night? Second, my son seems to be a very light sleeper during these transitions between sleep phases. About 45 minutes into each nap, he starts talking some and making noise. Sometimes he can get himself back to sleep. Other times he cannot. Do you think this could be related to the fact that his naps are too long (as mentioned above). Is there anything else I can do to help him get back to sleep through these transitions? Thanks for your blog. It is so helpful.

Babywise Mom said: Ashley–no. Naps should be 1.5-2.5 hours (for younger babies the nap might only be 1 hour). See this post: Sleep Begets Sleep the transitions, it just takes time for them to learn to sleep through them. It is a normal part of the process.

Suzie said: From all the poll results, it looks like my baby sleeping only 30-40 minutes at 7 weeks is pretty normal (thought it was a growth spurt, but she’s not hungry when I try to feed her after only 1.5-2 hours), and that she’ll get the hang of it eventually. But I need practical advice about what to do when she does wake up. She wakes up crying, but I don’t want to go in immediately. I have a 2 year old to take care of, and can’t be always in the baby room. So, I’d like to start CIO, but can’t for another week or so until our schedule of activities dies down enough to stay consistent. She doesn’t care for the swing, so I can’t just put her in that. I could try letting her cry and just going in every 5-10-or 15 minutes, but that usually means she’ll end up crying for a solid hour or so.I suppose I could just get her up and see if she’ll play. At this point, I’m more focused on getting her metabolism settled than her naps. What do you think? Some other advice I need in terms of troubleshooting: let’s say I cut her wake time back 15 minutes. Does it only take ONE nap to figure out if that’s the problem? B/c I’ve been trying to cut back wake time for 2 days with no results. Is that long enough to determine, yeah, it’s probably not that she’s awake too long? So if it’s not fixed after one nap, is that my answer?

Babywise Mom said: I think getting her up to play is a good option for stabilizing metabolism. Cutting waketime, a lot of times you get it in one nap, but sometimes it takes a few days. I would give it a few days before trying something new.

Krista said: My 6-week-old will only sleep for 35-40min and then wakes up crying. If I pick her up she’ll fall back asleep, others she cries and cries and can’t seem to calm herself down. She is swaddled. Is this the transition period? How do I know? Any suggestions?

Babywise Mom said: Krista, it could be a growth spurt. It could also be just her learning how to sleep. I would make sure it is not a growth spurt, and if not, be sure to see my “newborn sleep hierarchy” post.

Becca said: I have a question regarding total sleep time, as it relates to naps during the day. I have a 9 week old (she’ll be 10 weeks in 2 days) and here’s her rough schedule.
8am feed/wake
9am nap
11am feed/wake (sometimes 10:30am)
12pm nap
2pm feed/wake
3pm nap
4:30 or 5pm feed/wake
6:00pm catnap (maybe 30-45mins)
7:00 feed/bedtime routine, in bed by 810pm
DF5 or 6am DF (I consider this DF since optimal waketime is 8am eventually!)

With this schedule she is getting about 17 hours of sleep every day – maybe a little less with the time it takes her to fall asleep. That seems like A LOT to me, babycenter recommends around 15 hours at this age as a guideline. my 3questions: first, is this amount of sleep what you experienced with your LO’s? A part of me feels like I’m missing out on time with her since she sleeps so darn much…and feeding takes 30 mins of the hour she’s up. Second, my daughter is REALLY fussy between the hours of 5-7pm, I try to put her in her crib, sometimes she’ll catnap, other times she won’t. She won’t take a bouncy or a swing for longer than 5 mins. should I just do whatever it takes to get through those hours and hope she eventually grows out of it? I’m wondering what ideally I should be doing between 5-7 when it’s right near bedtime…It’s very frustrating because every time we have people over she is a mess! Lastly, am I doing her a disservice by making her take every nap in her crib? The only exception is if I’m running around, she’ll sleep in her carseat (though not as good/consistent.). She’ll eventually be going to daycare and I wonder if it will be a hard transition if I don’t ‘practice’ in other places (like grandma/grandpa’s, etc) now rather than later.

Babywise Mom said: 1-Total sleep in a day does vary from child to child. You will likely find guidelines in various sources to be lower than what you are actually experiencing. See this post for how much sleep my kids got at all ages up to one year: Sample Schedules See this post for thoughts on spending time with baby: Spending Time with Baby/Child. Yes, do what you need to for those hours. She should be over that before too long. 3. See this post

Becca said: Thank you so much for answering my questions and referring me to other articles on your blog – really appreciate the sounding board! Very helpful information!

Lewis Farm said: Hi there! My issue is getting my 6mo old to nap longer than 1hr. 30% of his morning naps, he was consistently sleeping 2hrs; the majority of the time he’d wake after an hour; ½ that time he’d fall back asleep after 20mins, the other ½ I get him up when he doesn’t fall back asleep. He rarely takes a 2hr afternoon nap. This has been the norm since we started BW/CIO at 14wks. The CIO part was effective in that I can put him down for a nap easily. He just won’t sleep beyond 1hr.
HIS SCHEDULE: (optimal wake time of 1.5hrs between naps)
Bedtime – 6:30-7pm
Wakes in the morning – 6:30-7am
AM Nap – 8:30am falls asleep 8:45 (1 hour)
2nd AM Nap – 11:15am falls asleep 11:30 (1 hour)
1st Afternoon Nap – 1:00pm falls asleep 1:15 (1 hour)
2nd Afternoon Nap – 3:45pm falls asleep 4pm (1 hour)

This, of course, varies, depending on when he starts the day and other variables where he might take longer to fall asleep, etc. How can I help my baby take 2hr naps? I try letting him babble/fuss back to sleep. I try rocking him back to sleep. I’ve let him lie there for 1+hrs several times before finally getting him up. A while back, you recommended I drop his late afternoon nap. For most days he’s awake from 4-4:30pm until bedtime. Because he’s only napping an hour and has an OWT of 1.5hrs, he’s essentially remaining on a 4 nap a day schedule and I can never plan my day because I never know what kind of morning nap he’s going to have. I can only see this being the case for the next 6 months to a year if his naps never consistently go beyond an hour. Please help.

Babywise Mom said: It looks to me like he might have too long of waketimes. Try shortening them by 5-15 minutes at a time to see if you can find the right length, especially in the morning. If the morning is right, the others will follow. Be sure to also see the 45 minute nap blog label for more ideas. And also this post: 5-8 Month Sleep Disruptions

Ericksons said: I just wanted to share a success story and a tip because I feel like I have been struggling with my son’s naps for weeks and weeks! I have had my son on a 3-3.5 hour schedule and he is almost 8 months. I was reluctant to move him to anything beyond because I never have to “wake him” from his naps..so I assumed he wasn’t ready. The last 2-3 days I have just said, let’s try..and we are doing 4 hours 7, 11, 3, snack at 4:30ish, and 7. Well, he is napping better!!! I guess I needed to do this sooner. Hopefully this will give an idea to some of your readers that may be struggling with the same thing. By the way, it has taken a few days to get better. it didn’t happen in one day.

Babywise Mom said: Thanks Ericksons! That has been true for many moms. Thanks for sharing!

Susanne said: Hi Val, my son is 5 months now and we are down to three naps. The third nap is only 45 min and the other naps are about 2 hours each. The first nap, however, for a couple days off an on has been a mess. In the morning he is usually only able to be up for 1.5 hours before he needs a nap. The second nap he is able to be up for 2 hours. Do you think it is possible that he can handle being up for 2 hours in the morning now? Or should I only extend his morning wake time to 1.75 hours? Thanks for your help!

Babywise Mom said: It is possible that he can be up earlier. I like to extend waketime in small increments. I wouldn’t add more than 10 minutes at a time. With Kaitlyn I only added 5 minutes at a time.

Kaitlyn said: Thank you for such a wonderful wealth of knowledge. You have been such a fabulous resource for this first time mama!! My 9 month old’s schedule is the typical 4 hour schedule, starting at 7 am. She seems to want to nap longer in the afternoons (more than 2 hours). At what point do I let her sleep until she wakes up rather than waking her to keep on the schedule?

Babywise Mom said: I don’t really ever let my kids just sleep until they wake up. I often wake Kaitlyn up still who is 2.5. If your daughter consistently wants a longer nap in the afternoon, you could just plan on her sleeping 30 extra minutes and make that your new schedule

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