How can wake-up missions help me wake up?
A wake-up mission makes you get up and do something before the alarm leaves you alone. We know of no study that has tested mission alarms yet, but the logic is simple: sleep inertia fades with time awake, and a mission keeps you awake and moving through those first groggy minutes instead of letting you drift back to sleep.
The mechanism
Sleep inertia is worst in the first 15–30 minutes after waking and then fades (Hilditch & McHill, 2019). The same review notes that exercise has not been tested as a countermeasure yet, so no one can honestly promise that a mission lifts the fog faster. What it does is keep you busy and awake during those minutes, standing up, solving, moving or taking a photo, rather than asleep again.
Why it beats willpower
Willpower at 6 AM is in short supply. A mission you chose the night before removes the decision, and ByeBed has no snooze button. If you stop the alarm without finishing the mission, it rings again a minute later and keeps coming back, up to 10 times over 15 minutes.
ByeBed's approach
ByeBed keeps it simple: the night before, pick one of 14 missions (math, shake, push-ups counted by Apple Vision, photos of a random object, the sky, your made bed, grass, your pill or one of your own objects, drawing, maze, memory sequence, memory pairs, bird hop) and a difficulty. The alarm rings, you complete the mission, and you're up. Subscription with a 3-day free trial on the annual plan for eligible new subscribers.
Sources
- Hilditch & McHill, Nature and Science of Sleep, 2019. Sleep inertia: current insights
Tired of hitting snooze?
ByeBed replaces the snooze button with a mission: math, push-ups, a photo. Stop the alarm without finishing the mission and it comes back, up to 10 times over 15 minutes. Subscription required, with a 3-day free trial on the annual plan for eligible new subscribers.
Download ByeBed on the App Store