Mattress Thickness

Today’s mattress market is packed with options, bringing numerous benefits to sleepers. However, there is a downside to all of this: with seemingly endless choices, making the right one can be an impossible mission. We’re here to help settle one of those options—mattress thickness. We’ll list the most common thickness varieties to help you choose the correct one.

Comfort Layer

The comfort layer is the top layer of your mattress—the one that comes in contact with your body while you’re sleeping. As its name implies, the comfort layer acts as a cushion between the sleeper and the lower layers of the mattress. Manufacturers usually use softer materials here: soft foam, felt, cotton wadding, and more. The comfort layer of a mattress takes up at most half of the thickness of your mattress. Any thicker, and your mattress will start to resemble a pillow.

Support Layer

The support layer is the base of your mattress. It’s firmer than the comfort layer, and this is because of its purpose. This layer will provide a stable yet comfortable sleeping foundation. In other words, the support layer prevents your body from sinking too far into the mattress. The support layer is thicker, taking up at least half the thickness of a mattress.

Standards for Mattress Thickness in Australia

Like most markets, the Australian mattress standards include low profile, standard, and thick mattresses. Apart from those, there are the outliers—mattress toppers and extra-thick mattresses. Let’s see what all of this means.

1. Low-Profile

A low profile or slim mattress will be anywhere up to 20 cm thick. These mattresses usually find their way into couches with fold-away sections, but you can also buy them for stand-alone use. The comfort layer takes up a significant part of the thickness with low-profile mattresses. Mattress toppers would also fall into this category if only looking at thickness.

2. Standard

The standard mattress thickness is between 25 and 30 cm. At least half of that is dedicated to the base layer, and in many cases, it’s even thicker. The standard thickness will provide an excellent support-to-comfort ratio. Moreover, most memory foam mattresses in Australia fall into this category.

3. Thick

A thick mattress measures over 30 cm, sometimes going all the way up to 50 cm in thickness. The purpose of such thickness lies in the extra support these mattresses can offer. Most of the added thickness can be attributed to the base layer.

4. Extra-Thick

An extra-thick mattress will be upwards of 50 cm thick. In the past, piling up layers was used to achieve extra support. However, modern technology makes this practice obsolete. As a result, extra-thick mattresses are all but gone nowadays.

Also read: Best Mattress for Adjustable Beds

Choosing Your Thickness

The most influential factor will be your body weight when choosing mattress thickness. Smaller sleepers are the only ones that should consider buying a slim mattress. A thin mattress will be insufficient in the support department for everyone else. Of course, if you’re looking for a mattress topper, that’s a different story. For a topper, a thickness of 10 cm is plenty.

Standard mattress thickness is standard for a reason—it works for almost everyone. As we mentioned, it provides a tremendous support-to-comfort ratio that will benefit the average sleeper.

A thick mattress offers more significant support, and as such, it’s more suited to heavier-set sleepers. It can also be a good choice for side sleepers, as this sleeping position requires a little extra support (1). However, very thick mattresses will be overkill in this department. Thus, you probably won’t need to buy one.

There is one other thing that you should consider when deciding on the thickness of your mattress: your bed frame. One thing you never want to do is have a mattress that sits lower than the edge of your frame. If you do, you’ll end up hitting yourself night after night, disrupting your sleep. On the other hand, an overly thick mattress will make your bed taller than it needs to be. Improper height can potentially cause injury when climbing in and out of bed. Ideally, you’d want the mattress to stick out of your bed frame, but only slightly.

F.A.Q.

Conclusion

Deciding on the correct mattress thickness is no big deal, provided that you have all the necessary information. Hopefully, our article gave you exactly that. When choosing a mattress thickness, consider your weight, whether or not you plan to sleep next to a partner or child, and whether or not you’ll need extra support.

Do you feel a thicker mattress adds comfort? Let us know in the comments below.