Scientists found out: people have started sleeping 56 hours less per year

Global warming is stealing people's sleep: scientists have calculated how many hours of rest each person on the planet loses annually due to abnormally hot nights. The results of a large-scale study by the American organization Climate Central, covering the period from 2020 to 2025, proved alarming. This was reported by Bloomberg.

According to the data obtained, people around the world lose an average of about 56 hours of sleep annually due to elevated nighttime temperatures. Moreover, more than six hours of these losses — effectively an entire sleepless night per year — are a direct consequence of anthropogenic climate change. Notably, this is the first study in which scientists were able to quantitatively estimate the duration of lost sleep based on nighttime temperature data and their impact on the body.

The scale of the problem is striking: the authors analyzed the situation in 1,338 cities worldwide. In 1,335 of them, sleep losses linked to climate change at least doubled compared to the early 1970s. And in 840 cities, this figure more than tripled.

Residents of the Middle East suffer most from hot nights. In cities across Saudi Arabia, Oman, and the United Arab Emirates, people lose between 55 and 87 hours of sleep per year, with 12 to 16 of those hours specifically linked to climate change.

In India and Southeast Asian countries, annual losses reach 78 to 91 hours, of which 8 to 9 hours are attributed to global warming. In West African countries, this figure exceeds 65 hours per year, with approximately 10 to 11 hours also explained by climate shifts.

In the United States, residents lose an average of about 36 hours of sleep per year due to hot nights. Researchers attribute approximately four hours of this time to climate change. The effect is most noticeable in Arizona, California, Florida, and Nevada.

The study's authors draw attention to the particular danger of rising nighttime temperatures: the body recovers significantly worse during sleep in the heat. While people can partially offset daytime heat with air conditioning or by adjusting their activity schedules, warm nights substantially reduce the quality of rest and can seriously undermine health.