Did you just buy a new mattress? Wondering what the proper steps are for maintaining it? Then you’ve come to the right place.

Maybe you remember flipping your mattress when you were younger or maybe you’ve just heard that it’s the best way to extend the life of your bed. Sleeping on your mattress every night will eventually leave a body impression in it, over time. If you don’t rotate your mattress, you’ll have uneven wear. This can lead to poorer sleep quality and a shorter life for your mattress, if not properly addressed.

If you flip or rotate your bed regularly, your body impression will wear more evenly, so you won’t have to buy a new bed quite as soon. Rotating or flipping your bed can make it feel like new again. However, this may only be required with certain mattress models.

With newer mattresses, complete with their customized and specific layers, flipping or rotating your bed may not be quite as necessary as it once was. This guide will cover the benefits of flipping and rotating a mattress, whether or not your specific bed requires rotating or flipping, and how often you should do it, if it does.

Reasons to Rotate Your Mattress

Before proceeding, we should define what “rotate” means, exactly. Rotating the bed means turning it 180 degrees, so that the head of the mattress is now the foot and vice versa. As mentioned before, some beds need to be rotated to help them wear more evenly. This can extend the life of the mattress and help keep your spine aligned, which is important for your health.

Allowing your mattress to wear in the same spot, night after night, can cause it to sag prematurely. Mattress sagging can lead to pain, tension, and the need for a whole new bed. Rotating the mattress allows a new spot to take on the weight, giving the previous spot a break.

How to Know if Your Mattress Needs Rotating

While most mattresses out there can be rotated, this doesn’t apply to all of them. The best way to know for sure whether yours should or shouldn’t be rotated is to look at the care instructions. A bed that doesn’t require rotation or flipping will say so on the label or in the warranty.

How to Rotate Your Mattress

Although it’s a fairly straightforward process, there’s both a wrong and right way to rotate your mattress. Follow these guidelines for the best results:

Prepare ahead of time: You can save yourself a lot of hassle by getting your bedroom ready before you actually rotate or flip your bed. Move any furniture away from the mattress, take off the bedding, and choose ahead of time which way you’re turning the bed before you lift it. You may also want to invite someone to help you with the process.

Set a schedule: Plan out when you’re going to rotate your mattress by using a calendar. How often your bed will need to be flipped or rotated depends on the brand, model, and type of mattress. While some manufacturers may recommend once every few months, others may recommend every six months, and others might only require it once a year.

Think about your bed type: The type of bed you have will impact the rotation process. For example, a bed with a headboard will require you to move the mattress away from the headboard before you rotate. Beds without headboards or footboards will be much easier to rotate or flip.

What Type of Mattress Needs to be Rotated?

As mentioned before, if your mattress doesn’t require rotating, the company will make that known to you on the label or in the warranty information. If you’re unsure, you can always directly ask customer service about it.

For the vast majority of mattresses, however, it’s a good idea to rotate them regularly. Memory foam, latex, innerspring, and hybrid mattresses can all benefit from regular rotation.

Why Should You Flip Your Mattress?

While flipping your mattress used to be necessary to extend the life of the bed, modern mattresses often don’t need it. This is because they use a combination of layers that won’t work correctly if flipped. When we refer to flipping the bed, we mean turning it over so that the underside is now the top and vice versa.

As a general rule, only innerspring mattresses or older beds without a pillow top need to be flipped. The springs in an innerspring bed wear out over time, especially if you always sleep in the same spot on your bed. In order to combat this issue, you should both flip and rotate your innerspring bed to extend its life.

What Type of Mattress Requires Flipping?

Again, innerspring mattresses without a pillow top will need to be flipped occasionally. Foam mattresses that have multiple layers won’t require flipping. When it comes to hybrid beds with both foam and springs, you’ll need to consult the warranty or ask the manufacturer about whether you should flip or rotate the bed.

How to Flip Your Mattress

In the interest of preserving your bed and helping it wear evenly, you can rotate the mattress at the same time you’re flipping it. As you rotate the bed, flip it upside down and keep rotating until it’s rotated 180 degrees. You might be able to handle this on your own but it will be much easier with a friend.

Have one person on either side of the mattress so that you can pick it up evenly, then plan out which way you’ll rotate it. As soon as you’ve rotated or flipped the bed, ensure it’s centered on the frame before you put the bedding back on.

Final Thoughts

  • During days where you rotate or flip your bed, you can do some extra cleaning in the hard-to-reach areas around the mattress.
  • If the warranty for your mattress states that it’s best to use it with a particular type of foundation, you should follow this to get the most out of the bed.
  • When you sleep in the same spot on your bed, the materials can start to shift, potentially sagging over time. When you rotate your mattress, you’re giving it a chance to recover from this, spreading the weight over other areas. This is an important process to get the most out of your bed.

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