Blackout curtains and night lights: what does a baby need, and which colour?

The case for darkness

Melatonin is the hormone that tells the body it’s night. It climbs in the evening, and light holds it down. A 2018 study looked at this in 10 healthy children of about 3 to 5 years old. Once they had spent a week on a steady sleep schedule, the children sat in bright light — around 1,000 lux — for one hour before bedtime. Compared with dim light, their melatonin fell by about 88%, and it remained suppressed for at least 50 minutes after the light was switched off.

It was a small study, done in preschoolers rather than babies, but it illustrates just how sensitive a young child’s body clock is to light in the evening.

A dark room supports sleep, but it can’t teach a baby to fall back asleep between cycles — and that is what Actually Sleeping works on.

When light is most disruptive

• Early sunrises, particularly in summer, when daylight hits the room ahead of your child’s wake-up time. See early morning waking.
• Bedtime before nightfall, when your child is trying to drift off in a room that’s still bright.
• Naps. When a baby surfaces after a single short sleep cycle, they often open their eyes to a bright room, and settling back down gets harder.
• Streetlights or car headlights coming through the window.
• Evening screens. The AAP recommends switching them off at least an hour before bed. See screens and toddler sleep.

Daytime light counts as well. Dark nights work best when paired with morning daylight, which helps set the body clock. If you put in blinds or blackout covers, make sure any cords are well out of reach of the crib.

On night lights

A night light isn’t something babies need. A dark room is perfectly fine, and plenty of babies sleep better in one. You might want a bit of light for your own sake during night feeds and diaper changes — if so, keep it very dim, placed low and outside your baby’s line of sight.

As for colour, the study above looked at brightness, not colour. Your safest bet is to keep any light as dim as you can, whichever colour you pick.

When a toddler fears the dark

Some toddlers begin asking for a light. According to the AAP, it’s fine to leave a light on if that helps a child after a nightmare. A dim night light is a small and sensible comfort. Lights that cast moving pictures or cycle through colours, though, can keep a child watching rather than sleeping. See when your toddler is afraid of the dark.

The limits of a dark room

When sleep goes wrong, blackout curtains are among the first things parents buy, and they genuinely help a body clock that light is knocking off course. What they can’t change is the way a baby falls asleep. If your baby needs feeding, rocking or holding to get to sleep, they will still wake between sleep cycles — even in total darkness — and ask for that same help. Most families who come to Actually Sleeping have already tried fixes of their own, and a darker room is frequently on the list.

The waking is the part that can be fixed. Dr. Sam writes your baby a plan that addresses the room, the schedule and, above all, how your baby falls asleep, and you get bootcamp-style coaching before the first night plus daily 1:1 check-ins. We coach naps until they are solid. Hear from families in our 129 client video reviews.

If the room is already dark and your baby is still waking, book a free consultation with Actually Sleeping.