Welcome back to “Build Your Ultimate Bed” week on the blog!
Earlier this week I shared some changes we made in our master bedroom to upgrade our bed. Our new upholstered bed and Casper mattress have brought us one step closer to our dream bedroom. Let’s take a look at the before and after.
So far, the new mattress and the new bed are a total win!
Turning our Bed into a Smart Bed
Ben and I are both kind of obsessed with adding technology into our home. There are so many smart home products on the market now, and we both get giddy when we find out about something new.
I think it reminds me of when I was younger and I used to watch the Disney Channel movie Smart House. Anyone else remember that movie? I was obsessed with that movie and I really wanted to live in the Smart House! Please tell me someone else used to love that movie too!
The idea of a smart house has been my dream ever since I learned about things like the Nest thermostat (on our wishlist) and the lights that connect to an app. We’ve already started automating a few things in our house, like buying home essentials through Amazon using the Dash buttons.
This post contains affiliate links for your convenience. For more information, see my disclosures here.
The Eight
About two years ago, Ben was browsing on Indiegogo (which is like Kickstarter) and found this new product for tracking your sleep. It’s called the Eight and it’s a smart mattress cover. See, Ben and I had been using sleep tracking apps for a while because we love being able to see how well we were sleeping or try and figure out what we needed to do to improve our sleep. #nerds!
The apps that we had been using were nice, but they were never completely accurate. And it was difficult to make sure the phone was capturing the right data. The Eight promised to be the next best thing in sleep tracking.
So, we decided to give it a try and pre-ordered our Eight. Actually, at the time it was originally called the “Luna.” Unfortunately, it took longer than they were expecting to create the product and we had to wait a long time to actually get it – almost 2 years! But, that’s kind of expected when you are investing in a new product that’s being funded by crowdsourcing.
It all worked out though because, in that delay time, they improved a lot of the features that were part of the original design and created an awesome product that we now love!
So what does the Eight actually do?
Sleep Tracking
The Eight is a mattress cover that works with an app on your phone to track and analyze your sleep. The mattress cover has sensors inside of it that monitor your movement and breathing rate to track when you fall asleep and what stage of sleep you are in.
Right out of the box, the Eight looks like a regular mattress cover. To make sure you put it on your bed the right way, there’s a label for the top left corner of the bed.
On the side, there is a connector for the power cord which hooks into the hub – the brains of the Eight.
To use the Eight, you need to download the Eight app. Once you create an account, you can choose your side of the bed so the Eight knows which side to track for you.
Each night, the Eight is able to sense when you fall asleep, without being confused by your spouse and their movements. It then tracks how you sleep through the night and records things like how long you slept, temperature, breathing rate, and when you were in deep sleep.
Then, in the morning, it creates a report for you and gives you a sleep score.
This was one of my better sleep scores ????
Over time, Eight will give you more data about your sleeping patterns and help you see how you are sleeping.
It’s really cool to see all of the data that it’s able to pick up during the night! There’s another feature in the app called the Sleep Lab that will analyze the data and help improve your sleep.
Warming
While I do think the sleep data is really cool, my absolute favorite thing about the Eight is that it can warm your bed!
Inside the cover, there are dual warming zones (one for each side of the bed) that can be set from the app.
You can program the Eight to turn on your side of the bed to a certain warming level before you go to bed. Then, when you are ready to climb into bed, your bed is set to your perfect temperature!
Each side of the bed can be set to a warming level independent of the other side. So while I’m heating up at level 6, Ben’s side can be set to 3. Perfect compromise! But really, I’m always cold so my side is actually normally set to 9! ????
Smart Alarm
One thing that I liked about our previous sleep tracking apps is that they were able to wake you up at the best time in the mornings depending on what phase of sleep you were in. The Eight also has this ability, but it’s so much more accurate than the other apps.
The built in sensors in the mattress cover can sense your movements, breathing, and heart rate. It uses that data to figure out when you are in your lightest sleep cycle and determines the best time to wake you up.
Integration with your Smart Home
One of the most exciting features about the Eight is its ability to integrate with other smart home devices.
Eight can integrate with IFTTT. If you aren’t familiar with IFTTT, you can read more about it here. Basically, it’s an app that helps you automate your life. You can program it easily to do things like “if I’m tagged in a photo on Facebook, save that photo to Dropbox.”
There are already a lot of smart home devices that work with IFTTT. Since the Eight can also work with IFTTT, you can create automation programs to help your day run better.
For example, if you have the Nest thermostat, you can set up an IFTTT program that will turn the temperature in the room to a specified level when the Eight senses that you are in bed for the night. Or, how about if you have a smart coffee maker? You can use IFTTT to start brewing your morning coffee when Eight senses that you have gotten out of bed in the morning.
The possibilities are endless! And as more smart home devices come out, there will be even more things you can integrate. My smart home dreams are starting to come to life!
Our Review
The Eight mattress cover and the app are well made and work great together. They are constantly improving and updating the app as they learn new things and improve the software.
When we first got the cover, there were a few times that the Eight sensors accidentally picked up Ben instead of me. Since then, there have been a few updates to fix that.
They also added an option to remove data that you know is incorrect. For example, if Ben went to bed earlier than me and it accidentally tracked him on my sleep report, I can delete the data and tell Eight the actual time that I went to bed.
One time we found Widget asleep on our bed, totally relaxed and warmed by the Eight cover. Later, Ben looked at his report and it had tracked Widget’s sleep, her breathing, and her heart rate. It was funny to see, but it was also nice that he was able to delete that set of data so that Eight didn’t try to average it with his actual sleep data.
Overall, we love our Eight mattress cover! It’s definitely a splurge item, but we think it’s been so nice to have in our home. I can’t wait to add more smart devices to our home and connect them to the Eight.
I hope that you enjoyed “Build Your Ultimate Bed” week! We are so happy with the improvements to our master bedroom so far. Our bed now feels like the ultimate luxury bed! It’s like we’re staying in a hotel, except it’s actually our home!
Let me know in the comments which new item is on your wishlist – the Upholstered Bed, the Casper Mattress, or the Eight Smart Mattress Cover!
Build Your Ultimate Bed – Our New Bed & Casper Mattress
Build Your Ultimate Bed – Our New Eight – the Smart Mattress Cover (You’re Here)
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