Selling Sleep to a Sleepless Nation
24 Oct 2025 7:00 AM IST
Most adults need 7 to 9 hours of sleep every night. But how many of us actually get that?
It’s no wonder the sleep industry is booming. It consists of everything from melatonin gummies, to “sleepy-time” teas to wearables like Oura rings.
But do you really need these supplements? And how far is too far when it comes to buying sleep? We speak to doctors and consumers to find out in the latest episode of The Signal Brief.
The Core produces The Signal Brief. Follow us wherever you get your favourite podcasts. To check out the rest of our work, go to www.thecore.in
NOTE: A machine transcribed this episode. A human has looked at this text but there might still be errors. Please refer to the audio above, if you need to clarify something. If you want to give us feedback, please write to us at [email protected].
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TRANSCRIPT
Kudrat (Host): Anuj is an economist at Welspun, an Indian conglomerate. His job is hectic. He says he rarely gets more than four to five hours of sleep.
Anuj: To kind of address that, uh, I have resorted to these melatonin products which are out there in the market. Uh, I've tried a couple of them be gummies, be it these me strips on some of the brands even have these sprays, uh, you melatonin based sprays. So these kinds of things essentially help. Uh, to kind of get to sleep, uh, early rather than waiting two, three hours before you can actually get into sleep.
Kudrat (Host): Melatonin is a sleep-regulating hormone sold over the counter as a supplement. Anuj told The Signal Brief that in addition to taking melatonin, he used to track his sleep using smartwatches too. He still uses his Apple watch to track fitness markers but has stopped checking his “sleep score.” He says that what began as a helpful tool to track his rest quickly turned into an unhealthy obsession.
Anuj: I actually have, I would say, rather poor relationship.
The other thing which has recently started happening is because of my sedentary lifestyle and this work-life imbalance, my, my, my, my variable devices started popping up, you know. Low cardio, health warnings and stuff. So at days I've really become frustrated that, you know, there's so much going on in life.
And on top of that, this gadget is now kind of trying to tell me that your health is on a downward trend. I've actually gone ahead and just stopped using it for a week or so, you know, getting frustrated with this device.
Kudrat (Host): My name is Kudrat Wadhwa and you’re listening to The Signal Brief. We don’t do hot takes. Instead, we bring you deep dives into the how and why of consumer trends.
In this episode, we’ll learn about India’s sleep crisis and the booming sleep economy that’s coming up to help consumers address their sleep issues. How far is too far when it comes to sleep?
Kudrat (Host): India is one of the most sleep-deprived countries in the world. A 2025 LocalCircles survey found that 59% of Indians reported getting less than 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep each night.
Sleep woes cut across class and gender. Studies have found that 20% of Indian corporate employees reported insomnia. A study among slum residents in Bengaluru found that 24% of them reported “poor sleep quality.” And, reports show that Indian women sleep 30-50 minutes less than men.
The reason for poor sleep among these populations differs — professionals say that their sleep suffers because they need to answer late-night emails, or get on calls with overseas clients. Some say they stay up late to pursue side projects. Of course, there’s also distractions like Netflix and our phones, all of which can eat into bedtime.
Indian women who are homemakers have to wake up early to cook and clean and help the rest of the family prepare. Many women balance both jobs and housework, meaning they rarely get adequate shuteye time.
For working-class people like construction workers, labourers, domestic help and gig workers, sleep deprivation is baked into their need for survival. Commutes are long, they work several jobs, and sometimes live in overcrowded housing without proper ventilation. All of that makes restful sleep impossible.
Kudrat (Host): Most people need 7 to 9 hours of sleep. It’s our biological repair and maintenance system; sleep is essential for mental and emotional regulation, repairing the immune system, cellular repair, cardiovascular health, and hormone regulation, among other things. Without it, even the best diet or exercise can’t save us.
In fact, it might even be more important than food. Early studies in animals found that they died of sleep deprivation faster than of starvation.
Kudrat (Host): The fact that sleep is crucial is probably not news to you.
In fact, there’s a growing segment of the wellness industry that’s helping people get to sleep and sleep better. The sleep economy consists of sleep-tracking wearables, like rings by this company called oura. There’s also cooling mattresses, bedding as well as supplements like melatonin, magnesium and sleepy-time teas. These products are on the more expensive end–melatonin gummies cost upwards of 500 rupees. You’d have to shell out at least 30,000 rupees to buy an oura ring, meaning this economy caters to the wealthy only for now.
Also, until now, I’ve mentioned over the counter or OTC solutions only. These are products that you can buy without a doctor’s prescription. There’s also more clinical sleep products like C-Pap machines, and prescription sleep medicines like Alprazolam for people with disorders like OSA or obstructive sleep apnea. In OSA, your airways get blocked at night. Overweight people or those with obesity are at higher risk for sleep apnea, and studies suggest that 9-14% of Indians struggle with this.
Kudrat (Host): Sleep supplements are becoming more popular–sleep gummies saw a 650% spike in search interest over the course of 2024, according to a report by AGR Knowledge. Data shows that the total sleep economy in India–this includes both OTC and medical products–was worth 3.35 billion in 2024 and will grow to USD 5-8 billion (or higher) by 2030.
The consumers The Signal Brief spoke to said they used products like melatonin and magnesium supplements, both in gummies and in tablet form, to fall asleep and sleep longer.
Adyasha, who’s a lawyer, said that when she takes a melatonin gummy, she has to ensure that she gets at least 11 hours of sleep, otherwise, she feels groggy and tired the next day. Purujit, a 25-year old analyst, told me that she struggles to get good sleep during stressful periods in her life. For those times, she relies on magnesium, melatonin and L-theanine. She says she spends about 1500 rupees on these products each month.
Like Purujit and Adyasha, a lot of us are self-medicating with supplements to improve our sleep. But, what do experts say? The Signal Brief reached out to Dr. Sanjay Kalra, an endocrinologist based in Karnal, Haryana.
He says his first prescription isn’t a pill; it’s daylight, routine, and comfort foods.
Dr. Sanjay: So, what has worked in my practices, uh, first of all, sleep hygiene, using comfort foods, comfort foods, beverages and spices.
So the comfort foods that we use most often are turmeric, milk or milk with cashew or banana.
Cashew nut is a rich source of and amino acid known as Trytophan, T-R-Y-P-T-O-P-H-A-N. This gets converted into the body, into serotonin, S-E-R-O-T-O-N-I-N, which is a happy hormone. It's a field happy heart. So this is what we tell our patients to do. Do. Remember that the definition of comfort food spice beverage will vary from person to person.
In general, if you want to figure out what is your comfort food, think of what you liked when you were three or four or five years old, and you will find that that will help you. So it might be ice cream for someone, it might be hot milk for another, it might be cocoa.
Kudrat (Host): In addition, he sometimes instructs his patients to use melatonin. Meta-analyses of clinical trials show that melatonin only helps increase sleep by a little less than 10 minutes. But, Dr. Sanjay said that he has seen it work among his patients, with some caveats.
Dr. Sanjay: Number two, melatonin does work. We use it in the OPD, and though some people say it's not effective, there will be many people who will complain of excessive sedation also. Uh, with, uh, melatonin for those who have forgotten what they liked in childhood and were not able to think of any comfort food, then I would And who do not wish to take melatonin?
Then I would suggest camo, T-C-H-A-M-O-M-I-L-E-T, which is a non-city tea. So these are some, uh. Some, uh, sort of interventions that we practice in our, but usually we actually push back to the patient and we say, why don't you change your bed with your partner? Why don't you look at Northeast, Southwest and see what you wish to do?
Maybe you might wish to open the window to allow fresh oxygen in. You might wish to close the window because the outside environment is so polluted. So these are simple things that we tell them. This is environmental medicine. We also teach them the triggers of sleep. We teach them to self-identify the triggers of good sleep and the triggers for bad sleep.
So someone then might come and say, yes, I've seen that whenever I drink coke or drink coffee at night, then I have to get up once to go to the bathroom. That disturbs my sleep routine. So these are simple ways of, uh, I personally do not, uh, have not have never prescribed the sleep mattresses, but we do tell our patients to experiment with.
The thickness of their pillow. And sometimes we tell them to try on a trial basis. We tell them to try to sleep with the head and raised. So if, if I increase the thickness of the pillow, the neck hurts. But if I put one brick, you know, below the feet of the bed on the head side, the entire head end gets raised.
Kudrat (Host): If none of these interventions work, doctors suggest that patients get a proper sleep study and find out if they might have ailments like sleep apnea. In that case, they might need clinical solutions, like a C-Pap machine.
Kudrat (Host): Like Mustafa, Subir wasn’t chasing a high anymore, just routine. He is trying to quit vaping now, though. He and his colleague have made a pact, no vaping for a whole year. Subir’s chest discomfort isn’t unusual. Doctors say vaping isn’t harmless.
For the rest of us, Dr. Sanjay said that behavioural changes and supplements should suffice.
He also cautioned people about becoming too obsessive with sleep. Doctors are even seeing a new condition they call ortho-somnia nervosa, a kind of sleep anxiety caused by obsessing over tracking devices, supplements, and routines.
Dr. Sanjay: So Orthosomnia nervosa is actually something that we are seeing in the younger population, especially the ones, uh, who are in, uh, corporate, uh, uh, jobs.
And where there is, uh, too much of, there is an excessive focus on work-life balance. So, uh, orthosomnia nervosa means that you are worrying about sleep, you are worrying about the right sleep all the time. So you have these gadgets around you, you keep on searching for, uh. What kind of products the sleep, sleep industry is selling and, uh, you just keep on, you focus so much on yourself that you, you become your own spectator and then you forget that sleep was actually meant to help you relax and rest to repair and rejuvenate.
Kudrat (Host): Remember Anuj? Whose story we started this episode with. His experience was similar too, where he found himself constantly obsessing over his sleep score, which defeated his original purpose of feeling more relaxed.
In fact, Anuj says he doesn’t recommend that people track their sleep using wearables.
Anuj: a lot of times initially when you, you know, you don't meet these goals, be on sleep or fitness, it kind of kick in and kind of an anxiety as well in people who I am lacking or you have. So rather not have people have one more reason to make them anxious and for the anxiety to kick in.
So I think it, it's better not to have it purely for the point of view of monitoring sleep.
Kudrat (Host): Sleep problems have become so normal that they’ve built an entire industry from melatonin gummies and magnesium pills to sleep scores and smart rings.
But as Anuj discovered, and as doctors warn, chasing perfect rest can quickly become another form of anxiety. Sleep isn’t necessarily something we can hack. It’s something we surrender to.
Kudrat (Host): That's all for today. You just heard The Signal Brief. We don't do hot takes. Instead, we bring you deep dives into the how and why of consumer trends. The Core produces The Signal Brief. Follow us wherever you get your favourite podcasts.
To check out the rest of our work, go to www.thecore.in.
If you have feedback, we'd love to hear from you. Write to us at [email protected] or you can write to me personally at [email protected].
Thank you for listening.
