My Partner and I Can't Agree on a Mattress. Will This $4,000 Beautyrest Bed Be the One?

If you and your partner have different sleep preferences, you know that sleeping together can be a nightmare at times — and you’re certainly not alone. The Better Sleep Council found that one in three Americans reports that their partner negatively impacts their sleep, and 63% of the couples surveyed spend most of the night separated.

The concept of sleep divorce has become increasingly popular as couples search for solutions to their interrupted sleep, whether their partner snores or tosses and turns all night. Dillon and I have had our fair share of struggles in this department. To be fair, neither of us is great at getting solid rest. As light sleepers, we tend to wake each other up often throughout the night — especially when lying on a mattress that one of us finds uncomfortable.

Disclaimer: As partners, there’s no shame in accepting sleep divorce and sleeping in separate beds or bedrooms if that allows you both to get the best rest possible. Before accepting sleep divorce as the final solution, we are embarking on this bed-searching journey to see if we can find one that works for both of us — and hopefully, our trials will help you and your partner, too.

Dillon and I are members of CNET’s sleep team. We research, test and review mattresses and sleep-related products for a living. Yes, I know. The irony is palpable. We have been on a mission to find the perfect mattress to accommodate Dillon’s needs as a side sleeper and my preferences as a stomach sleeper. We have been trying out different mattresses for 30 nights at a time and documenting the process along the way. To back up our claims about the beds, we track our sleep every night to compare our health data and sleep quality.

This review delves into our experience sleeping on the Beautyrest Black Hybrid Series Three (2024 Edition). Last month, we were on the Nectar Premier Hybrid. If you want to learn more about that bed — which was Dillon’s favorite — check out our article review and YouTube video.

So, does Beautyrest live up to its name and help us get the rest we crave? Will we become more beautiful? Read on to find out.

Video: We Slept on Beautyrest for 30 Nights

Watch us review the Beautyrest Black Hybrid mattress on YouTube!

Initial thoughts on the Beautyrest Black Hybrid mattress

The Simmons Bedding Company has been around since 1870, and its flagship brand, Beautyrest, sold its first mattress in 1925. Based on the company’s historical impact alone, I was eager to test a Beautyrest bed.

Dillon and I had similar reactions when we first saw the Beautyrest Black Hybrid at our mattress testing facility. We both loved its sleek black look and the pretty diamond cover design. It’s an extremely dense bed, weighing nearly 160 pounds for the queen-size. An average queen-size mattress weighs anywhere from 90 to 160 pounds, making it the heaviest bed we’ve tested so far in our 30-night series — which is only worth noting if you move quite a bit. Overall, we were impressed by how luxurious it looked.

Another characteristic we noted right away was its plethora of handles to help move and rotate the bed. Though we don’t recommend using the handles to move the full weight of the bed (they can rip or tear pretty easily), it does help make the moving process a little easier — especially for a dense mattress like this.

Firmness

Beautyrest offers a variety of mattresses and firmness options. We have the medium model of the Beautyrest Black Hybrid Series Three. The brand claims this profile is ideal for all sleepers and those who “like a deeply contouring, responsive mattress with added conforming support and enhanced pressure relief.” 

Lying on the mattress for the first time, Dillon and I agreed that it felt firmer than medium, leaning into medium-firm territory. Since my preferred sleeping position is on my stomach, I was happy about this, as firmer beds offer more support for keeping the spine aligned. As a side sleeper, Dillon wasn’t sure it would be soft enough for him — a running theme we’ve seen throughout our mattress-testing journey.

Temperature

We immediately noticed that the cover of this bed felt cool to the touch. Beds with memory foam typically sleep warmer because the denser foam tends to trap and retain your body heat as it forms around your curves. Beautyrest tries to combat this by adding the “Sleep Climate Surface” with cooling yarn and diamond particles infused into the memory foam. Many mattress brands claim their beds are cooling when often they aren’t, so as two hot sleepers, we were excited to test these features.

Feel

Lying on the bed for the first time initially felt quite firm and supportive. As I slowly began to sink into the layers, it softened up a little, providing that body-conforming quality of viscous memory foam. When I got up, I noticed that the materials snapped back surprisingly fast at first and then more slowly, seeming to offer a balance between dense and responsive. I was interested to see how it would actually feel while sleeping on the bed — would it be predominately dense and memory foamy? Would we be able to switch positions easily throughout the night, or would we feel stuck in the layers?

Our thoughts at the end of the trial

I thoroughly enjoyed my experience sleeping on the Beautyrest Black Hybrid mattress. After a few nights of sleeping on Beautyrest, I wrote in my notes, “I love this mattress so much. I don’t feel like I’m overheating and don’t wake up sore, even after sleeping on my side. It’s supportive for my back and stomach.”

Firmness

Though the model we tested is Beautyrest’s medium profile, it felt firmer than that — around medium-firm. This was confirmed by our fellow mattress reviewers and Mattress Smasher 9000, which scored the bed at 7.5 out of 10 (more on that below). 

Thankfully, Beautyrest offers multiple firmness options for the Black Hybrid Series Three, including plush, medium and firm. If you’re a side sleeper, we recommend going with the plush version. Combination sleepers looking for more support than pressure relief should opt for the medium model, while strict back and stomach sleepers should check out the medium or firm models. 

Despite the mattress being too firm for his liking, Dillon was getting surprisingly good rest — some of the highest sleep scores he has had in this series. His total average sleep decreased by only four minutes compared to Nectar. We expected his sleep numbers to drop much more than that, considering he couldn’t spend as much time on his side during the night as he’d prefer. The main downside is that he was spending more time in light sleep versus deep sleep, and he snored more due to having to sleep on his back rather than his side. 

Read more: Anti-Snoring Products for a Peaceful Slumber

Feel

Dillon and I loved Beautyrest Black’s overall feel, as shown below by our matching scores of 18/20 for this category. It feels pretty firm at first but softens as your body heats the foam, and you begin to sink in slowly. It has a pleasant contouring sensation as the materials mold around your curves, typical of dense memory foam. However, given the mix of micro coils, latex foam and a slight hint of pillow top, it’s not quite as viscous as other memory foam mattresses like Tempur-Pedic.

Factoring in its medium-firm profile, this bed provides a bit more push-back than you might expect, which I loved as a stomach sleeper. As restless people, Dillon and I have found that memory foam’s slight “stuck” feeling helps prevent us from tossing and turning all night.

Construction

It may seem obvious, but a bed’s construction informs its feel, so let’s dive into the design. We like that this bed is 15″ tall. Dillon and I prefer the extra height offered by mattresses on the thicker side, as they automatically feel more luxurious — emulating that desirable five-star hotel bed feel. The Beautyrest Black Hybrid is hefty but just short enough not to need deep-pocket sheets.

Hybrid design

This mattress’s primary support system is a tall layer of individually wrapped coils, which provides enhanced durability and breathability as it allows for more airflow. On top of that is a layer of micro coils, which improves the bed’s motion isolation. This hybrid design also means it can withstand quite a bit of weight and pressure, making it suitable for all body types, including heavier individuals and couples.

Temperature regulation

Above the micro coils is what the brand calls “Micro Diamond Memory Foam,” intended to keep you cooler by drawing heat away from your body. Pairing that with the “Sleep Climate Surface” of the cover (which also has the micro diamonds), this mattress has impressive cooling capabilities — especially given its memory foam design.

Typically, beds with dense memory foam sleep hotter as the foam surrounds you and retains your body heat, but the Beautyrest Black Hybrid does a great job of preventing this. I thought I would feel much hotter on this bed than I did. I wouldn’t say it was overly cooling, but we slept temperature-neutral and hardly ever felt warm — which is awesome since Dillon and I are pretty hot sleepers.

Foams

This mattress’s pressure relief comes primarily from Beautyrest’s “ContourFit Form HD Material,” a fancy way of saying comfort foam. This layer cradles your curves and joints, while the supportive latex layer provides a responsive bounce-back sensation. Beautyrest’s foams are CertiPur-US certified, meaning they’re made without harsh chemicals, formaldehyde or heavy metals. While it’s becoming the industry standard among mattress brands, we appreciate that Beautyrest’s beds have this certification. 

Motion isolation

Thanks to the dense memory foam feel (and that extra layer of micro coils), we thought this bed performed well regarding motion isolation. I hardly felt Dillon switching positions. Most importantly, I rarely noticed our cat jumping on or off the bed or taking a bath next to my head — which is a pretty impressive feat. Dillon also seldom felt me moving around (unless I was actively kicking him in my sleep, which allegedly happened a few times). 

If you’re a light sleeper sharing the bed with a partner, having one with good motion-isolating capabilities is a good characteristic to look for, and this one passed the test.

Edge support

Sturdy edge support is another characteristic to look for if you share the bed with a partner (or kids or pets). The Beautyrest Black Hybrid has some solid edges. We rarely felt like we were going to fall off, and there’s not much sagging if you’re lying or sitting on the edge. However, I didn’t find it quite as supportive as a few other beds we’ve tested — like the Avocado Luxury Organic mattress, which boasts reinforced steel around the perimeter.

Scoring the Beautyrest Black Hybrid mattress

At CNET, our sleep experts use an objective, standardized system to score mattresses. For this 30-night series, Dillon and I created a customized system to subjectively rate the features and qualities we seek in a mattress. Feel and firmness are scored out of 20 points, while the other characteristics are scored out of 10 for a total possible score of 100. We rated these factors preferentially, meaning what we liked or didn’t like on a personal level. 

Read more: How CNET Tests Mattresses

After completing the 30-night trial, Dillon and I rated each characteristic and offered a brief explanation. Here is a breakdown of our final scores.

Dillon’s scoring breakdown

• Firmness: 12/20
  I could get by on this bed. However, the firmness keeps me from my preferred side sleeping position and forces me to sleep on my back and stomach, so I have to knock off a few points.
• Feel: 18/20
  I love the overall feel. This bed has a denser feel than Nectar Premier, the last bed we were on. That bed had a lighter and more airy memory foam feel, while this has more of that traditionally dense memory foam feel, which I still really like.
• Motion isolation: 10/10
  This mattress has super great motion isolation. I’m giving it 10/10. I only felt Aly move when she was kicking me in her sleep.
• Edge support: 8/10
  I never felt like I would fall off the side, even though I sleep on the edge quite a bit. There is solid edge support.
• Temperature: 7/10
  I didn’t necessarily feel like the bed was actively cooling through the sheets, but I also never overheated. It keeps you temperature-regulated.
• Construction/design: 10/10
  It’s got coils. It’s got micro coils. It’s got latex foam. It’s got memory foam. It’s got a little pillow-top feel. The Beautyrest Black Hybrid is undeniably luxurious and high-quality.
• Brand policies: 5/10
  The trial period is the baseline for mattress brands. I would like to see a more extended trial period. I appreciate the free returns and white glove delivery. The price is on the expensive side, even for how luxurious it is. I don’t see many people wanting to pay that much, but I do think it could be worth it.
• Sleep quality: 8/10
  I can’t argue with the numbers. I slept almost as well on Nectar (just four minutes less on average). However, I did spend more time snoring on Beautyrest because I had to lie on my back, and it was too firm to stay on my side long. 

Dillon’s overall score: 7.8/10

“This is a premium, luxurious option that I think many couples will be happy with (as long as you’re OK with sleeping mainly on your back or stomach). The motion isolation and edge support are top-notch. The only other thing to worry about is the price, but you definitely get what you pay for,” Dillon explained.

Aly’s scoring breakdown

• Firmness: 18/20
  It’s almost my perfect firmness level. I wish it were a tad firmer for my stomach and back, but on my side, it’s great.
• Feel: 18/20
  I love the feel of this mattress. It has a dense memory foam feel, where you feel yourself settling into it for a while. However, because of its layer of bouncy latex foam, it’s a hair more responsive than your typical memory foam bed. It’s very supportive.
• Motion isolation: 9/10
  The motion isolation is excellent. I hardly felt Dillon moving when switching positions and barely felt when Jess (our cat) jumped on and off.
• Edge support: 7/10
  The edge support is good. I never really felt like I was going to fly off the edge, but I also didn’t spend a ton of time on the perimeter.
• Temperature: 7/10
  Memory foam sleeps hot because the dense foam retains your body heat as you sink in, and it conforms around you. Beautyrest’s foam being infused with micro-diamonds does help a little, but it’s not overly cooling when you’ve been lying on it for a while. I did feel a little warm at times.
• Construction/design: 10/10
  I honestly don’t know what I would change to improve the construction — maybe a reinforced perimeter. I love how it looks with the sleek black cover and diamond design on top. It basically has everything you’d want in a hybrid memory foam bed.
• Policies: 6/10
  The policies are fine, but it’s pricey. Environmental sustainability is important to me, and Beautyrest is certainly striving for that—the beds have recycled steel, CertiPur US-certified foams, etc., and the brand offers a mattress recycling program, which I appreciate.
• Sleep quality: 8/10
  My sleep quality was pretty good. It increased significantly from the last bed we were on, but I still have yet to hit the 8-hour average I was hoping for.

Aly’s overall score: 8.3/10

How we tracked our sleep

Dillon used his Apple Watch to track his sleep, and I used my Whoop band. They provided similar health data and sleep metrics, allowing us to compare our overall sleep quality with the previous beds we’ve reviewed in this series.

The primary data we focused on for this trial included our sleep stages, specifically how long we spent in light/core sleep, REM, deep sleep and time awake.

Read more: 8 Best Sleep Trackers for 2025

Our sleep quality on the Beautyrest Black Hybrid

We acknowledge that other factors affect sleep quality aside from our mattress — from the cat bathing next to my head at the witching hour to our diet, exercise, stress levels, caffeine intake and more. We keep our bedroom environment virtually the same every night: same bedding, air temperature, sound machine and darkness levels. We try sticking to a consistent daytime schedule and bedtime routine. We’re not perfect test rats, but we do our best. 

Tracking our sleep for 30 nights also provides a general picture of our sleep quality and whether it improved or declined on that particular mattress.

Total sleep averages

Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty. As shown in the graph below, Dillon’s total sleep average decreased ever so slightly from 7:27 hours (7.45) on Nectar to 7:23 hours (7.38) on Beautyrest. We were surprised that his total sleep average stayed nearly the same, given the fact that Beautyrest was a little too firm for him to sleep comfortably on his side. 

I was pleased with my results when analyzing our data after the 30 nights. My total average sleep increased quite a bit from 6:59 hours (6.98) on Nectar to 7:31 hours (7.52) on Beautyrest — a jump of 32 minutes.

Sleep stages

Below is a visual breakdown of our time spent in the various sleep stages. I spent more time in deep sleep, while Dillon spent more in light sleep. This makes sense given that I was comfortable in any sleep position, especially my stomach, which I spend most of the time in.

Dillon spent more time in the REM (rapid eye movement) stage than I did, which also makes sense. Since he spent more time in light sleep than deep sleep, his brain may have prioritized REM sleep, known as REM rebound. The REM stage is crucial for forming long-term memories, processing emotions and supporting cognitive development. When you’re not getting enough quality sleep or are sleep-deprived, your brain will shorten other stages of sleep to stay in REM longer.

Here, you can see Dillon’s restorative sleep was much less on Beautyrest — from 1:20 hours (1.33) of deep sleep on Nectar to 0:49 hours (0.82) on Beautyrest. His average REM sleep decreased from 1:49 hours (1.82) on Nectar to 1:31 hours (1.52) on Beautyrest.

My restorative sleep flip-flopped. My amount of deep sleep increased quite a bit, going from 1:13 (hours (1.22) on Nectar to 1:51 hours (1.85) on Beautyrest — a much-welcomed change. 

Conversely, my REM sleep decreased from 1:32 hours (1.53) on Nectar to 1:11 hours (1.18) on Beautyrest.

Dillon and I both spent nearly an hour awake each night. It’s normal to wake up for brief periods throughout the night, commonly referred to as “disturbances” or “arousals,” but they generally only last a few minutes, and you may not even be aware of it. Dillon and I still spend quite a bit of fully conscious time awake throughout the night, which we are working to resolve.

Smashing the Beautyrest Black Hybrid mattress

Our proprietary Mattress Smasher 9000 (MS9K) apparatus, created by CNET Labs engineers, finds any bed’s objective firmness level. We placed Beautyrest on the base frame, activated the device’s custom software program and watched this unique CNET-only technology do its thing. 

After running the mattress through the Mattress Smasher a few times, the Beautyrest Black Hybrid Series Three’s final objective level was 7.5 out of 10 — a little higher than we expected.

Learn more: Using Tech to Test Beds: Say Hello to Our Mattress Smasher 9000

Brand policies: shipping, trial period and warranty

Beautyrest offers a 100-night trial period and a 10-year warranty. These policies aren’t as impressive as those of other brands offering 365-night trials or lifetime warranties, but 100 nights should still be enough time to decide if the mattress is right for you. 

Given its hefty construction and hybrid design, this bed should definitely last up to ten years or longer if properly cared for.

In addition to free shipping and returns, Beautyrest offers white glove delivery and free mattress removal. This is an awesome service to take advantage of if you aren’t sure what to do with your old mattress.

Learn more: Don’t Toss Your Mattress. Here Are Eco-Friendly Alternatives

Beautyrest beds can be found at various mattress retailers and furniture stores that carry the Simmons brand. If you’re interested in Beautyrest but want to try out some mattresses before buying outright, check out Beautyrest’s store finder to find a location near you. 

What we learned and what’s next

The history of Beautyrest

I found the backstory of this bed fascinating, so I wanted to share a brief overview. The Beautyrest mattress was first introduced a century ago, and its parent company has been making waves in the industry for much longer. The Simmons Bedding Company was founded in 1870 by Zalmon G. Simmons, later becoming the first manufacturer to mass-produce steel wire mattresses. By 1889, the Simmons Manufacturing Company had refined its bed-making process enough to drop the average price of a mattress from $12 to 95 cents for consumers, making them affordable for everyone.

The founder’s son, Zalmon Simmons Jr., went on to create and sell the first Beautyrest mattress in 1925, featuring Simmons’ patented Pocketed Coil technology. This premium mattress was more expensive, retailing for $39.50 at the time (valued at around $720 today). The company used an innovative campaign featuring testimonials from “celebrities” like Henry Ford, Eleanor Roosevelt and Thomas Edison to advertise. This successful marketing tactic generated an estimated $9 million in sales by 1929.

The Simmons Company also first developed king and queen beds. Prior to this, most mattresses were either twins or doubles. To this day, Beautyrest is the brand’s signature mattress and one of the most well-known in the industry.

Pricing

The Beautyrest Black Hybrid is not what we would consider an affordable mattress today. At $4,000 for a queen size, it is well out of our budget — and if we hadn’t had the opportunity to test this bed through CNET, Dillon and I would probably not have considered it. That said, this mattress is truly luxurious. The Beautyrest Black Hybrid could be worth the investment if you’re in the market for a high-end mattress like this, and it checks all your boxes. I do not doubt this bed will offer supportive, contouring comfort for a decade or longer if properly cared for. 

Additionally, Beautyrest frequently offers this bed at a discount. Right now, it’s $600 off, bringing the price for a queen down to $3,400.

Firmness

I do spend some time on my side at night, so I thought I might get away with a medium to medium-soft mattress since that’s what Dillon prefers. That led us to try the Nectar Premier Hybrid last month, where I struggled to get comfortable and felt like my spine didn’t have enough support. It confirmed the notion that it was simply too soft for me. Sleeping on this Beautyrest bed, which lands around medium-firm, solidified that I need a firmer mattress. I was much more comfortable on this bed and felt supported all around.

The opposite rings true for Dillon — as a side sleeper, he was more comfortable on the softer Nectar than the firmer Beautyrest (though we were much closer to agreeing on this bed than any in this series so far). Though Beautyrest was dang close, we still have not found the “perfect” mattress for us both.

Next, we will test the Sleep Number ClimateCool mattress. This smart bed has adjustable firmness and temperature control on both sides, allowing Dillon and me to have personalized settings for each of us. Will it be enough? Stay tuned to find out.

Who should get the Beautyrest Black Hybrid mattress?

This bed might be for you if:

• You have the budget for it
• You prefer the dense memory foam feel 
• You seek a supportive hybrid mattress
• You’re a back or stomach sleeper (or a heavier combination sleeper)
• You want a memory foam bed that won’t overheat

You should probably skip this bed if:

• You don’t like the feel of memory foam
• It’s not within your budget 
• You want an all-foam mattress 
• You’re a strict side sleeper (if so, opt for the plush version)