I'm always amazed at the people who can just close their eyes and fall asleep in minutes, even in a sitting position. All of these articles about napping completely neglect the question of how to fall asleep quickly in an unideal environment.

I should take a 20-minute nap every afternoon? Well, how am I supposed to manage that if it would take over an hour for me to fall asleep, assuming I'm able to do that at all?

In regards to having difficulty sleeping (I assume for you this is what you experience at night):

I asked my doctor about how I can stop feeling tired all the time, and I had some problems falling asleep. He said that one of the biggest things about sleeping well is always waking around the same time. Basically, don't sleep in on weekends.

For a month or so I set an alarm every day, even on weekends (something like 7:30 on weekdays and 9:00 on weekends). After a while I would wake a bit before the alarm, and even on weekends I would wake normally around 8. It's been about 6 months since I reached this point and I do not need an alarm anymore, because I always wake up around the right time.

I do have a hard time staying up until 4 AM like I used to, but I feel well rested when I wake up (even if , due to going out, I stayed up exceptionally late), and I always wake up around the same time. I'm also now able to sleep on command, both at night, and in the middle of the afternoon I sometimes nap outside for 15 minutes or so.

your results may vary, but I've gotten a lot more control over my sleeping habits thanks to always waking up around the same time.

I read this week that the average person falls asleep in 7 minutes. 7 minutes!!! If I could fall asleep in 7 minutes I would get a lot more sleep.

Great point. To give you a look into the future: Version 1 helps you wake up, Version 2 will help you fall asleep too. Stay tuned.

Can't wait for version 2 :-) What's your opinion on melatonin?

It's generally okay in small amounts but if you plan on taking it longer term you should consult a physician.

My wife is like that, takes a long time to fall asleep even when she is tired.

It's rare for me to take long to fall asleep. I can't say for sure how long it is, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was 10 minutes or less.

My problem with naps is that once I'm down, it's 3 hours. I used to be able to take 20 minute naps, but not anymore. If I take a nap, it's just about guaranteed to be 3 hours on the dot.

You might want to try an old Edison trick. Hold a heavy pen in your hand. Place a hard object below it like a plate. Try to fall asleep. Just when you start to transition to deep sleep (the kind that takes 3 hours), your muscles will relax. Then pen will drop, causing the object to ring out. You'll be startled awake. Now you've got a nap and you've got a shot of adrenaline.

This is my situation as well. I can't just decide to go take a nap, and when I do nap it's sort of spontaneous while I'm watching sports or reading a book. My wife on the other hand can pretty much just choose to go to sleep.

From personal experience, it helps to actually get to a point that you're physically exhausted in order to fall asleep easily. Exercise really helps!

This is my problem too. I've mostly given up trying to nap because falling asleep takes so long that it's not worth it.

I've always been under the impression that a good nap consists of me being tired and going to lay down in my bed for 15-20 minutes. I've done it so regularly and so often that I naturally wake up after 20 minutes and feel quite refreshed. I looked (not too hard) to try to find a description of how someone/some company/some app could possibly optimize my napping but I couldn't find any information about what I was looking at.

It was only when I went to the Kickstarter page that I realized this is some sort of sleeping mask with what looks like an alarm clock or timer built in to it.

One benefit here seems to be telling other people when they can expect you awake again (as the timer seems to be visible on the outside).

That was something we heard repeatedly from our Kickstarter backers.

...I have exactly 8 minutes and 20 seconds to get that watch off of your wrist and into my pocket.

I know this isn't a real concern but it was the first thing I thought when I saw the timer.

For sure it can be a downside as well. Of course, napping in situations where it might be a downside probably wouldn't be wise in the first place (... and maybe they could build in a proximity sensor?)

I guess the idea is that it's preferable to an alarm clock, whose shrieking beeps and buzzes make for an unpleasant arousal.

I have an alarm clock/lamp that slowly increases light and audio levels (I have it set to bird sounds). It's great for a gentle wake-up, but the bird sounds get repetitive if you don't snooze/turn it off after 20 seconds or so.

My biggest issue with Napwell, aside from the obnoxious information desert that is its homepage, is that I could never fall asleep with a thing strapped to my face.

You might want to add a 'tweet this' button to improve the virality of this. I can't afford this right now, but I still want to share it with my followers who maybe can. It's a cool idea. Also, I have zero knowledge of marketing, but: what about adding a tagline on the first page, that explains it for those people who are impatient, don't have headphones and can't watch the video. Something that explains that you developed an electronic sleep mask that wakes you up with light.

Awesome looking product! I noticed that the favicon doesn't load on any of the pages in the root directory. Maybe it was only put into /blog, because it loads for the blog. Tried in Chrome and Safari on OSX.

Thanks, will fix

What does it do?

The mask has interior lights that slowly become brighter to wake you up naturally. Like a sunrise alarm clock but in a mask.

there is a flying ">" somewhere

There is some unparsed PHP in there:

    <html class="no-js" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" <?php language_attributes(); ?>>
    <!--[if lt IE 7 ]><html class="ie ie6" <?php language_attributes(); ?>> <![endif]-->
    <!--[if IE 7 ]><html class="ie ie7" <?php language_attributes(); ?>> <![endif]-->
    <!--[if IE 8 ]><html class="ie ie8" <?php language_attributes(); ?>> <![endif]-->
    <!--[if (gte IE 9)|!(IE)]><html <?php language_attributes(); ?>><![endif]-->

Seems to be right after the opening body tag. The ">" is visible if you hide the header.

Please don't disable the play-controls in embedded videos.