To revist this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories.To revist this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories.Louryn StrampeBuying a Mattress online offers lots of convenience, but the purchase is only half the battle. I’ve been testing mattresses as a part of my job for nearly four years, and I’ve made a lot of mistakes in the process. Here’s the best advice I have to give for setting up your mattress once it arrives. May your box handles be reinforced, and may your scissors cut true. Godspeed.Check out our other sleep guides, including the Best Mattress, Best Organic Mattress, Best Sound Machines, Best Bedsheets, and Best Sleep Gadgets for more recommendations. Special offer for Gear readers: Get WIRED for just $5 ($25 off). This includes unlimited access to WIRED.com, full Gear coverage, and subscriber-only newsletters. Subscriptions help fund the work we do every day.If you buy something using links in our stories, we may earn a commission. This helps support our journalism. Learn more.A bed in a box is, in a word, unwieldy. Usually, these boxes are big and wide rectangles. They can weigh up to 150 pounds before they reach FedEx’s limit. If you live in a walk-up, if your bedroom is on the upper floor of your home, or if you don’t have a ton of physical strength, you may want to consider paying for white-glove delivery. It can be pricey, but it means someone else goes through the trouble of bringing the mattress into your home and setting it up.If you’re setting up the bed yourself, keep an eye on that tracking information and try to meet the delivery person as soon as they arrive at your home. Trust me when I say you do not want to arrive home from a camping trip to find a soggy cardboard box sitting in the middle of your driveway. Even with the cut-out handles that many of these boxes employ, they can be difficult to move. Without the handles, it's a lot worse.When lugging the mattress inside and setting it up on your own, make sure you have a lifting buddy to help get the box where it needs to be. A dolly can be helpful. A brand-new, comfortable bed won't offset the physical toll of throwing out your back. Lift safely!Some specifics may differ from brand to brand, but the general setup process is the same. Cut open the cardboard box carefully—the mattress is vacuum-sealed, and you do not want to remove the plastic before you’re ready. Inside your box, there will be a big, tube-shaped, plastic-wrapped jelly roll. This is your sealed mattress. Place the tube on or near your bed frame.Typically the mattress will be double- or triple-sealed, so there will be an outer layer of looser plastic wrap encasing the vacuum-packed bed itself. You can start removing the plastic layers one at a time once the mattress is where you want it. Remember that the mattress will start inflating very quickly once you break the vacuum seal. I made the mistake of slicing into the plastic packaging while the bed was in a completely different room. That meant I had to wait for the mattress to inflate and then transport it to my bedroom—not ideal in a tiny apartment. When you’re down to the final vacuum-sealed layer, orient your mattress in the correct direction on its frame. You may need to unfold or unroll it to get it placed. You also want to make sure the right side is facing up. Learn from my mistake! You do not want to go through the pain of flipping a floppy mattress over when you realize it’s upside down. Once all these steps are completed, you can get this bad boy inflated.Simon HillJulian ChokkattuGideon LichfieldAdrienne SoCut the vacuum-sealed plastic from around the perimeter of the mattress. Make sure you cut carefully—you don’t want to accidentally cut into the bed itself. When the seal is broken, the bed will start inflating immediately, so you want to be quick about getting the plastic off. I’ve found luck in shimmying the plastic layers off by sliding them out from underneath the mattress one at a time. If you can lift a corner of the mattress on your own, this process is cumbersome but not too difficult. A partner can help speed up everything.Mattresses that are shipped in boxes are made like other mattresses and then are fed through a roll-packing machine, which squishes them flat inside a plastic bag and rolls them into a tube that can be delivered by a standard package handler such as FedEx or UPS. Once they arrive, you break the seal and allow the foam and/or springs to puff back up. The full inflation time varies by brand, so head to the company website or the mattress-setup instructions for further information. Most beds require a minimum of two hours and a maximum of 48 hours for the bed to fully puff into shape. The longer you wait, the more comfortable your first night’s sleep will be. Let the mattress inflate on its own and avoid putting anything on the bed until you’re committed to sleeping in it. This includes bedding and pillows. Most mattresses are fresh off the factory floor and will off-gas while they’re inflating. The odor and off-gassing time can vary for different beds based on their materials, but you’ll want to make sure your bedroom is well-ventilated so the odor can disperse quickly. Set up a fan or open the doors and windows to help speed up the process. The gases aren’t dangerous, but they can be stinky. Any odors should dissipate within a day or two.Adjusting to a new bed means that your sleep might be a little different until you’re used to the change. When you're finally able to sleep on your mattress, make sure you’re practicing good sleep hygiene. Don't go crash on the couch or your old bed. Sleeping on your new mattress every night will help your body acclimate and feel comfortable faster. You might also want to roll around or jump on the bed since that can help break in the materials faster than simply snoozing. Many mattress companies offer a free trial period. If things aren’t feeling right after the first month, it may be time to consider a return. Just give yourself enough time to fully decide whether your new bed is exactly as Goldilocks would have intended.📨 Understand AI advances with our Fast Forward newsletterThe AI detection arms race is onThe gruesome story of how Neuralink’s monkeys actually diedQuan Millz was the biggest mystery on TikTok—until nowThere’s an alternative to the infinite scrollAI chatbots are invading your local government🔌 Charge right into summer with the best travel adapters, power banks, and USB hubsSimon HillJulian ChokkattuGideon LichfieldAdrienne SoAlex DoakSimon HillJulian ChokkattuSimon HillExtra 20% off sitewide - Dyson promo codeGoPro promo code to save 15% on your next orderSamsung coupon Code for up to 40% Off the storeDell Promo Code 10% offDeal of the Day Best Buy coupon: Enjoy up to 50% off$30 off VistaPrint coupon for orders $150+More From WIREDContact© 2023 Condé Nast. All rights reserved. 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