Showering at night also ensures you will be cleaner when you go to bed, reducing the buildup of sweat, dirt, and body oils on your bedding. Additionally, research suggests showering before bed might provide other benefits. These benefits vary, depending on whether you take a hot or cold shower.
“Humans tend to perspire at night,” Dr. Goldenberg said. “When you wake up in the morning, there's all this sweat and bacteria from the sheets that's just kind of sitting there on your skin.” So take a quick shower in the morning, he said, “to wash all of that gunk and sweat off that you've been sleeping in all night.”
The Best Time of Day to Shower
Fact: Taking an evening shower is healthier for your body—and the skin, more specifically—than a morning rinse. Whenever we shower before bed, we can rest assured knowing we're not bringing any stowaway germs with us from the day's activities.
Best: Morning
You may be exposing yourself to more opportunities to get dirty throughout the day, but there are a variety of special benefits of showering in the morning. "Most humans sweat throughout the night, so a morning shower does have certain benefits," Backe says.
"The effect of the cold water weakens our immune system," Mahesa said. "So taking a shower at night after a whole day of activities isn't recommended. But if you get some sleep first before taking a shower, your body temperature will have adjusted. That would actually improve our blood circulation."
25.3% of adults shower or bathe right before bed, part of the 38.4% doing so in the evening.
Taking a shower before hitting the hay can help relax your body and mind, which can lead to better sleep. The rise and fall in body temperature after a shower can signal to your body that it's time to rest, making it easier to drift off.
You can enjoy both—and both have obvious appeal. “A morning shower can help shake off sleep inertia and get you going, while an evening shower can be a relaxing part of a pre-bed routine,” says Michael Grandner, director of the Sleep and Health Research Program at the University of Arizona.
While there is no ideal frequency, experts suggest that showering several times per week is plenty for most people (unless you are grimy, sweaty, or have other reasons to shower more often).
Most dermatologists say that your shower should last between five and 10 minutes to cleanse and hydrate your skin, but no longer than 15 minutes to avoid drying it out. You can still benefit from the shower length you prefer, whether long and luxurious, quick and efficient or somewhere in the middle.
Morning showers makes certain your body gets the oxygen it needs. Adequate oxygen in the brain decreases stress. Aromatherapy helps, too! Morning showers increase immunity by stimulating your body to make new white blood cells.
"You can actually make yourself more prone to infection if you over-wash because the skin is protected with some really nice natural bacteria and things that protect it and you want to preserve those," she says. So typically showering multiple times a day isn't a great idea, she shares.
Dermatologists recommend keeping your showers between 5 and 10 minutes. This time period gives you enough time to properly clean your body without overdoing it. If you have certain skin conditions, staying in the shower too long could have negative effects.
The average person has a shower duration of 7 minutes. Shower timer duration is 4 minutes; saving 3 minutes shower time or 45 litres (QLD Government 2008). The average Burnside household is made up of 2.36 people (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2006).
A Reddit user recently polled 562 people and found that most men said they showered daily. Women's bathing rituals were more diffuse, but about 60 percent preferred to shower three, four, or five times weekly.
Most dermatologists say that your shower should last between five and 10 minutes to cleanse and hydrate your skin, but no longer than 15 minutes to avoid drying it out. You can still benefit from the shower length you prefer, whether long and luxurious, quick and efficient or somewhere in the middle.
Many doctors say a daily shower is fine for most people. (More than that could start to cause skin problems.) But for many people, two to three times a week is enough and may be even better to maintain good health. It depends in part on your lifestyle.
In general, showering every other day or every few days is enough for most people. Keep in mind that showering twice a day or frequently taking hot or long showers can strip your skin of important oils. This can lead to dry, itchy skin.
An ordinary electrically heated shower puts out four litres per minute. So a 19-minute shower is just more than a bath. If you have a power shower, flow rates could be doubled and you'd need just 10 minutes.
The oldest accountable daily ritual of bathing can be traced to the ancient Indians. They used elaborate practices for personal hygiene with three daily baths and washing. These are recorded in the works called grihya sutras which date back to 500 BCE and are in practice today in some communities.
Aside from helping the planet, Dr. Chen says it can also benefit your skin. "Showering less helps strengthen your immune system by keeping disease-fighting bacteria living on your skin. It also allows us to preserve more of our microorganisms and the skin's natural oils," she says.
You will smell
Perhaps the most immediate (and obvious) consequence of skipping a few too many showers is the odor. But it's not just sweat that makes you stink.
When counting people who shower every day, Mexicans and Australians led significantly, followed by Americans and the French. Brits, Russians, Swedes and Germans averaged less, with Chinese coming in the least frequent.