Newborns who sleep for longer stretches should be awakened to feed. Wake your baby every 3–4 hours to eat until he or she shows good weight gain, which usually happens within the first couple of weeks. After that, it's OK to let your baby sleep for longer periods of time at night.
By 6 months of age, your baby is developmentally ready to start sleeping through the night without a feeding — or at least for longer stretches.
The amount of sleep an infant gets at any one stretch of time is mostly ruled by hunger. Newborns will wake up and want to be fed about every three to four hours at first. Do not let your newborn sleep longer than five hours at a time in the first five to six weeks.
Most pediatricians recommend that you wake up your baby if they are due for a daytime or nighttime feed. Babies shouldn't go without feeding for more than 4 hours. So while most of the time your baby will let you know when they are ready to eat, it's okay to wake them up if they snooze past the 4-hour mark.
While waking up a sleeping baby might seem like a bad idea, frequent feedings early on are important for a couple of reasons: Crying is a late sign of hunger. The sooner you begin each feeding, the less likely you'll need to soothe a frantic baby.
Newborns who sleep for longer stretches should be awakened to feed. Wake your baby every 3–4 hours to eat until he or she shows good weight gain, which usually happens within the first couple of weeks. After that, it's OK to let your baby sleep for longer periods of time at night.
Newborns should not go more than about 4–5 hours without feeding. Signs that babies are hungry include: moving their heads from side to side.
Check in with your health professional if your baby is consistently too sleepy to breastfeed to make sure they are not poorly or getting dehydrated. Hand expressing or pumping your milk will protect your milk supply and provide a breast milk supplement to keep your baby fed until they can breastfeed.
Generally, newborns sleep about 8 to 9 hours in the daytime and about 8 hours at night. But they may not sleep more than 1 to 2 hours at a time. Most babies don't start sleeping through the night (6 to 8 hours) without waking until they are about 3 months old, or until they weigh 12 to 13 pounds.
Can a 1-month-old baby sleep through the night? It may be too early for your 1-month-old to sleep through the night, as they may still wake up regularly during the night for feedings and diaper changes.
Should we let sleeping babies lie? New parents are often told never to wake a sleeping baby. While this advice is undoubtedly well-intentioned, it can, if followed, lead to substantial nighttime sleep disturbances which in turn can have a really negative effect on the sleep of the parents and the rest of the household.
When do babies sleep through the night? If all of those factors are lined up though, it is entirely possible for a baby as young as 6 weeks old to sleep for a solid 6-8 hours, or even longer, overnight. It can, and does, happen!
Generally, newborns sleep a total of about 8 to 9 hours in the daytime and a total of about 8 hours at night. But because they have a small stomach, they must wake every few hours to eat. Most babies don't start sleeping through the night (6 to 8 hours) until at least 3 months of age.
Newborn babies need to feed every few hours until the age of 3 months. After this, it is normal for infants to feed once or twice during the night. Most infants can sleep for 6–8 hours without a feed by the age of 6 months. Once they are 9 months old, most infants can sleep for 11–12 hours without a feed.
First Weeks and Months
Over the first few weeks and months, the time between feedings will start to get longer. On average, most exclusively breastfed babies will feed about every 2 to 4 hours. Some babies may feed as often as every hour at times, often called cluster feeding.
SIDS is most common at 2-4 months of age when the cardiorespiratory system of all infants is in rapid transition and therefore unstable. So, all infants in this age range are at risk for dysfunction of neurological control of breathing.
“Babies can still breastfeed on demand—usually they will want to breastfeed every 2-4 hours at this stage,” she notes. “But sometimes they will want to feed every hour and other times will not eat for 5 hours.” All of this is common, she says.
For the first few days you may need to wake them to feed if they are still sleeping by 3 hours from the last day feeding and 4 hours at night. If baby still won't eat, allow baby to sleep another hour and try again to wake and feed them.
This can be a sign of illness, infection, or low blood sugar. Infants dehydrate easily and not eating can quickly turn into a medical issue. Generally, they shouldn't go without feeding for longer than five hours for their first 12 weeks.
Short nursing sessions are normal – and perfectly fine unless your baby is having trouble gaining weight. Some babies are snackers – they nurse for a minute or two, take a break, and then go back. Other babies can drain the breast in two minutes and be satisfied for a few hours.
As a rule of thumb, a truly hungry baby will rarely choose sleeping over eating. So, if your baby falls asleep in your arms without taking a full feeding, it's likely he was tired — not hungry.
Your 4-week-old baby's development
Newborns up to 3 or 4 months old need 14 to 17 hours of sleep in a 24-hour period, usually waking every two to four hours to eat. Breastfed babies should eat as much as they want at this age, but a general rule of thumb is roughly 16 to 24 ounces of breast milk or formula in 24 hours.
At this age, it's common for newborns to be in their nighttime sleep space for 9 - 12 hours at night, waking multiple times for feedings and comfort.
Newborns usually sleep in short bursts of 2-3 hours each. Some newborns sleep for up to four hours at a time. Newborns wake frequently to feed because they have tiny tummies. Your newborn might go straight back to sleep after feeding or they might stay awake long enough for a short play.