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[GSGBen]

How long have you maintained this and how is it going for you?

Historically I've been 7-8 and drifted down lower, but over the past few weeks I've kept it down to 6-7. With four coffees a day, understanding and preparing for tired periods and a bad mood/struggle when getting out of bed I seem to be able to maintain it.

Not sure how people maintain less than this.

[TEETH]

Why though.

[GSGBen]

Trying to fit in more of the things I enjoy and less that I don't. I live close to work and I've cut down my non-work time to only my key activities, so the next area to find more time is sleep.

[Schoq]

How long have you maintained this and how is it going for you?

a decade. I'm not doing great but I can't be sure how that's linked to my sleeping habits

[s0]

i sleep around 6 hours a day and feel p normal. i don't drink any coffee at all.

[TEETH]

not worth it

[JWK5]

Look up "polyphasic sleep", human beings aren't really built for the socially accepted "8 hours of sleep", we're actually built to sleep lightly ("first sleep"), wake up for a while, and then enter a deep sleep (the "second sleep"). Many people sleep for 8 or more hours staying in a light sleep for most of it and then wake up feeling like shit because they never entered REM sleep and now they're struggling through the day with no real rest. Polyphasic sleep is considered to be the "ancient sleep cycle", it is the cycle that was common before the western world blew up into the modern era.

Although it’s a common belief that 8 hours of sleep is required for optimal health, a six-year study of more than one million adults ages 30 to 102 has shown that people who get only 6 to 7 hours a night have a lower death rate. Individuals who sleep 8 hours or more, or less than 4 hours a night, were shown to have a significantly increased death rate compared to those who averaged 6 to 7 hours.

Many may like to point out ‘or less than 4 hours a night’, but these individuals also were tested to get far less REM and less SWS than the suggested amount. Polyphasic sleep depends on the fact that you are getting the same amount of REM and SWS as you do monophasically. A 4h monophasic sleep will not be the same quality sleep as 4h polyphasically.

Another added benefit is because you don't lay there for 6-8 odd hours straight (there is a break after around 4 hours where you are up and moving around) you also don't wake up with horrible back aches and joint pain (which I used to get especially bad sleeping long periods).

[s0]

i sleep around 6 hours a day and feel p normal. i don't drink any coffee at all.

i also never take naps during the day because i always feel like shit afterwards

i also often have trouble sleeping

[_glitch]

http://cogsci.stackexchange.com/questions/15926/how-many-times-on-average-do-people-wake-up-per-night

You should check this; it's not the only question on there, there are many others about sleep.
I love StackExchange.

[GSGBen]

I'm very on-board the naps-are-shit train

[_glitch]

I'm very on-board the naps-are-shit train

I too.

[Tanner]

naps shouldn't last longer than 20-30 minutes. naps fucking own but it has to be like that or else you will feel shitty

[Tumetsu]

Naps are great and boost my attention and focus a lot but like already said one has to keep them around 20-30 min long.

[Schoq]

Always sleep in multiples of 90 minutes for maximum restedness (syncs with phases of sleep)

[GSGBen]

Yeah I'd like to try one of those sleep cycle apps, but I don't want to have to leave my phone in use/charging each night. Might dig up a cheap old one to use instead

[voidSkipper]

I try to spend 8 hours in bed each night, but with the amount of time it takes me to get to sleep and the amount I wake up, I probably only sleep 6-7 hours.

During most (3+years) of uni and stressful times at work, I often have/do end up sleeping less than 5 hours, but I am miserable and underperforming during those times, and abuse chronic amounts of caffeine to stay awake.

The difference between ~5 and ~8 hours sleep is most noticable for me in the gym - it can make a difference of 15-20kg to squats, similar for deadlifts, and ~10kg for bench press, also with a large effect on rep ranges. For cardio, it makes the difference between getting that post-workout "runners high", and the post work-out "nausea and no appetite". 

I have read some animal trial studies implicating extended (read: several days or more of) sleep deprivation (not consecutive days awake, but consecutive under-rested days) in various forms of brain and organ damage, but I don't know to what degree those results carry over to humans.

[GSGBen]

I've noticed it a bit in the gym, but I just anticipate it and use it as a form of increased efficiency to work towards: instead of lifting more weight with the same calories/body weight, or the same weight with less calories/body weight, I try to lift the same (or more) weight with less sleep.

[Superb Joe]

between 2008 and 2015 I didn't sleep for more than 2 hours at a time. Its bad