Why can't my character sleep in Ostranauts?

Sleep is gated by a Sleep Comfort check, not just by tiredness. Pain and a poor sleeping area can make sleep impossible — but being genuinely exhausted plus a good bed can override a bad situation. If you can't sleep, treat your wounds and improve the bed, in that order.

Do I start the game with insomnia?

Yes. The default character grew up on an asteroid and starts feeble, with bad eyesight and insomnia among other lingering issues. It's not a bug — it's your starting condition, and it can be traded away during character creation.

Are there traits that affect sleep?

Yes — Heavy Sleeper gives Sleep Comfort +2 and Light Sleeper gives −2. On a character who already starts with insomnia, that swing is worth real money at creation.

When do characters sleep?

On shifts. Characters try to sleep during a sleep shift when tired, and can also rest during a Free Shift. Crew follow the same logic — see the crew page for managing their rosters.

Ostranauts Sleep Guide — Why You Can't Sleep & How to Fix It

“My spacer won’t sleep” is one of the most-searched Ostranauts problems, and it’s almost never a bug — sleep is a check you can fail. The need builds over time (faster when you’ve been exerting yourself), but whether you can act on it is decided by a separate stat.

Sleep Comfort: the “can I sleep yet?” stat

This is the mechanic behind almost every complaint. Sleep Comfort is a threshold check, and two things move it:

Negative conditions push it down. Pain and a poor sleeping area can make sleep outright impossible. A wounded spacer in a cold unpressurized corner is not going to nod off no matter how tired they look.
Exhaustion and a good bed push it up. Being genuinely tired plus a decent bed can overcome a bad situation.

So when sleep fails, you have two levers, and they’re not equal:

Fix the pain first. Untreated wounds are the most common invisible blocker — see first aid basics in the beginner guide.
Upgrade the sleeping spot. A proper Sleeping Bunk — a fixed-frame solution with alcove privacy and adjustable suspension — beats improvising. Put it in a real, pressurized, reasonably warm room.

You start as an insomniac (by design)

Worth knowing before you blame the game: the default character is 18 and already in very poor shape. Growing up on an asteroid leaves you feeble, with bad eyesight and insomnia among the lingering issues. If sleep has been miserable from minute one, that’s why.

Two traits directly move this dial:

Trait	Effect
Heavy Sleeper	Sleep Comfort +2
Light Sleeper	Sleep Comfort −2

On a character who already starts with insomnia, picking up Heavy Sleeper during character creation is one of the higher-value quality-of-life buys in the game — you’ll feel it every single in-game night.

Shifts: when sleep is even attempted

Sleep doesn’t happen whenever you’re tired — it happens on the schedule. Characters try to sleep during a sleep shift if tired, and can also rest during a Free Shift, which is when they handle personal needs generally. If your spacer is exhausted and still upright, check what shift they’re on before assuming something is broken.

The same logic drives your crew — an NPC who never seems to rest usually has a roster problem, not a personality problem.

Quick triage

Symptom	Most likely cause	Fix
Tired but won’t sleep	Pain, or a bad sleeping area	Treat wounds; move to a real bunk in a pressurized room
Sleeps badly every night	Starting insomnia / Light Sleeper	Trait choice at creation; better bunk mitigates
Never even attempts sleep	Wrong shift	Check the shift schedule
Sleep interrupted constantly	Environment — noise, temperature, pressure	See life support; a cold room is a low-pressure room’s cousin in symptoms

Stat behaviour above comes from the official wiki’s Health and Safety page, which notes its figures were verified against game files in the Early Access era. If 1.0 retuned the thresholds, the mechanics described here still hold — the numbers are what would shift.