Waking up after a night of restless sleep will start anyone’s day off on the wrong foot. It might even set you back a few days, which puts you in the exhausting cycle of trudging through your waking hours only to collapse into bed to do it all over again. Luckily, there are devices out there to help you sleep well and wake up feeling more rested. You may not think an alarm clock could be one of them, but the Loftie Alarm Clock aims to do just that.

You may have tried listening to the sounds of a babbling brook or the ocean while sleeping. Maybe you’ve tried white noise, brown noise, or other hardware options like wearing earbuds to help fall asleep. Most of these are just a few of the many features that come standard with the Loftie Clock, but it also focuses on helping you wake up better each day.

I’ve been testing the Loftie Alarm Clock, and it’s helped me ease into each day feeling much more rested. Plus, I don’t have to stumble around looking for my glasses, thanks to the helpful nightlight feature.

Specs, pricing, and availability

The Loftie Clock is available both on Amazon and Loftie’s website. It retails for $150 and comes in a few different colors: black, white, cherry, denim, coffee, peach, and lavender. It has a sharp-looking body made from alloy steel and polycarbonate, and it fits on most nightstands. It measures 6.5 inches in width and 2.7 inches in height and weighs in at 14.4 ounces.

The display is digital, and you can set it to either display time in either 12 or 24-hour formats. It must be plugged in to work and comes with a cable and an outlet plug — that and the clock make up all the contents in the box.

What I liked about the Loftie Alarm Clock

It comes with strategy and style

The Loftie Clock looks great on any nightstand, as its shape is modern and doesn’t take up a ton of room. Once you plug in the alarm clock, it tells you to download the Loftie Clock app. The only reason you need to use the app is to help connect your clock to your home Wi-Fi via Bluetooth. After that, the app is optional; everything the clock can do can be accessed or programmed via the buttons on the top of the device, which is refreshing in a day and age when you need your phone for almost anything in your home.

Part of Loftie’s design plan is to have you put down your phone to help you get a better night of sleep.

Once the clock is up and running, you can set your alarm schedule. You’re able to choose what sound you want to wake up to, but Loftie’s main goal is to ease you into each day with a two-step gentle alarm. The process includes a gentle wake-up alarm that slowly rises but doesn’t get too loud, though you can adjust the sound settings if it fails to wake you up.

The wake-up alarm will sound for 30 to 40 seconds before it snoozes for nine minutes, thus allowing you to slowly wake up, rather than be jolted to attention. After those nine minutes, a louder alarm sounds to help you get out of bed.

You’re able to stop the alarm from following up by hitting the small button on the top right of the Loftie. You can also snooze longer by hitting the large button on the left. Loftie could’ve stopped there, and it would’ve had a solid alarm clock, but the company added in many other features that make the device useful at all times of day.

The Loftie includes a library of different noises to help you fall asleep, including both white and brown noise. Additionally, you can use the Loftie as a Bluetooth speaker and play your own music over it. It also comes with a selection of free playlists, as well as an extended list with a paid subscription. These playlists include sound clips such as breathing exercises, guided meditation, and stories. I personally enjoy doing the breathing exercises right before bed as it helps me unwind.

Another feature of the Loftie Clock I enjoy is the nightlight. You can press the large button, and it turns on a nightlight that glows from the bottom. This illuminates a dark room well enough to see what you’re doing on the clock. It’s also convenient to see the area around my clock to be able to grab a remote or my glasses.

What I didn’t like about the Loftie Clock

Setup takes a long time

As mentioned above, you need to download the Loftie app to set up the alarm clock. But after you do that, you’re able to do everything else on the clock itself. While you can go back into the app and manually set up an alarm, change the volume or intensity of the nightlight, or download more content to the Loftie Clock, you don’t actually have to. On the other hand, some of the best content is only available through a Loftie+ subscription, which costs $5 per month. A subscription will give you horoscopes, more meditations and stories, as well as affirmations tailored to you.

The Loftie Clock takes a long time to set up. Mine took nearly 20 minutes to run firmware updates and download content, so I wasn’t able to use it right away. It even said on the clock “Downloading” to let me know it was updating.

The Loftie Clock does tend to run these updates a decent amount, so I noticed my clock “Downloading” multiple times afterward. Also, it might not bother many people, but because of the glossy finish, the Loftie shows a lot of fingerprints in the daylight. The smudges are very apparent, and it puts a bit of a damper on the aesthetic.

Should you buy the Loftie Alarm Clock?

If you’re someone who struggles falling asleep, the Loftie Clock can help you with that by playing meditations, stories, white noise, and more to help you get to snoozing. If you’re someone who hates waking up to a loud obnoxious alarm each day or having to fumble for your phone to turn it off, the Loftie Clock shines in that respect.

You won’t have to use your phone for an alarm, and it cancels the chances of waking up startled, thanks to the soft two-phase wake-up. While some of the best features may be hidden behind a paywall, there are enough free features, especially for the price of the alarm clock, that it could make it worth the purchase for you.