Nectar Mattress UK Review

Nectar Mattress UK Review

Nectar is an extremely popular “mattress in a box”. Hitting the UK market in 2018, Nectar makes some big promises about the sleep quality it can deliver. Is Nectar the right mattress for you? Or will it be totally wrong? Is it worth the money, and is there anything special about it? Would I buy it myself, and what do other people think of it? I cover all this in more in this Nectar Mattress UK review.

• Nectar UK Overview
• Nectar Mattress Features
• What Does A Nectar Mattress Mattress Feel Like To Lie On?
• Is Nectar The Right Mattress For You?
• Are There Any Problems With Nectar Mattresses?
• What Are People Saying Who Love Theirs? (Reviews From Real People)
• Final Opinion

If you’d like more information about the UK market and memory foam mattresses in general, check out my Memory Foam Mattress UK Guide here.

Nectar UK Overview

Nectar is a brand by Resident, an American based company specialising in home goods that was launched in 2016. Hugely popular and growing quickly in the USA, Nectar extended their territory to include the UK with their own UK only website in 2018.

Nectar likes to claim they make their products locally, and as such, they manufacture their mattresses in Britain with materials they source from around the world (mainly Asia).

Nectar make two mattresses and a variety of related accessories including pillows and beds. One of their mattresses, the flagship “Nectar” model, is available to British buyers on the Nectar Mattress UK website, along with many of the accessories. Mattress purchases come with two free pillows, and bundle purchases that include a complete bedware set offer popular savings.

One of the big reasons for Nectar’s massive success and the thing that really makes them stand out from all the other foam mattresses is that they offer a 365 night sleep trial (yes, a whole year), and a lifetime warranty (yes, they think their mattress will outlast YOU). 

Nectar Mattress Features

The Nectar UK Mattress is an all foam mattress with a total thickness of around 25 cm. This is a pretty standard height for a foam mattress in a box at this price point. Every mattress purchase includes:

•  2 Premium Pillows (£70 value)
•  Free Home Delivery
•  365-Night Home Trial (Nectar reports that less than 3% of customers return it)
•  Forever Warranty

The Nectar Mattress is priced from £599 (but there is usually a deal to be had – don’t pay full price).
Materials

Cover: The top cover is made of a thin knit blend, designed to be soft to the touch and efficient at wicking away sweat. It is 70% polyester and 30% tencel. The bottom cover is a heavier polyester designed to keep your mattress in place on its base. 

Three Foam Layers Inside: two of which are viscoelastic foams, better known as memory foams. The third is a polyfoam. The foams are Certi-Pur certified so there’s no need to worry about toxins. Here’s more detail about what each layer does:

1. Immediately under the cover is a layer of thick layer of gel memory foam about 7.5 cm thick. This foam has been engineered to be soft and giving, it is there to give a soft feel through the top of the mattress along with deep pressure relief. This layer is infused with gel particles, which help to draw body heat away and out of the mattress.
2. The middle layer is another memory foam of different composition. This is a higher density foam, and is there to provide further contouring but also support, as it acts as a transition through to the very dense foam core below it. Nectar call this layer “Hi Core Memory Foam”. This layer is about 5 cm thick.
3. The final foam layer is a high density polyfoam support core. The material itself is pretty standard across most memory foam mattresses, but there is one big difference with the Nectar here: the support foam is divided into 7 different zones for more targeted support.  This is a lot – more than others – and rare at this price. Many similar brands (who trade in the US only at this stage, may offer a 5 zone support layer, but they’ll reserve this for their premium models and charge more for it).

What Does A Nectar Mattress Mattress Feel Like To Lie On?

Nectar claims their mattress has the  ideal ratio of softness, firmness, and support most people want. This is the ideal that all mattresses in boxes are chasing, as they generally offer one or two mattresses.

Nectar has a firmness rating of 6.5 out of 10 on the mattress firmness scale where 1 is feather soft and 10 is a rock. This means it’s a touch softer than many others that are rated around a 7, and indeed it is a point where many people will find the mattress comfortable.

When you lie on a Nectar, you’ll feel yourself sinking into the softer top layer, but the two bottom layers will work to keep you feeling supported at the same time. The Nectar mattress does have that classic memory foam sink, which people tend to love or hate. It’s actually getting rarer and rarer to find this feel in an online mattress, as companies move towards more responsive or bouncier foams.

That classic memory foam feel is great if you want really soft cradling and comfort for your pressure points. It’s also really great at stopping motion transfer if you’re sharing the mattress with someone who’s up and down a lot in the night.

It’s not so great if you toss and turn a lot (you can feel a bit stuck in the mattress during the night, especially since the top foam layer only gets softer as you sleep in response to body heat) or feel like you’re someone who gets hot during the night.

This mattress is therefore a bit of a polarising one. While it has a universal comfort rating that most people will like, I also think the memory foam will be something you love or hate. Lucky you’ve got a whole year sleep trial to decide.

Is Nectar The Right Mattress For You?

As I said above, I think you’ll either love or hate this mattress. There are also some people I think should steer clear of this mattress based on body or sleep type. Here are my recommendations:

You will love Nectar if:

• You want to buy a decent quality mattress without a big price tag, but with a great warranty and trial period
• You love the feel of memory foam
• You have pressure points you’d really like to be contoured around by your mattress for individualised support (for example, you sleep on your side and want your shoulder to be really well cradled)
• You are of average or lighter body weight
• You want a mattress with zoning in the support core

Buy something else if:

• You weigh over 150 kg. I don’t think this mattress will be supportive enough for you. I think you need something with a higher density foam in the top layer, and either a thicker foam core or, even better, a pocket coil support system (as you’d find in a hybrid mattress)
• You don’t like the feel of memory foam
• You tend to get hot as you sleep (yes Nectar has cooling tech in the cover and foam layer, but it will never be as cool as a mattress that has less conforming foam and coils that allow air flow)

Are There Any Problems With Nectar Mattresses?

There are two issues with Nectar that I think you need to be aware of.

The first is I don’t think they are that transparent about their mattress materials. I jumped on their live chat to get more detailed information on the foams inside the mattress (I don’t know about you, but I find their descriptions on the website very waffly and unhelpful, just marketing speak). I wanted to know the densities of the foams, particularly of the memory foams, to give you an in depth comment on the quality or durability of them. The customer service rep “did not have that information available”. Many other (but not all) brands will display this information clearly, even if it means revealing they’ve used a low durability foam. Nectar have previously been in trouble for making false claims about where their mattresses were made, but they’ve been held to account for that and have updated their information.

The second is I know that US customers have had some issues with customer service. The issues have mainly been related to getting timely refunds organized. This is a shame, since when making a big online purchase, trust is everything. I don’t know how this has played out in the UK branch of the Nectar Mattress business, but I hope they’ve got it sorted and I’m watching closely. I DO know that there are delays in organizing returns due to COVID-19. This is because Nectar usually organises for a charity to come and collect your mattress. This can’t happen at the moment, so it may take longer for Nectar to get to it themselves.

What Are People Saying Who Love Theirs? Reviews From Real People

Nectar has an overall rating of 4.5 stars out of 5, and has been reviewed by 2,000+ people. So most people are pretty happy with their Nectar purchase. Here’s what some of them had to say:

Final Opinion

I think Nectar is a very interesting mattress. Is it my favorite? No. Would I buy it myself? No…because I don’t really like that memory foam conforming feel… but you might! This is one of the few mattresses out there that really still has it, so if you love that feel or crave that kind of pressure relief, you’ll probably love it. Remember you can try it at home for a whole year before you have to commit to keeping it.

Nectar has the two very unique selling points in the 7 zone support core and the massive trial/warranty period. I certainly think that Nectar is offering good value for money here.