Zeo Review and First Impressions

About three weeks ago, I was on vacation in the Outer Banks, NC when I heard about this crazy new sleep gadget called the Zeo.  How did I hear about it?

Zeo Personal Sleep Coach

I was browsing David Pogue’s website of course! He posted one of his normal goofy video reviews of the product.  After seeing the review, I immediately thought, “This is the most nifty product I’ve ever seen!”  Then, right after that, I thought, “Whoa, wait a second,  4 HUNDRED dollars?” (Edit: It’s now 249 for the entry model. See the bottom of this post, or click here, to get free shipping as well.) Despite the rather large price tag though, immediately when I returned home from the Outer Banks, I logged onto their website, http://myzeo.com, and purchased the Zeo Personal Sleep Coach.

The ordering process was painless (minus the continuous “Is it really worth this?” going through my mind).  I entered my credit card number in, and within 3 days, the Zeo Personal Sleep Coach was waiting for me on my doorstep.

What IS it?

The Zeo Personal Sleep Coach, as described on their site:

Introducing Zeo™, the Personal Sleep Coach. Developed with leading sleep scientists, Zeo is a new kind of educational tool and motivational program that helps you understand how you are sleeping, reveals habits and behaviors that may be helping or hindering your sleep, and teaches new ways that may help you get a better night’s rest. Zeo is a three-part personal sleep coach product, combined with a highly personalized sleep coaching program.

Packaging

Similar to an Apple product, the Zeo’s packaging is simply beautiful.  It’s a rather compact box that is a soft white color covered with all of the marketing photos and information one could ever desire about the Zeo.

Unboxing the Zeo

The box also had this nifty little “Lift to find out more” tab which I’m always a big fan of on products.  During the unboxing process, I continued to be impressed.  Again, similar to how Apple has “Designed by Apple in California” written on the inside of its boxes so you see it first, Zeo had “The more you know, the better you sleep.” written on the inside (that’s their slogan for the product).  The packing on the inside sort of unfolded to reveal the device.  Inside is everything you need – the Zeo Bedside Display, the Zeo Headband, the plug, a spare set of connectors for the headband, a Zeo branded USB SD card reader, and a users guide along with a sleep wheel for data comparison purposes.  There was also a letter inside the box from the President & CEO of Zeo welcoming you to the product, along with a paper journal and instructions on how to sign up for the MySleep portion of the MyZeo website.

The Zeo Bedside Display

The Bedside Display looks like a really fancy alarm clock, and essentially, that’s what it is.  Along the top of the device is a set of buttons that allows you to easily change the settings of the device including setting the alarm type, the type of alarm (regular vs SmartWake – more on that in a minute), the alarm music, see the life of the pads on the headband, and much more.  The buttons along the top also give you quick access to your sleep data from the night before or any night for the past month, and allows you to set the screen brightness.  And, of course, there’s a snooze button which also functions as a home button to bring you back to the main screen at any time.  The five different alarm tones to choose from are softer than most alarm clocks on the market.  There are a few songs, and one is a classic “beep beep” alarm, although, the tone is softer and less harsh than most alarms.  Some might be worried that the soft alarms won’t be loud enough to wake them; there’s nothing to worry about there though as the alarm gets progressively louder until you finally wake up.  That was a concern of mine before it arrived, and I was delighted to find out that it did in fact get progressively louder until I woke up.

The Zeo Headband

The Zeo Headband is the most important part of the system because it is what actually gathers the data from your brain waves.  Surprisingly, it is incredibly comfortable!

The Zeo Headband

Whenever I took it out of the box, I was a little worried about what it’d feel like, but once I put it on my head the first night, I immediately realized it was going to be a non-issue.  It took me a few minutes to get the correct tightness set, but once I did, I almost forgot the headband was there.  That having been said, just the fact of wearing something to sleep, even being as comfortable as it is, kept me awake for a few nights.  It did take me a few nights to get fully used to the headband.  All night long though, the headband actively monitors brain waves and sends the data back to the bedside display for collection and viewing purposes.  Let me just say this: It really does work!  This part of the system is what most intrigued me to begin with – a wireless headband that essentially does the same thing as an expensive sleep study can now be in my hands, every single night?  That is incredible.  This technology is incredible.  The headband sits on a magnetic inductive charging dock on the back of the bedside display and it takes about two hours to charge.  How a two hour charge lasts through a long sleep like my weekend sleep is beyond me, but however it does it, it DOES do it, which is what counts.  In all honesty, I couldn’t be more impressed with the headband.  It’s comfortable and it functions exactly how it should.  Zeo even includes an extra set of soft pads in the box that can easily be snapped onto the headband after the first set wears out (about every 3 months the pads need replaced).

SmartWake

My absolute favorite feature of the Zeo is called SmartWake.  If you turn it on, it finds a natural waking point for your body and rings the alarm then.  This avoids what is called Sleep Inertia which happens from waking from deep sleep.  Many people with traditional alarms are actually woken during this period which is what causes grogginess in the morning which can last all day.  With SmartWake, you set an alarm time and an alarm window.  For example, if I set my alarm for 7:05 with an alarm window of 20 minutes, if at any time between 6:45 and 7:05, the Zeo detects a REM to NREM transition, it will ring the alarm, thus waking me at a natural waking point.  It will never ring the alarm past the set alarm time, either, which is fantastic.  Ever since I’ve bought the Zeo, I’ve used SmartWake.  There have been mornings where there was no natural waking point, but on the days that there were, let me say this: it worked incredibly well!  The mornings in which I was woken via SmartWake, I was not at ALL groggy.  In fact, I felt refreshed and ready to go for the day.  The feeling really is priceless, and if you’re even considering buying a Zeo, this feature should be one of your main drawing points.

The MySleep Portion of the MyZeo Website

A Night of My Sleep

As often as you’d like (I do it every morning), you can take the SD card out of the side of the bedside display, put it in the USB SD card reader, connect it to your computer, and upload your sleep data to a special portion of the MyZeo website.  This special portion of the MyZeo website takes the sleep data that’s available for viewing on the bedside display and makes it ten times more easy to read, and ten times more functional.  In addition to being able to view the sleep graphs for each night, you can see trends, track cause and effect, and even track your own custom sleep factors in the journal that you fill out for each night.  The journal responses and data tie into the coaching service that Zeo provides free for six months with the product.  I’ll be writing a separate blog post later this week digging deeper into the MySleep portion of the site, but for now, take my word for it: it’s FANTASTIC and beautiful looking.

The Coaching

As I mentioned above, Zeo provides six months of sleep coaching for free with the device.  This is really what Zeo is about; Otherwise, there really wouldn’t be any point to collecting all of the sleep data besides the fact that it’s cool.  This coaching service is essentially why you’d want to collect the data in the first place.  Zeo takes 6 nights of your data and creates a baseline for you and from there helps you work on three goals that you set for yourself.  For example, you can tell Zeo you’d like help falling asleep faster, among other things.  From your baseline, they send you a series of e-mails that contains tips personalized to your sleep habits and how to achieve/make progress towards your goals.  It’s important to note that these aren’t just cheesy fortune cookie like tips, these really are personalized e-mails with information provided to Zeo from scientists and such.  For example, one of the e-mails I got this week was about relaxation tips when lying down in bed.  Zeo offered me two MP3 downloads to listen to before bed where a sleep scientist helps talk you to sleep through relaxation techniques before bed.  This stuff could really be beneficial for some people!

Overall, my thoughts?

Here’s what I think about the Zeo: It’s a fantastic product overall.  Once the word gets out, I could really see a lot of people buying this.  We all know how important sleep is for our bodies, yet so many of us disregard it, stay up late, wake up early, nap at odd times for odd intervals, etc.  None of that is good for us.  Sleep is one of the most important things for us, so why do we all treat it so poorly and neglect it so much?  The Zeo really brings one’s bad sleep habits to light and really encourages one to correct the issues.  It’s also a modern company founded by a few college grads from Brown university which makes it even more cool and hip.  They’re trying to bring sleep study technology to the bedroom for each one of us to experience each night.  It is however, as I said, very expensive.  I think the ideal price for this device is about 200 dollars.  I think if the guys at Zeo reduced the price down by 50 percent, they’d see a lot more sales which would basically negate any losses they would incur by knocking the price down.  I’m not at all sure how much the device costs to produce, though, so I’m just saying that without any factual information to back it up.  I also understand that this device took a lot of work to bring to the market, and with a very small round of VC funding, they do have to recoup their costs somehow, and I respect that fact.  Again though, 200 dollars = ideal price point.

For anyone who’s curious as to how they sleep and why they sleep that way, the Zeo is definitely something to consider.  It’s not a medical device and it’s not intended to diagnose or treat any real sleep disorder like sleep apnea, but it could still be very useful.  The coaching, for anyone who has trouble falling asleep, waking up, or anything in between, is perfect and will most likely improve those issues.  In general, by putting such a large focus on one’s sleep, anyone who buys a Zeo is most likely to see an improvement in how they sleep.

In closing, once you get used to the headband, the Zeo is a really cool product that has the potential to be very, very useful for a lot of people!

Update: Oct 6, 2009 – Lower Prices & Free Shipping

Zeo has now lowered their prices to below $400 with the entry model starting at $249. They’ve made coaching an optional thing to buy as well.  Link for free shipping: http://bit.ly/ShipZeo4Free

*Note: This review post remains unediting since the day it was published (August 8, 2009), minus the bottom “UPDATE” and the single Edit at the top about the price change.  I was not paid to write the review, nor is it endorsed by or encouraged by Zeo.  I think it’s unethical to receive payment or any other form of compensation for the sole purpose of writing a good review, and none of the content you see on this site will ever be sponsored in that regard.