Does your REM get longer each sleep cycle?

[fishfinderG]

Hi Everyone,

I've read online that as you go through the night each sleep cycle will have a longer REM portion than the prior sleep cycles from that night. 

I'm curious what you all see when you look at your REM sleep stages using OSCAR or a sleep tracker that flags REM? 

What I see in my own data in OSCAR and Apple Watch Sleep Stage Tracking is that I often follow a pattern like this:

- My first sleep cycle has a short REM burst of a few minutes
- My second or third sleep cycle is usually the longest REM for the whole night by quite a large margin
- My remaining 1-3 sleep cycles have short to medium length REM periods that are much shorter than the second cycle

Counting REM duration in OSCAR is a little tricky but I'm going off of the undulating flow rate periods that look like footballs lined up next to each other.  These time periods roughly match up to what my Apple Watch also flags as REM.


Does this line up with what you see?

[B1Sailor]

I use FitBit and last night it shows I went into REM 4 times. Each shorter than previous. 62 min, then 44 minutes, then 35 and finally 22. Each almost exactly 1 hour apart.

I have not researched this to know what is expected. But the opposite of what you stated.  

I don’t see any correlation in OSCAR.

[B1Sailor]

Quick search on the internet and I see articles stating what you said. But looking at my data and my wife's, it does not fit. 

Of the things that change during REM, only breathing would be in OSCAR by default. I use SpO2 data also so I can see pulse also. But I don’t see the correlation in OSCAR.
 

Both Apple and Firbit claim a lot of research in their sleep algorithms. I don’t know which may be better.