Unisom SleepTabs Review

My experience with Unisom

For the last two weeks, I’ve been trying Unisom SleepTabs, which is a sleep aid containing the antihistamine doxylamine succinate. It’s available over the counter and online in the United States, which is where I bought the box in the photo above.

I’ve been having some difficulty sleeping during my time in the US recently, so I decided to try a new sleep aid to see if it would help me through the bad patch.

I then traveled to England in the second week, so I was also interested to find out if it might help with the inevitable jet lag when I arrived back home.

How I judge how well it works

When I write about sleep aids I take, it’s admittedly a subjective experience. I do keep a manual sleep diary to note the approximate time I believe I fell asleep, wakings in the night, and the time I woke up. I also use my Fitbit sleep tracking data to confirm what I think is happening with my sleep.

Ultimately though, it’s hard to know if the effects I notice and sleep times are due to the sleep aid, the placebo effect, something else, or a combination of factors. But I do try my best to keep an eye out for important points like side effects in the morning.

The first night

My first impression was that the Unisom SleepTabs are tiny, which makes them easier to swallow than some of the larger sleep aids in tablet form that I’ve tried in the past. They have a light taste, but it’s not unpleasant, so they were easy enough to take.

I took one and read my book in bed for a while, keeping an eye out for any obvious feeling of drowsiness or other effects. I believe I started to feel drowsier than I normally would after around 30 minutes.

I turned out the light and fell asleep pretty quickly afterwards – I’d say within 5 to 10 minutes, which is good for me.

Only one waking in the night

I woke up once in the night to go to the bathroom, around three hours after taking the Unisom SleepTab. I felt a little groggy, but was able to safely navigate my house and return to sleep.

I fell back to sleep quickly, and didn’t wake up again until seven hours later. So the first night seemed to go well.

Side effects the next morning

I woke up feeling mostly refreshed from getting seven hours’ sleep. However, I did have a slightly fuzzy head. It was similar to what I’ve experienced with other anti-histamine sleep aids, so the feeling of mental cloudiness didn’t surprise me.

Other than that, I had no other noticeable side effects after the first night.

The rest of the week

I seemed to sleep well during most nights of the first week that I took the Unisom SleepTabs. I woke up a few times on two of the nights, but fell asleep again relatively quickly.

On one of the nights, I did wake up for a longer period of time. But for me, I’d consider it a good week when I get more than seven hours of sleep on six out of seven nights, which is what happened.

The downside is that the next day ‘hangover’ effect increased in strength as the week progressed. By the end of the week, it seemed noticeably worse than the first couple of nights.

It would take a couple of hours for my head to clear completely in the morning. Although that’s still tolerable for me, and can be preferable to a bad night’s sleep if it’s an occasional thing, I was getting concerned by the fact that the effect was building.

The second week

I traveled from the US back to the UK at the end of the first week to visit family and friends.

Interestingly, I stayed one night in a house with cats, which I’m allergic to. I also spent a couple of nights in a friend’s house which is notoriously dusty, and I’m allergic to house dust mite too!

As I expected, the antihistamine doxylamine succinate did its traditional job of preventing me from sneezing and sniffling my way through the night in their houses.

As for my sleep, I still felt like the Unisom was causing some drowsiness after taking it, but the effect seemed to be getting weaker as the days rolled by. I wondered if I was starting to develop some tolerance to it.

However, it’s complicated by the fact that I travelled through multiple time zones; it may have been that I felt less drowsy because I was experiencing jet lag.

And then there’s the fact that I spent three nights as a guest in houses where I know I’ve slept badly in the past due to my allergies. Anecdotally, my feeling is that I may have slept worse without the doxylamine keeping my allergies at bay.

More noticeable side effects

Towards the end of the second week, the next morning cloudy head feeling was very obvious. I was waking up feeling quite groggy, and it would take a couple of hours or longer for it to completely clear.

I also started to get a dry mouth, which would last for most of the day. For me, the increasing morning fuzziness and the new dry mouth side effect were unpleasant and I decided to stop taking the Unisom.

My conclusion

I feel like the Unisom SleepTabs were potentially useful for the first few nights, helping me fall asleep faster and stay asleep. How much of that was down to the Unisom is hard to say, but I did sleep reasonably well that week.

Although I had some noticeable side effects during the first week – the next day cloudy head – it was tolerable for me.

I wasn’t so impressed during the second week I took them. Again, it’s hard to say whether the weaker effect was due to jet lag, tolerance building, or something else. The real issue is that the cloudy head in the morning got worse and started to irritate me. And when I started to get a dry mouth in addition to that, enough was enough for me.

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Further information

Listed Unisom Sleeptabs ingredients in 2018

Please note that these were the ingredients listed on the pack I bought in 2018. The manufacturer may make changes to them over time:

• Doxylamine Succinate 25 mg
• Dibasic calcium phosphate
• FD&C blue no. 1 aluminum lake
• Magnesium stearate
• Microcrystalline cellulose
• Sodium starch glycolate

What evidence is there that Unisom SleepTabs work?

I wasn’t able to find any research studies done into Unisom SleepTabs specifically for insomnia. The wikipedia entry for doxylamine lists some articles that mention doxylamine, but none are formal clinical trials using Unisom.

Warnings and potential side effects

It’s always wise to check with your doctor or a qualified healthcare provider that a sleep aid is safe and appropriate for you to take, even if it’s available online or over the counter. They can give you personalised advice rather than relying on the brief description on a box or label.

When I got mine, it came with a list of warnings of which groups of people shouldn’t take it. It didn’t come with a list of potential side effect, but that doesn’t mean it can’t cause side effects. I won’t list the warnings here because they may change over time and I don’t want anyone reading this to think it’s an exhaustive list. They also didn’t include warnings for older adults, which I think is important to consider.

Just to reiterate, it’s important to check with a qualified healthcare provider that Unisom is appropriate for you to take.

In the further reading section below, I’ll also link to some websites where you can do some background reading about Unisom, antihistamine use for sleep, and doxylamine succinate

Further reading

Unisom.com – this is the company’s information page on the SleepTabs (not a sponsored link).

WebMD – they have several sections on Unisom, including side effects, precautions, and warnings.

Drugs.com – they have a factsheet about Unisom, including side effects, warnings, and interactions to be aware of.

NIH article in 2023 – discusses several issues, such as toxicity, with doxylamine.

Consumer Reports – a long article about problems with sleeping pills.

Research in 2000 – looks at issues with older people using certain medication, including antihistamines.

My sleep hygiene article – I discuss natural ways to sleep, with lots of practical tips.