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Breathing timer for 4-7-8, box and slow breathing

What it does

A pacer for slow breathing, with nothing to count: follow the circle, let the out-breath take its time, and stop when the timer does. It offers 4-7-8 and box breathing because people search for them, and slow breathing at six a minute because that's the pattern with the best measurements behind it.
  1. Pick a pattern and a length Slow breathing, five seconds in and five out, is the default.
  2. Breathe with the circle It grows as you breathe in and shrinks as you breathe out.
  3. When it stops, stop Do not check the clock. Lie on your side and let the breathing go back to normal.

Counting to seven in your head at midnight is a job, and sleep can't start while you're doing a job. The timer takes the counting off you.

The only thing left is to follow the shape. That's close to doing nothing. Doing nothing is what sleep waits for.

How to use it

Pick a pattern and a length, press start, and breathe with the circle. It grows as you breathe in and shrinks as you breathe out. The screen stays on while it runs, where your phone allows it, and the space bar starts and pauses on a keyboard.

When the time is up it says so. Then comes the instruction that matters: stop. Don't check the clock; lie on your side and let the breathing go back to whatever it does on its own.

Slow breathing, five seconds in and five out, is the default. Long out-breath, four in and six out, is the same rate. Some people find it easier to settle into.

4-7-8 is there because it's famous. Box breathing, four counts each way, is used for steadiness more than for sleep.

What the evidence says

In a 2025 study, 84 students breathed through 4-7-8, box breathing and plain slow breathing at six a minute. Researchers measured heart rate variability, a sign of how readily the nervous system settles. The slow pattern did the most.

The authors' own summary was that 4-7-8 is widely promoted and has little empirical support. Nobody in that study, or any we could find, timed how fast anyone fell asleep.

So the claim here is modest. Slow breathing settles the body's alarm system, measurably. Whether that gets you to sleep sooner hasn't been tested.

Nobody has shown a method that gets a healthy adult to sleep in two minutes, either. In sleep labs, people with no sleep complaint take around 16 to 25 minutes on a good night.

What has been tested is the opposite of trying. A 2022 review of ten trials looked at paradoxical intention, which means lying quietly and intending to stay awake a little longer. It improved insomnia symptoms.

Part of the reason seems to be that it cuts the anxiety about performing.

A breathing pacer works best in that spirit. It's a way of giving up on the effort, not a technique to get right.

What it can't do

It can't fix a night that breaks at 3am. It won't help much if the problem is a mind full of tomorrow. For that, the evening brain dump and how to switch your brain off at night are the right places.

If slow breathing makes you light-headed, breathe normally and stop.

Still wide awake 20 minutes after the timer ends? The NHS advice holds. Get up, keep the lights low, and come back when your eyes are heavy.

The methods that promise minutes, and what the trials found, are in how to fall asleep faster, according to the evidence. Nothing you do here leaves your browser.

Questions

Does 4-7-8 breathing work for sleep?

It hasn't been shown to. The one study that measured it against other patterns found plain slow breathing did more for the nervous system, and its authors said 4-7-8 is widely promoted with little evidence. If you like it, keep it; just don't take a stopwatch to bed.

How long should you do breathing exercises before bed?

Two to ten minutes is plenty. The point is to stop trying, so the moment it feels like work, stop the timer and lie still. If you're still wide awake after about 20 minutes, get up until you're sleepy.

What is the best breathing pattern for sleep?

Slow breathing at about six breaths a minute has the best measurements behind it. Five seconds in, five out, or four in and six out. None has been timed against falling asleep, so pick the one you can follow without counting.

Sources

  1. Comparing the Effects of Square, 4-7-8, and 6 Breaths-per-Minute Breathing Conditions on Heart Rate Variability, Cardiovascular Parameters, and Affective Response, Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback, 2025
  2. Paradoxical intention for insomnia: a systematic review and meta-analysis, Journal of Sleep Research, 2022
  3. The attention-intention-effort pathway in the development of psychophysiologic insomnia: a theoretical review, Sleep Medicine Reviews, 2006
  4. Insomnia, NHS, 2024

This article is general information, not medical advice. If sleep problems last more than a few weeks, speak to your GP.

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Why not just take a magnesium tablet?

Because a tablet is one ingredient and Serune is eight. Each sachet contains 150mg of elemental magnesium as fully reacted, chelated magnesium bisglycinate, whereas many high-street tablets use magnesium oxide. Alongside it are Safr'Inside™ saffron, glycine, L-theanine, lemon balm, chamomile, vitamin B6 and zinc, each at the dose listed on the pack. And it is designed as a warm drink you make each evening, not a tablet you take and forget.

How is it different from chamomile tea?

Same evening warm beverage, but with very different contents. How much a tea bag gives you depends on the flowers, the water and how long you leave it. Serune contains 400mg of chamomile extract in every sachet, standardised to 3% total apigenins, alongside seven other actives at named doses.

How long before I know if it is for me?

Every sachet carries the full dose from the first night. What takes time is the habit. That is why we suggest three packs before you decide: long enough for the ritual to settle, and long enough for you to judge it honestly.

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Because of what is intentionally included in each sachet. Eight actives, each at a named dose, with the botanicals as standardised extracts, so every sachet carries the same measured amount as the last. Every batch of material that goes into it comes with a Certificate of Analysis, and it is made in a BRCGS AA-graded facility: the food safety standard UK supermarkets require of their suppliers, at its top grade.