Baby sleep schedule at 6 months: naps, solids and the 3-to-2 transition
Lulla TeamPublished Updated
At 6 months your baby still needs 12 to 15 hours of sleep a day: 10 to 11 hours at night and 3 naps making up the rest. Wake windows now run 2 to 3 hours, shorter in the morning and longest before bedtime. It is a month of big milestones — first solids, sitting up — and sleep sits alongside all of them.
The widening wake windows are also the start of something. With close to 3 hours of stamina available by late afternoon, the third nap begins to look surplus. Many babies start the move from 3 naps to 2 somewhere in the next few weeks, and the transition is bumpy by design.
See the full wake-window table, from newborn to 2 years→How many naps by age — the full table→When your newborn won't sleep: what to check, in order→Sleep regression by age — the full table→
Does this 6 months schedule match your day?
Lulla times the naps and tells you when the wake window is closing, so you do not have to keep count in your head.
The clearest sign the 3-to-2 transition has begun is the late-afternoon nap: your baby fights it, takes 30 minutes to fall asleep, or takes it and then pushes bedtime far too late. You don't need to force the switch on a fixed day. For several weeks it's normal to alternate — 3 naps on some days, 2 on others — and simply bring bedtime forward by 20 or 30 minutes on the 2-nap days.
Solids usually start around now, and with them your baby can take small sips of water at meals, though milk stays the main source of nutrition. Honey is off limits in any form before 12 months, including in baked goods. One expectation worth adjusting: solids don't make babies sleep through the night. That's a maturation story, not a dinner story.
A sample day
A typical 6-month day keeps 3 naps with wake windows of 2 to 3 hours. Read it as a flexible guide rather than a rule — the moment the third nap starts failing, an earlier bedtime that evening is the right answer.
| Time | What happens |
|---|---|
| 7:00 | Wake-up and first feed |
| 9:00 | Nap 1 · approx. 60 min |
| 12:15 | Nap 2 · approx. 75 min |
| 15:45 | Nap 3 · approx. 30 min |
| 19:00 | Bedtime routine and lights out |
A sample day to give you a rough idea — every baby is different. Adjust the times to your child's sleep cues, and talk to your pediatrician about anything that worries you.
Your baby's sleep schedule, by age
One table with everything that matters: total sleep per 24h, wake windows and number of naps, from newborn to age 3. Total sleep follows the National Sleep Foundation recommendations.
Tips for this age
- Keep putting your baby down on their back in an empty crib; the rule holds until 12 months, even now that they roll and sit up on their own.
- When the third nap collapses, do not fight it — move bedtime 20 to 30 minutes earlier that night to absorb the missing sleep.
- Offer new foods earlier in the day rather than at dinner, so any digestive reaction does not land in the middle of the night.
- No honey before 12 months, in any form — not in cookies, yogurt or homemade remedies.
- Noting in Lulla which days ran on 2 naps and which on 3 shows whether the transition is genuinely underway or whether it was just one off day.
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Common questions
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Keep reading
- Baby tiredness signs: how to read them before the crying starts
- How to build the perfect sleep routine for your baby
- How much do newborns sleep? What's normal by age and when it's too much
Sources
Total sleep per 24 hours follows the National Sleep Foundation's ranges (2015); at 3 months we smooth the step between two of them to 13 to 16 hours. Night sleep, wake windows and the number of naps are Lulla's own reference points, not recommendations from the organizations below. This information is educational and does not replace advice from your pediatrician.
- Hirshkowitz M, Whiton K, Albert SM, Alessi C, Bruni O, DonCarlos L, et al. National Sleep Foundation’s sleep time duration recommendations: methodology and results summary. Sleep Health. 2015;1(1):40–43.
- American Academy of Pediatrics — Safe Sleep
- NHS — Helping your baby to sleep
- World Health Organization — Guidelines on physical activity, sedentary behaviour and sleep for children under 5 years of age