Reasons Why Air Mattresses Deflate Overnight & How to Prevent It from Deflating

1. A Puncture or Hole

Punctures may not be easy to detect, particularly if the hole is very small. Holes can be caused by sharp objects, a pet’s claws, particularly a cat, or children playing on your bouncy air bed when you are not there to stop them!

How to Prevent: Keep sharp objects, such as needles and pins, well away from your air bed. Make sure that pets are not allowed in your bedroom.

2. Stretching of the PVC Through Overheating

Most inflatable beds are made using PVC which is easy to stretch as it warms up. Your inflatable mattress can lose pressure when it heats up and give the impression that is has a leak. In fact, the loss of pressure is caused by the softening of the PVC if you keep your bedroom temperature too high. Some people place their heater too close to their bed and wonder why their air bed seems to be leaking!

How to Prevent: If you prefer a warm bedroom, inflate your mattress some hours before you go to bed. Then, just before retiring, top up the pressure to your preferred hardness level. Also keep heaters well away from the air mattress.

3. Stretching of the PVC Through Misuse

If you have children, then your air bed might be too much of an attraction for them. An inflated air bed is a trampoline to many young children, and it’s not unknown for them to play on an inflated air mattress.

4. Overloading the Bed

The PVC could be stretched, resulting in a loss of pressure, by overloading the bed. Air beds have weight limits, and Twin and King size air beds are not designed to accommodate the same weights.

Miscellaneous Tips to Prevent Air Mattresses Deflate Overnight

a) Careful Handling in Storage

Careful handling of an air mattress is essential, yet many people ignore this. Continual folding can stretch the material and increase the likelihood of the fabric weakening and tearing or puncturing when inflated. The folding instructions provided are important. If there are none, then rolling the mattress up would be a good way to store it. This would be easier with a single or twin size (single airbed) than a queen size mattress (double airbed) !

b) Lie Flat On the Bed

Lying flat on your air bed is one way of helping prevent your air mattress losing air but no hole appearing. If you continually sit on the ends or sides so that your total body weight is pressing down on a small area, then tears and holes may eventually develop. With your body weight spread over a larger area, you may help to keep an blow up bed from deflating ‘for no apparent reason’.