Inside you’ll find step by step tips for your 3 month old baby sleep schedule and routine so baby will sleep well, eat well, and be cooing all day.
Are you coming out of the haze yet, mama?
Around here, I always found that from birth until baby was around 3 months… I lived in a haze. A newborn haze that felt difficult to survive at times.
Baby and I had to figure out feeding, resting, night wakings, and all the rest. Together. And we probably got into a great newborn sleep schedule groove and then…
What's in this post...
BAM.
Baby turns 3 months.
Honestly, this is a tricky age because baby is more alert and likely sleeping a bit less so some habits start to show that used to work that now, maybe, don’t work any longer.Â
Read: 8 Reasons You’ve Got A Whiny Baby (And How To Fix It!)
3 Month Old Baby Sleep Tips & Strategies
Here are some basic things to keep in mind as your baby approaches the 3 month mark. This is often a really tricky time for one main reason, and that’s the first point.
1. Babies Start Waking Up Now
If you haven’t really worried about your baby sleep habits at all, but baby slept well the first few months.
That often goes bye bye during the third month. Why?
Because babies aren’t as sleepy due to developmental changes.
And they aren’t falling asleep as they nurse left and right. The amount of time they sleep is directly related to whether or not they fight sleep. If they have healthy sleep habits and can get to sleep on their own, they’ll sleep.
However, if they have a lot of sleep props, they will start to fight sleep and become fussy and irritable.
- Did baby used to sleep on their own? And did they stop? Look for sleep props.
- Has baby started to wake more at night and take longer day naps? Could be a delayed type of day night confusion.
- Might be time to do some deliberate sleep training.
Create sustainable sleep habits for your little lamb so the whole family can sleep peacefully without the stress, drama, and tears.
Learn More2. Little Ones Need Routine
The exact routine you do doesn’t matter nearly as much as simply having a routine.
Babies love routine.
Moms might not love it, but your baby totally will.Â
If your baby is waking up more and struggling to get to sleep, more irritable, and just not quite as calm or peaceful during the day, let’s get on a consistent sleep schedule.
Here’s a sample 3 month old baby sleep schedule
- 5:00 am | An early morning feed (don’t change diaper or unswaddle unless you have to) and just put right back down to bed
- 7:30 am | Wake up and feed, maybe bathe baby (I use this in the sink and it’s amazing)
- 8:30 to 9:45 am | Proper and specific wind down routines and down for a nap
- 10:30 am | Feed baby, snuggle, special tummy time mat
- 11:30 to 11:45 am | Wind down and then go down for a nap
- 1:30 pm | Feed baby, go for walk, carry baby around house to do chores, read to baby or hold baby while you read
- 2:30 to 2:45 pm | Wind down routine then go down for a nap
- 4:30 pm | Feed baby, put in infant seat (this is ours) or on a blanket while you cook, let siblings play with baby
- 5:30 pm | Quick nap
- 6:15 pm | Feed baby if desired (a cluster feed happens when you feed multiple times in a close period). Play with daddy, play with siblings, play on mat, bathe if you didn’t in the morning
- 7:30 pm |Feed baby and put to bed, you can rock gently to drowsy then in the crib, or I find that mine often feed to sleep and sleep the whole night through
- 10:30 pm | Dream feed, the last feed before you go to bed (if they aren’t yet sleeping through the night)
Read: 7 Simple Reasons Why Your Baby Won’t Nap & What To Do
You can change this however drastically to fit your own lifestyle, but find something that works and repeat it.
A lot.
Get my cheat sheets and find your family’s groove. Chore, independent play, meal, nap, bedtime, and MORE routine ideas!
These lovely cards and checklists will help you create and keep healthy wind down and sleep routines for your little ones.
Learn More3. Babies Sleep Less, But Still A Lot More Than You Think
Here are some general rules of thumb for baby sleep times.
- Newborn to 2 months: 16-18 hours a day | 7 to 9 naps (one after each feed)Â
- 2-4 months: 15-17 hours a day | 4 to 5 naps (after each daytime feed)
- 4-6 months: 14-16 hours a day | 4 naps or so (probably dropping the last nap before bedtime)
- 6-9 months: 14-16 hours a day | 3 to 4 naps a day (eventually getting down to 2 naps a day)
- 9 – 12 months: 14-16 hours a day | 2 to 3 naps (eventually getting down to 2)
- 12-18 months: 14-15 hours a day | 2 naps a day (eventually getting down to 1 nap a day)
3 month old babies generally sleep around 15 to 17 hours a day, including nighttime hours.
This equates to about 4 to 5 naps during the day then the nighttime.
That’s a lotta sleep.
To be clear, if your baby currently sleeps less than that, but isn’t fussy… your 3 month old is fine. On the other hand, if your baby currently sleeps less than that and is pretty fussy and unsettled, add in more naps and perhaps an earlier bedtime.
Read: The Ultimate Guide To Baby Sleep Times (Naps, Nights, & Sleep Tips)
4. Babies Can Feed Less At Night
3 month is a big mark in baby sleep. Many people say your baby can begin sleeping through the night without waking by 12 weeks.
Honestly, this wasn’t my goal.
Two of my five did sleep through the night by 4 months, but the other 3 took a few more months. Maybe they only had the dream feed for a month or two, and then finally they slept fully through, 12 hours.
But, either way, at the 3 month mark, your baby shouldn’t be waking every few hours all night if you play your cards right.
- Make sure you haven’t dropped the dream feed. It’s the feed that, if baby will take a full one, will get them through until a decent morning wake up time.
- Purposefully cluster feed in early evening before bedtime and this will help prevent accidental cluster feeding at night.
- Give full feeds at night feeds. If baby wakes up at 1 am, give a full feed! Then, if light snacking is all baby is interested in, wean the snacking and watch the night wakings disappear. Here’s why you need to give full feeds.
Read: Why Frequent Night Wakings Will Actually Make You Crazy
5. Watch What’s Working And Keep Going
Well, the truth is, if baby is happy and not super irritable all the time… then all is well.
➡️ When baby is fighting sleep, you can start some sleep training.
➡️ If baby is unpredictable with his moods and life feels like chaos, start a routine.
➡️ And, if baby is perfect and wonderful and smells good (#duh) then cuddle him all the time.
Learn how to space naps, how many a day per age, best times, etc. and get your nap game ON!
3 month old FAQ
Typically, breastfed 3-month-olds can go about 3 hours between feedings. Bottle fed babies may go 3.5 hours. The key is not to let baby go much longer than that during the day or they’ll wake up more frequently to feed at night.
Babies’ biological, circadian, and sleep rhythms are changing and maturing and this reaches a head around 4 months. Late 3 month olds often start regressing in their habits, but another thing that happens is that their earlier habits start to Show Up. If babies can’t self-soothe, around this age you begin to notice.
Yes! Routines are always great ideas for babies and mamas. You can begin with a 3 month old sleep schedule, feeding at regular times, and an age appropriate bedtime that helps prevent having an overtired baby.
Many 3-month-olds can sleep long stretches at night. While it’s likely too early to have a baby sleep longer than 8 hours at a time at night, a 5 to 8 hour stretch is very possible if your little one feeds well during the day.
I have a 3 month old who sleeps great during the night, but fights me on naps and only sleeps for 30 minutes at a time while napping unless she’s being held by me. I swaddled her and rock her to sleep for each nap because it’s the only way to get her down initially. she’s formula fed and on a schedule. She hates being swaddled but her startle reflex is too strong to not swaddled. She can’t self soothe, and she wakes from naps whenever her pacifier falls from her mouth. I am going back to work soon and need to get her to sleep better during the day. Desperate for tips. Please help!!
Hi Elizabeth, sounds like your 3 year old is giving you a run for your money! I’ve been there :). Is she an unhapy baby and overtired or does 30 minutes a pop multiple times a day seem to be enough for her? Also, if she wakes from a nap and you put the pacifier back in, will she go back to sleep?
Hi Rachel!
All this information is super helpful. Thank you! I have a 3 month old, this is my second child and needed some refreshing. I love routine and schedule and he’s settling into something very similar. My question is about bedtime. He goes down for his naps throughout the day super easy although only sleep for about 45 mins on each one. He’s a very happy content little guy. When it comes to bedtime- he fights it hard. We have tried me doing it with nursing/rocking. We have now tried me nursing him first in the living room and then Dad doing a mini bedtime routine and putting him down. We have also tried Daddy doing full routine in his nursery and then bottle/rock. It takes like an hour or so to get him finally settled without crying etc. Any suggestions??
Could be his bedtime is a tad too early or too late? How long is he up from his last nap until bedtime?
Hi
My baby is 13 weeks today and she will only sleep on me. The second I put her down she wakes and cries.
I don’t know how to tackle this.
Rae, hvae yo done my free baby sleep series via email yet? You can sign up at the bottom of this post. That’s a sleep association (i.e. she’s associating sleep with you) and so the key is helping her associate it in her own crib!
Hi – Is the 5am feed yiu have suggested for the 3 month old routine a full feed? Thanks!
Great question! I’d probably try to just feed enough to get them to go back to sleep. Now, if they stop wanting to take their 7 am feed then you’ll know it was too much. IF you feed a full feed at 4:45 or 5 and they sleep and still get hungry at 730 keep doing it. If they start refusing a feed during the day or only taking a little you know they can drop back and wean some night feeds!
Hi Rachel! Quick question: is the 5am feeding indicative of any early morning feeds I’d do over night with my daughter when she’s hungry, or a suggestion to wake her up for a feed (almost like a dream feed) a couple of hours before waking her up for the day at 7:30am?
Thank you! Your insight is the first I’ve found online that made me feel empowered to conquer the nap time woes we’ve been saving for a couple of weeks now!
-Jenna And Julia
Hi there, so you can do it a few ways. You can simply feed her at 530 in the dark without getting her up and then put her straight back down to bed! Or you can try gently feeding at 430 or so, so that they sleep longer and break that early morning habit. But 3 month is still early and baby will be hungry!
Hello. My wife and I have a challenge on our hands right now. Our baby is almost 3 months old and we just started trying to get him on a routine. It still seems impossible that he’d be able to sleep from 10:30 to 5:00. Currently, he goes to bed at 9 and we try to dream feed at 10:30, but he won’t take it. He then wakes up between midnight and 2 screaming his head off for food. He takes a full feed and then wakes up about 3 hours later hungry again. This was last night after he’d had two full feeds within an hour before going down at 9. If he is needing to eat every 3 hours, how are we supposed to sleep through the night? Please help!
Hi there! Most 3 month old babies won’t sleep fully through the night uNLESS they take a dream feed. And if he won’t take it or it backfires, you’ll have to do a night feed at some point. I’d try to make the 2 night feeds at times that will mean he goes back down and sleeps until a good morning time.
Hey! Love your site. Thank you so much for your advice.
My baby fights naps in the bassinet which then causes him to become over tired and affects his nighttime sleep.
Some naps he’ll sleep long chunks on me, sometimes not. My goal is to get atleast one hour plus chunk with him sleeping on me.
He’ll wake up wide eyed and smiling from his short nap and will refuse to go back down after all my attempts. He then progresses into cranky. I’ve tried everything and monitor his sleep cues and the wake time for his age (3 months).
I’m exhausted. Do you have any advice?
Sara, so the issue with babes is they are creatures of habit, right? So he’ll love to sleep on you or with you, but if you move are in a different environment, if he is slightly hungry, didn’t feed as much on the last feed, etc. then when he transitions through his sleep cycle he’ll probably just WAKE UP because he’s near mom and he wants attention, sweet thing! So you can start moving around that 45 minute mark if you want him to sleep there, or go into a dark room, etc. but if you’re in a well lit room around this age at his transition through the cycle then he may just wake up regardles!
Hello! I have an 11 week old. She dream feeds at 10:30 and feeds at 5am. Nighttime is going quite well. Naps have always been contact naps or monitored in a swing. I have enjoyed contact naps, but I am ready to let them go! I am using the pat and shush method. She will fall asleep well, but she won’t sleep longer than 15-30 minutes. While contact napping she slept for 1-2 hours. I’m not sure how to handle this. Do I stick to the schedule and try and help her get back to sleep or get her up and try again. Our schedule is becoming jumbled as we try to wean off of contact naps. I’m just to sure how to proceed.
Hi there!
My baby will be 3 months on the 23rd. I’m trying to get a routine down with her during the day but isn’t working out that well. She’ll wake up at 5:45-6, I’ll feed her and she goes back to sleep till 10:30! I have a good evening routine. Her last nap is 5-6-6:30, we do her bedtime routine and she’s in bed by 8 for the night! I work nights 2 days a week so it’s hard for me to get a set schedule! But anything will help! TIA
My baby will be 3 months in 3 days and she takes long naps during the day. For example, the first morning nap and second morning nap could be 2.5 hours to 3 hours each, followed by the third nap that could be 2 to 2.5 hours long. Wake windows between 60 to 90 minutes.
Usually middle of the night like between 12am to 2am she would wake up once or twice for feeds and then head back to sleep. 2 days ago, I attempted to wake her up from naps and her sleep patterns became whack and been waking up at 10pm, 12am and 3am crying and I’m assuming it concides with growth spurt or some developmental thing going on and not due to the change in schedule i dont know.
I am thinking if i should wake baby up from naps if it exceeds 2 hours or 2.5 hours so that she could eventually sleep longer during the night? I would like her bedtime between 8pm to 8.30pm.
I have an almost 3 month old and I’m super keen to get more of a routine going. What I struggle with and I feel no one seems to talk about it how do you stick to your routine when 1. They take a long time to settle/fall asleep for their nap or 2. They only do a short 40min nap. Do you keep them awake longer until the next nap time (but then over tired right?), if they take ages to settle do you count that as part of the nap time and still wake at the same time? Any advice much appreciated