How Your Hotel Room's Clothes Hangers Could Help You Get a Better Night's Sleep

Even the nicest hotel rooms can fail to live up to the comforts of home. After figuring out the Wi-Fi password and combing the carpet for bed bugs, you may want to test out the bed—which isn’t easy with floor-to-ceiling windows shining light in your eyes. To envelop your room in darkness, all you need is a basic item that’s likely waiting in your closet when you arrive. 

According to Popsugar, clipping your blackout curtains closed with a clothes hanger is the hotel hack every frequent traveler should know. Most hotel rooms supply hangers with clips attached to the bottom so they can be used for hanging tops as well as pants and skirts. If you have an extra one leftover after putting your clothes away, you can use it to clip the edges of your curtains together. This seals the gap between the drapes, preventing light from seeping through at 6 a.m. and interrupting your beauty sleep. 

This tip isn’t new. In a viral Tweet from 2019, Rick Klau shared a picture of the hack in action with the caption: “I don’t remember who posted this on Twitter a few years ago, but whoever you are: you have improved every night I’ve spent in a hotel since.”

The beauty of the trick is that it uses a tool already found in most hotel rooms. If for some reason your hotel doesn’t provide this type of hanger, you can bring clips of your own—binder clips work just as well. Here are more hotel hacks to keep in mind the next time you’re traveling.