Review: Manta Sleep Mask

Occasionally, I'm inspired to do a review of something because I want the company to succeed. This is one of those.

Like many people, I have problems sleeping with light. I've tried a lot of sleep masks over the years, but they have a whole bunch of problems: they press on my eyeballs, they are often made of comfortable-but-too-hot velvets, they fail to stay in place when I'm sleeping on my side.

And then I got a CPAP, and it all got worse. The CPAP is absolutely essential for me to sleep well, but it involves this big ridge going up over my nose, so that the CPAP mask sits properly on my face. No sleep mask works with that -- or at least, none did until recently.

I Kickstarted the Manta Sleep Mask on the theory that they seemed to be intending to address all of these problems. After some months of using it, I have to say: it works remarkably well.

Basically, this is a super-adjustable sleep mask. Not only is the headband itself velcro-adjustable, but it has individual eye pillows, each of whose position can be individually adjusted. Each pillow is a little donut, resting around your eyes instead of on them. And they're made out of cotton, so they're not horribly hot. It's even washable, and comes with a washing-machine bag for the purpose.

Best of all, it is so adjustable that it works with the CPAP mask! Mind, not perfectly -- I have to adjust the headband to its absolute max, and pull the eye pillows out so far that it looks like it's set up for a halibut. And there is some light leakage, due to the awkward setup. But 95% effective is still a heck of a lot better than anything I've had before.

I just ordered a spare, which reminded me to write this up. It's a solidly good product, that does what it says. My only caveat is that the website is kind of annoyingly pushy about trying to get you to order extras, which you don't need. But if you have been looking for a good mask, it's well worth a try...