Written by Natalie Grigson, Writer
The 5 Little Monkeys Mattress is designed to transition toddlers from their crib to their first “big kid bed.” This all-foam mattress is made with several layers, designed to help your little ones sleep better, and include several kid-specific features like a water-proof mattress cover, hypoallergenic materials, cradling technology, and more.
Since this is a mattress for kids, this review might look a little bit different than normal, but we’ll still go over all the important elements like firmness, pressure relief, and support.
Keep reading to find out if the 5 Little Monkeys Mattress is right for your child.
5 Little Monkeys Mattress
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Material
Foam
Trial Period
100 nights
Shipping Method
Free shipping
Firmness
Medium: 5/10
Warranty
15-year warranty
Price Range
$$$$$
5 Little Monkeys Mattress
Material
Foam
Warranty
15-year warranty
Firmness
Medium: 5/10
Shipping Method
Free shipping
Trial Period
100 nights
Price Range
$$$$$
5 Little Monkeys Mattress
Material
Foam
Firmness
Medium: 5/10
Trial Period
100 nights
Warranty
15-year warranty
Shipping Method
Free shipping
Price Range
$$$$$
Who We Recommend The 5 Little Monkeys Mattress For:
- Kids – This mattress is designed for children from about four to thirteen years old. It uses a unique cradling technology to reduce movement and uncomfortable sleep positions, as well as materials best suited for children.
- Side sleepers – While this mattress should work well for both stomach and back sleepers who are very light weight, like toddlers, it will also work well for side sleepers. It is soft enough that it should gently cradle your child’s shoulder and hip in this position.
- Kids who sleep hot – The top layer of this bed includes Dual Phase Change Gel, which adapts to your child’s body temperature, keeping your child cool and sleeping soundly.
Who We Don’t Recommend The 5 Little Monkeys Mattress For:
- Anyone over 13 – This mattress is soft and made entirely of foam. As such, it is designed to support children’s smaller frames. It wouldn’t be suitable for children over 13 years old, or for adults who are taller and weigh more. If you’re looking for a beds for teenagers, we’d recommend a more supportive bed instead.
- Heavier kids under 13 – If your child weighs significantly more, the all-foam construction of this mattress might not be supportive enough for them. Instead, we’d recommend an innerspring mattress that also includes coils for extra support.
First Impressions: Firmness & Feel
Firmness Scale: 5/10 (Plush Soft)
Please remember that firmness is a subjective characteristic and your shape will dictate how you experience a bed. A heavier person whose weight can more easily push through softer comfort and support layers may experience a bed as softer than a lightweight person. The way you are shaped could also play a role here. Consider your weight, shape, and size when evaluating firmness scores.
According to our Sleep Advisor Firmness Scale, where one is as soft as a cloud and 10 is as firm as sleeping on your wooden floor, the 5 Little Monkeys comes in at a 5 out of 10. This makes it a soft / plush mattress, which is ideal for younger sleepers. In fact, the top comfort layer of this mattress is very soft and cushioning, giving your child a deep hug for maximum pressure relief. Where the transition layer in an adult mattress would normally feel firm, this one is much softer, as well, giving the whole bed a much more cushioning feel than an adult’s bed.
How Does It Feel?
The first thing you’ll notice about this mattress is the soft, organic cotton cover (which is easily removable and machine-washable!) If you press into the mattress, you’ll notice the top memory foam layer provides a deep hug. This provides excellent pressure relief and comfort for your little one, but with the transition layer, and then the firmer foam layer below, they won’t sink too far into the bed that they’ll feel stuck or overheated. In fact, the bed will feel temperature neutral overall.
What We Like About the 5 Little Monkeys
- The cover – The cover is made from a soft, organic cotton. It is easily removable and completely machine-washable, plus, it is stain- and water-resistant. This is perfect for younger kids who still have accidents sometimes.
- It’s hypoallergenic – All the materials used in this bed are hypoallergenic, which makes it a good choice for kids with allergies or sensitivities.
- It comes with a whole sleep system – The 5 Little Monkeys isn’t just a mattress; it comes with a hypoallergenic pillow, a mattress protector, a storage tote, and a cute, soft, stuffed monkey.
Our 5 Little Monkeys Complaints
- Not supportive enough for all – Since this is a soft, all-foam mattress, it won’t be supportive enough for children who weigh significantly more or are over the age of 13.
- Not a lot of edge support – Soft all-foam mattresses tend to have weaker edges, and the 5 Monkeys is no exception. That said, it shouldn’t matter too much for children who usually aren’t sharing a bed.
- No bounce – This one might actually be a blessing in disguise (no jumping on this bed), but for those who love a bouncier mattress, this all-foam design isn’t it.
Testing the 5 Little Monkeys Mattress: How it Performed
When we test mattresses for adults, we go through a whole checklist of items, like how it performs for couples, for back and shoulder pain, motion isolation, temperature regulation, pressure relief, and more.
Since this bed is specifically designed for kids, some of our normal tests just won’t apply, but we’ll still go over how this bed performed for different sleep positions, temperature regulation, support, and motion isolation.
Sleeping Positions for Different Body Types
According to 5 Little Monkeys, this mattress has no weight limit and parents are welcomed to lie in the bed with their little one. That said, lying in the bed to tuck your little one in might be fine, but this bed is specifically designed for smaller bodies and likely won’t feel comfortable or supportive enough for heavier folks / adults.
Here’s how it did for different weights and positions:
Side Sleepers
- Lightweight Sleepers – This mattress is soft enough to gently support your little one on their side. It should cushion the shoulder and hip in this position, keeping the spine in comfortable, neutral alignment.
- Average Weight Sleepers – This bed is not suitable for adults or those over 130 pounds.
- Heavyweight Sleepers – This bed is not suitable for adults or those over 230 pounds.
Back Sleepers
- Lightweight Sleepers – The 5 Little Monkeys should feel comfortable and supportive for back sleepers up to about 130 pounds. Weight should feel evenly distributed and the spine should remain straight and comfortable through the night.
- Average Weight Sleepers – This bed is not suitable for adults or those over 130 pounds.
- Heavyweight Sleepers – This bed is not suitable for adults or those over 230 pounds.
Stomach Sleepers
- Lightweight Sleepers – Your youngest and lightest children should feel good sleeping on their stomachs on this mattress, but for those who are a little bit bigger, it might be too soft in this position. Stomach sleepers need firmer support in order to keep the hips from dipping down into the bed.
- Average Weight Sleepers – This bed is not suitable for adults or those over 130 pounds.
- Heavyweight Sleepers – This bed is not suitable for adults or those over 230 pounds.
Pressure Relief & Pain
Normally in this section, we’d discuss how this bed does in alleviating back, hip, and shoulder pain. Since these are the woes of us adults, we’ll skip that part and just focus on how it does with pressure relief.
Overall, the 5 Little Monkeys is an excellent bed for pressure relief. It is soft and deeply cushioning, so your little one’s joints should feel comfortable, even through those uncomfortable growing pain years.
Support
The 5 Little Monkeys bed offers good support for children. It is made up of three layers of foam: the softest at the top, down to the firmest at the bottom. As such, your child’s weight should sink in comfortably to the top layer, but the bottom two should act as support, preventing them from sinking too far into the bed. This will keep their spine in proper, healthy alignment, which 5 Little Monkeys points out, promotes better sleep, which ultimately promotes better management of emotions, healthy weight, better performance in school, and better social development.
Motion Transfer
Motion transfer describes how much you’ll be able to feel it when somebody else moves on the other side of the bed. This will be an important consideration if your child is a light sleeper and shares the bed with a sibling, a pet, or if they drift off while you’re reading them a bedtime story.
Since the mattress is made entirely of foam, it isolates motion very well. If somebody (including the dog) moves on the other side of this bed or even gets up, your child will be unlikely to feel it.
Temperature Regulation / Cooling
One of the reasons the 5 Little Monkeys is so perfectly designed for children, is its ability to regulate temperature. Oftentimes kids wake up too hot or too cold in the night, but this mattress uses Dual Phase Change Gel, which should keep body temperature just right.
Additionally, the memory foam top layer features an open-cell structure, which makes it more breathable and cool.
If you want to learn more, read about what we consider to be the best cooling mattress.
5 Little Monkeys Mattress
Material
Foam
Trial Period
100 nights
Shipping Method
Free shipping
Firmness
Medium: 5/10
Warranty
15-year warranty
Price Range
$$$$$
5 Little Monkeys Mattress
Material
Foam
Warranty
15-year warranty
Firmness
Medium: 5/10
Shipping Method
Free shipping
Trial Period
100 nights
Price Range
$$$$$
5 Little Monkeys Mattress
Material
Foam
Firmness
Medium: 5/10
Trial Period
100 nights
Warranty
15-year warranty
Shipping Method
Free shipping
Price Range
$$$$$
Preference-based Features
Bed-in-a-box
The 5 Little Monkeys bed will be delivered to your doorstep, compressed inside a box. This makes it convenient for you to set up whenever works best for you.
Organic Materials
The pillow, mattress cover, and mattress protector are all made with organic cotton and are hypoallergenic.
Complete Sleep System
The 5 Little Monkeys is more than a bed– it also comes with a water-proof mattress cover, a kid-customized pillow, a cute tote, and a stuffed monkey for cuddling.
Construction: What’s Inside the 5 Little Monkeys?
This mattress will arrive at your door, compressed in a box. Once it decompresses, it should measure eight inches tall.
It comes in a soft, organic cotton cover, which is stain-resistant, removable, and machine-washable. Within this cover is the mattress itself, made up of three layers of foam. Let’s take a closer look at each.
- The top layer is the bed’s comfort layer. It is made of four pounds of gel memory foam, which is dense and very slow to respond to pressure. This means your child will sink deeply into this layer for a good amount of comfort and pressure relief. This memory foam is open-cell and is infused with gel to keep the surface of the mattress cool.
- The transition layer comes next. This more responsive foam ensures that your child won’t sink too far into the mattress or feel “stuck” in the bed. Unlike adult beds where the transition layer is much firmer, this one is still quite soft, since it was designed with smaller bodies in mind. Still, the material will help gradually transition the sleeper into the firmest layer below, the foundation layer.
- The foundation layer is made of high-density poly foam. This will be the firmest layer and provides the bed with its structure, shape, and durability. This bed was designed to last your child through adolescence, so this durable base layer comes in handy!
Additionally, the box will include your mattress cover, pillow, and stuffed monkey.
Unboxing & Off-Gassing
Unboxing the 5 Little Monkeys should take about 10 to 15 minutes total. Like most mattresses made with foam, the 5 Little Monkeys will take some time to fully decompress and off-gas once you’ve unwrapped it. This just means that it will take about 24 to 48 hours for it to reach its full size of eight inches tall, and for it to off-gas any chemical odors from the foam.
This is perfectly normal and safe, but if you want to speed up this process, be sure to leave the bed in a well-ventilated room for the first day or so.
Certifications
- Eco-Friendly Certifications – This mattress was certified by OEKO-TEX®, which evaluates textiles at all processing levels for acceptable levels of hazardous chemicals and flame retardants.
- CertiPUR-US® certified – The foams in this bed are CertiPUR-US® certified. CertiPUR-US® is a third-party program that ensures the foams meet rigorous health and safety standards. This means they don’t contain harmful substances like ozone depleters, PBDEs, heavy metals, formaldehyde, and phthalates. They should also have low volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions.
Coupons, Trials, Warranties, and Shipping
- Shipping – Shipping is free within the contiguous United States. There is a small fee for shipping to Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico.
- Trial – You can keep this product for 100 nights to make sure it’s a great fit for you kid. If it’s not, you can return it for a full refund.
- Warranty – There is a warranty on this bed for 15 years.
- Return Policy – If you’re not happy with this bed, you can return it within your 100-night sleep trial for a full refund and no charge for mattress pick up.
Sizes & Prices
| Size | Dimensions (inches) | Price (w/o discount) |
| Twin | 39” x 75” x 8” | $749 |
| Full | 54” x 75” x 8” | $999 |
| Queen | 60” x 80” x 8” | $1,399 |
Frequently Asked Questions
What age is the 5 Little Monkeys mattress for?
The 5 Little Monkeys is designed for sleepers anywhere from three through 18.
What are the dimensions of the 5 Little Monkeys mattress?
The dimensions will depend on what size mattress you order. The measures
39 x 75 x 8 inches, the Queen measures 54 x 75 x 8 inches, and the Queen measures 60 x 80 x 8 inches.
Is there a weight limit on the 5 Little Monkeys mattress?
There is no weight limit on the 5 Little Monkeys mattress, though it is specifically designed to be most supportive and comfortable for children.
What is the 5 Little Monkeys mattress made of?
This mattress is built with three layers of foam, including a top layer of soft, gel memory foam, a transition layer of more responsive foam, and a firmer, high-density poly foam base.
5 Little Monkeys vs. Other Childrens’ Mattresses
5 Little Monkeys vs. Helix Kids
Product
Type
Score
Who We Recommend the 5 Little Monkeys For
- Kids who prefer an all-foam bed
- Children with allergies
- Side sleepers
Who We Recommend the Helix Kids For
- Kids who prefer a bouncier bed
- Combination sleepers
- Indecisive kids who want a Soft and Firm option
5 Little Monkeys vs. Puffin
Product
Type
Score
Who We Recommend the 5 Little Monkeys For
- Side sleepers
- Those who want a Queen option
- Shoppers who want more extras
Who We Recommend the Puffin For
- Back and stomach sleepers
- Those who want a Twin XL option
- Shoppers on a smaller budget
5 Little Monkeys vs. Saatva Youth
Product
Type
Score
Who We Recommend the 5 Little Monkeys For
- Kids who prefer an all-foam mattress
- Toddlers moving from a crib to their first mattress
- Children who prefer a soft, more cushioning bed
Who We Recommend the Saatva Youth For
- 3-7 year olds (for one side) and 8-12 year olds (for the other side of the mattress)
- Children who prefer a medium-firm bed
- Kids who want a bouncier bed
Overall Summary
The 5 Little Monkeys mattress is designed to transition your little one from crib to their first bed. This soft and pressure-relieving bed should keep your child sleeping soundly through the night.
Side Sleepers
5/5
This bed is ideal for side sleepers, since it is on the softer side of things. This will allow your child’s shoulder and hip to sink down into the bed comfortably, but still be well supported. Plus, the pillow that comes with this bed will keep the spine in neutral no matter their sleep position.
Back Sleepers
5/5
Even though this bed is soft, it should work well if your child prefers to sleep on their back as well. They should sink down into the soft, comfort layer on top, but the firmer foam below will keep their spine in healthy, neutral alignment. In this position, their weight should feel evenly distributed and supported.
Stomach Sleepers
3/5
Most stomach sleepers need a mattress that is relatively firm in order to prevent the hips from dipping down, which can throw the spine out of alignment. This bed is soft, so it might not be a good fit for heavier children who sleep on their stomachs. However, toddlers or very lightweight children should feel comfortable in this position.
Combination Sleepers
3/5
The 5 Little Monkeys has a top layer of dense, slow-moving memory foam, so it won’t be quite as easy to reposition on this bed as it would on a more buoyant, innerspring mattress. That said, it is a good fit for both back and side sleepers, and the transition layer will make it responsive enough to comfortably change positions.
Lightweight Sleepers
5/5
This bed is specifically designed for lightweight sleepers– the lightest weight sleepers, in fact: children. It is curtailed to children’s needs in its softness and pressure relief, with its hypoallergenic materials, its waterproof mattress protector, and its ability to regulate temperature.
Overall Value
4/5
Considering you get not only a mattress, but also a customized pillow, a waterproof protector, a removable organic cotton mattress cover, a tote, and a stuffed monkey with your purchase– not to mention a 15-year warranty– we’d say that the 5 Little Monkeys mattress has an excellent overall value.
Our Verdict
The 5 Little Monkeys mattress is designed to be your child’s first “big kid bed,” though it is so comfortable, supportive, and durable, we wouldn’t be surprised if it ends up being your child’s bed for many years to come.
It comes in three sizes, Twin, Full, and Queen, so it can accommodate children as young as three all the way up to 18. Since it is so soft, we do recommend this bed specifically for younger and lighter weight children, so that they’ll feel properly supported.
5 Little Monkeys Mattress
Material
Foam
Trial Period
100 nights
Shipping Method
Free shipping
Firmness
Medium: 5/10
Warranty
15-year warranty
Price Range
$$$$$
5 Little Monkeys Mattress
Material
Foam
Warranty
15-year warranty
Firmness
Medium: 5/10
Shipping Method
Free shipping
Trial Period
100 nights
Price Range
$$$$$
5 Little Monkeys Mattress
Material
Foam
Firmness
Medium: 5/10
Trial Period
100 nights
Warranty
15-year warranty
Shipping Method
Free shipping
Price Range
$$$$$
Natalie Grigson
Writer
About Author
Natalie is a content writer for Sleep Advisor with a deep passion for all things health and a fascination with the mysterious activity that is sleep. Outside of writing about sleep, she is a bestselling author, improviser, and creative writing teacher based out of Austin.
Combination Sleeper