Your iPhone can dim automatically at 10pm, turn on Do Not Disturb, start a sleep timer, and log your bedtime — without you touching it. Here's the exact setup.
The problem with manual sleep routines
Most people know what a good wind-down routine looks like. The problem is execution. You're already tired. The last thing you want to do is remember to turn on Do Not Disturb, reduce your screen brightness, close your podcast, and set an alarm — in the right order.
Automations handle this. You set the rules once. Your phone enforces them every night.
The bedtime automation
Create a new Automation. Set the trigger to a time — your target bedtime, say 10:30pm, every day. Add these actions in order:
Set Brightness
Set screen brightness to 20%. This is the most effective single action for reducing stimulation before sleep.
Set Do Not Disturb
Enable Do Not Disturb until 7am (or your wake time). Allow calls from Favorites to still come through if you want emergency contact.
Set Volume
Reduce volume to 30%. Any audio playing (podcast, music) drops to a comfortable sleep level.
Log Health Sample — Sleep
Logs your current time as "in bed" to Apple Health. This builds your sleep timing data over time without requiring you to do anything manually.
Turn off "Ask Before Running". This should run silently every night.
The morning automation
A second automation, triggered at wake time:
- Set brightness back to 75%
- Disable Do Not Disturb
- Log "woke up" to Health (this gives you sleep duration automatically)
- Run your morning routine shortcut (weather, calendar, timer)
Your phone knows the difference between night and morning without any input from you.
The sleep timer shortcut
For nights when you fall asleep to audio: create a manual shortcut that asks how many minutes you want a sleep timer for. It starts that timer. When the timer ends, a separate Automation triggers that pauses all media. No more waking up at 3am to a podcast that's been playing for hours.
Tracking your sleep quality
Add a "Log Mood" action to your morning automation. When you wake up, iOS asks how you feel on a 1–5 scale. This runs before you check your phone, before coffee, before anything. Over two or three months you have data on the correlation between your sleep time and your morning mood. Useful information. Zero manual effort to collect it.
Sleep Routine Shortcut — free download
The bedtime automation and morning routine, pre-built. Install in two minutes, works tonight.
Download free