[Janelle Ward]

Thinking of updating your mattress? Consumer advocate CHOICE has named the ones you should leave off your shopping list.

It says their lab partners in Europe scientifically tested a range of factors, including comfort for both male and female body types, stabilisation, sagging over time, sweat resistance and more. These are the ones that returned the lowest scores.

1. Original Mattress Factory Refresh

CHOICE expert rating: 62%

Comfort score: 54%

Price: $2898

CHOICE says: “This mattress, which came in last overall in our tests, is proof (in case you still needed it) that you can’t always trust advertising. This queen-sized specimen markets itself as a ‘Firm’ in mattress parlance, but once our testers got their hands on it, they found it to be much closer to a ‘Soft’. With firmness often being a deciding factor for many shoppers buying a mattress, this product is falling short on essential criteria.

“And bad luck if you discover this too late: this was also the only mattress we reviewed to charge a fee for returns and exchanges…”

The Original Mattress Factory Refresh was also bad at retaining whatever firmness it had after heavy use, scoring 56% on our sagging scale – the third-worst of all the currently available mattresses we tested.

2. SleepMaker Alaska

CHOICE expert rating: 63%

Comfort score: 44%

Price: $1899

CHOICE says: In another case of false advertising, this mattress did not live up to its promised firmness and was marked down by our testers as being ‘Soft,’ when it had marketed itself as a ‘Firm.’ It also performed poorly in the comfort stakes, with our lab testers recording disappointing ratings for both male and female triallists.

“And if you or your partner toss and turn at night, expect some turbulence while trying to get to sleep on this SleepMaker. It scored an ordinary 58% in our stabilisation trials, which measures the amount of movement in the mattress following a sudden increase in pressure.”

3. Sealy Posturepedic Elevate Marbella

CHOICE expert rating: 65%

Comfort score: 61%

Price: $1250

CHOICE says: “Don’t let its comparatively modest price fool you, this mattress offers nothing close to value for money when it comes to absorbing movement. Anyone who is, or shares a bed with, a restless sleeper will have a hard time getting some shut-eye on this Sealy Posurepedic, which scored only 24% (equal second-worst) in our stabilisation simulations.

“This queen-size also over-promises on firmness, coming in as the third offender in our line-up of ‘firm’-labelled mattresses that are actually softies. It also came in below many other samples in our sweat-resistance ratings.”

4. Dusk & Dawn Essential

CHOICE expert rating: 65%

Comfort score: 58%

Price: $1649

CHOICE says: “While this mattress was on par with our other contenders in the comfort and support-retention stakes, it lost points for coming in below-average in our sag trials.

Again, here we had another mattress that under-delivered on firmness, being rated by our experts as a ‘medium’ despite putting itself forward as a ‘firm.’”

5. A.H. Beard King Coil Chiro Response

CHOICE expert rating: 65%

Comfort score: 39%

Price: $2899

CHOICE says: “The fact that every one of the top-performing mattresses we awarded a ‘recommended’ label to cost less than this A.H. Beard should tell you everything you need to know about mattress pricing: you don’t always get what you pay for. This mattress, which was one of the most expensive of the mattresses we tested, was also the equal third lowest scorer overall.

Both male and female testers alike found this mattress uncomfortable, with the men rating it just 34% for comfort. Although we found its support levels didn’t get worse over time, that only means it stayed uncomfortable, even after the simulated eight years of use.”

Read the full story here.

Are you happy with your mattress? Is it hard to find one that suits both you and a partner?

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