How to Split Night Feeds With Your Partner: Three Shift Plans for the Newborn Weeks, Even If You're Breastfeeding

How do you split night feeds with your partner? Pick one of three plans. If your baby has bottles of formula or expressed milk, split each night into two shifts or take alternate nights. If you're breastfeeding, the feeds stay with you in the early weeks and your partner does everything else: nappies, burping, settling and the early morning.

Newborns sleep in short bursts of 2 to 3 hours, day and night, says Raising Children Network(opens in a new window). That means somebody is up every few hours. A plan decides who, and gives each of you one block of sleep nobody interrupts.

This guide sets out the three plans, what each one protects, how to keep your milk supply going if your partner gives a bottle, and what to hand over at 3am.

How can two parents split night feeds?

Two parents can split night feeds in three ways: split each night into two shifts, take alternate nights, or keep breastfeeds with mum while the partner does every other job. Which one fits depends mostly on how your baby is fed. Each plan builds on Australian advice about taking turns at night.

Pregnancy, Birth and Baby(opens in a new window) suggests partners take turns with overnight bottle feeds of formula or expressed breastmilk. The Australian Breastfeeding Association(opens in a new window) (ABA) suggests the partner changes nappies and brings the baby to mum for a feed. Raising Children Network(opens in a new window) says shifts for night-time duties can make a difference, and may be harder for breastfeeding mums.

The list compares the three plans on an example night running from 9pm to 7am. Your baby's feeds will not keep to the clock, so treat the times as a starting point.

• 1. Split the night: Best for formula, mixed feeding or expressed milk. One parent covers 9pm to 2am, the other covers 2am to 7am. Longest protected sleep: about 5 hours each, every night. Works while breastfeeding: yes, with one bottle of expressed milk once breastfeeding is going well.
• 2. Alternate nights: Best for formula-fed babies. One parent covers the whole night while the other sleeps, then you swap. Longest protected sleep: a full night's sleep every second night. Works while breastfeeding: rarely, because mum still needs to feed or express overnight.
• 3. Feeder plus helper: Best for breastfed babies, especially the first weeks. Mum breastfeeds; the partner changes, brings the baby, burps, settles and takes the early morning. Longest protected sleep: for mum, bedtime to the first night feed, plus a morning sleep-in. Works while breastfeeding: yes, it's built for breastfeeding.

Adults generally need 7 to 8 hours of sleep to feel rested, says Raising Children Network. No plan gets you there every night, but each gives a longer unbroken stretch than waking together for every feed.

Plan 1: split the night into two shifts

Splitting the night means one parent is on duty for the first half and the other for the second half, while the parent off duty sleeps somewhere they can't hear the baby. It works best when any feed can come from a bottle of formula or expressed breastmilk.

A typical split:

• 9pm to 2am: parent A does every feed, nappy and resettle. Parent B goes to bed early, with earplugs or in another room.
• 2am to 7am: parent B takes over. Parent A sleeps through.
• Swap the halves every week or so, if one of you finds the early shift harder.

The off-duty parent gets about 5 hours in one unbroken block. Each of you still wakes on your own shift, but only one of you wakes at a time.

If you're breastfeeding, plan 1 usually means your partner gives one bottle of expressed milk in the first half while you sleep. Breastfeed just before you go to bed, then take the second half yourself. The bottle and supply section covers how to keep your supply steady with this plan.

Plan 2: take alternate nights

Alternating nights means one parent covers the whole night and the other sleeps through it, then you swap the next night. It suits formula-fed babies, where either parent can make and give every feed.

The upside is a full night's sleep every second night. The downside is that the night on duty is broken from start to finish. Some couples find that harder than two shorter shifts, especially if one of you goes to work the next morning.

Alternate nights rarely work while you're breastfeeding. You would still wake on your night off to feed or express. The ABA says delaying or stretching out feeds can mean less milk is removed, which may lower your supply. The bottle and supply section explains why the ABA counts night feeds.

One option is a mixed week: split nights on work nights, and alternate on the weekend so each of you gets one full night.

Plan 3: breastfeeding, the feeder plus a helper

When mum is breastfeeding, the partner takes every night job except the feed itself: changing the nappy, bringing the baby to mum, burping, settling and putting the baby back in the cot. Mum feeds and goes straight back to sleep. This is the plan the ABA describes for the early weeks.

Australian Breastfeeding Association · Supporting your partner after baby is born

In the early weeks, though, frequent breastfeeding helps build and protect your partner's milk supply. Feeding your baby at the breast, day and night, is an important part of how this happens.

How a night on plan 3 runs:

• Evening: after the bedtime feed, mum goes to bed early. The partner stays up with the baby until the next feed. The ABA suggests this: one parent goes to bed early while the other cares for the baby.
• Each night wake: the partner gets up first and changes the nappy. The ABA suggests changing nappies before a feed, or between breasts, so everyone gets back to sleep sooner. The partner brings the baby to mum, then takes the baby back after the feed to burp and settle.
• Early morning: after the first morning feed, the partner takes the baby and mum sleeps in until the next feed. The ABA calls this swapping mornings.

Mum's protected sleep on plan 3 is whatever is left of the baby's 2 to 3 hour sleep bursts once the feed ends. That sounds short. It's still sleep that starts the moment the feed ends, with no nappy, burp or resettle before it.

The partner is up at every wake on plan 3. On work nights, the partner can do the helper job for the first half of the night and sleep through the second half, while mum handles those feeds alone.

On the weekend, the partner gets a sleep-in or a daytime nap while mum takes the baby.

If your baby cluster feeds in the evening, plan 3 works well for that stretch too. The partner holds and settles between feeds, so mum only has to feed. Our guide to cluster feeding and the witching hour explains why evenings get so busy.

Can your partner give a bottle if you're breastfeeding?

Yes, once breastfeeding is going well, your partner can give one bottle of expressed breastmilk at night. In the early weeks, the Australian Breastfeeding Association says bottles, even of expressed breastmilk, can sometimes interrupt the frequent feeding that builds supply. The ABA sets no fixed week, so check timing with your child health nurse or an ABA counsellor.

Once you do add a night bottle, four things from the ABA help protect your supply:

• Keep your longest gap under about 6 hours. The ABA's expressing advice, for mums building supply, is to avoid gaps of more than 6 hours between sessions. A plan 1 split that gives you about 5 hours stays inside that. Our guide to how much breast milk to pump has the session counts and night gaps from Australian hospitals.
• Remember night milk counts. The ABA says your milk-making hormones are highest at night. The more milk that is removed from your breasts, the more you make. A night bottle is a feed your breasts miss, so keep it to one.
• Replace the same feed each night. The ABA's mixed feeding advice(opens in a new window), written for formula top-ups, is to be consistent with which feed you replace, and to breastfeed more if your baby seems hungry at other times.
• Ask your partner to pace the bottle. Paced bottle-feeding(opens in a new window) means holding the baby upright, using a slow-flow teat, keeping the bottle nearly flat and pausing often. It helps the baby take only what they need and keep breastfeeding well.

If the bottle is a formula top-up on a midwife's plan, our guide to mixed feeding and top-ups covers the rest of the day.

Your partner is also the right person to give the bottle. The ABA notes that a breastfed baby sometimes takes expressed milk more easily from someone else, especially when mum isn't nearby.

A bottle does not add sleep on its own. The ABA cites research that breastfeeding mums generally get more night-time sleep than mums using formula, and that formula top-ups do not improve sleep. In one study, parents who used formula at night lost 40 to 45 minutes of sleep a night on average.

A night bottle buys one unbroken block of sleep, not more sleep. Keep it to one feed, keep the gap under about 6 hours, and keep breastfeeding the rest of the night.

Staying safe when you're exhausted

The biggest night-time risk for a tired parent is falling asleep holding the baby, especially on a couch or armchair. Red Nose Australia says falling asleep holding a baby on a couch or chair is always unsafe. If you think you might fall asleep, move yourself and the baby to a safe sleep environment first.

For the parent on shift:

• Feed and settle somewhere you won't doze off with the baby, and put the baby back in their own cot, on their back, before you go to sleep.
• Keep the baby's sleep space in your room. Red Nose recommends a baby sleeps in their own safe sleep space, in the same room as a parent or caregiver, for at least the first 6 months.
• Stay out of bed with the baby when you're exhausted. Red Nose says never to co-sleep or lie down holding a baby if you're overly tired or unwell.

Our newborn sleep guide sets out the rest of the Australian safe sleep guidelines.

Know when your baby needs help, too. The Royal Children's Hospital(opens in a new window) says a baby under 3 months with a fever above 38°C should see a doctor as soon as possible. A baby under 1 month with a fever above 38°C should go to hospital.

Call 000 if your baby is struggling to breathe, turns blue or very pale, or you cannot wake them.

Watch each other, too. The ABA lists signs of postnatal anxiety and depression, which can affect mums and partners: ongoing low mood or anxiety, feeling constantly overwhelmed, trouble sleeping even when there's a chance to rest, and feeling disconnected. If these last more than a couple of weeks, or get in the way of daily life, the ABA says to talk to a doctor or child health nurse.

The 3am handover: what the next person needs to know

At a handover, the parent coming on needs four facts without waking the one going off: when the last feed was, how it went, the last nappy, and anything unusual. Agree the list once, in daylight, and write it down in the same place every time.

The handover list:

• Last feed: when it started, and which side it ended on or how much the bottle held.
• Last nappy: wet, dirty or both.
• Sleep and settling: when the baby last went down, and what settled them. The same notes fill in a sleep diary if your nurse has asked for one.
• Anything unusual: a refused feed, a lot of spit-up, a rash or a temperature.

A notebook by the cot does the job, as long as both of you write in it. So does a shared note on your phones. Our guide to sharing baby tracking with your partner covers house rules that keep a shared log accurate, like logging each feed when it happens.

BabyLog, the tracker we make, keeps this handover as a free shared log: you each log from your own phone, and the home screen shows how long ago the last feed and nappy were and who logged them.

Pro adds optional night-feed reminders that each of you switches on for yourself. If a shared log would help, you can start free and invite your partner.

As your baby grows, night feeds thin out and the plan gets easier. Our guide to night feeds by age shows what to expect. Whichever plan you choose, try it for a week, then adjust it together, with BabyLog free or a notebook by the cot.

Common questions