Breathing exercises for snoring: what the trials actually show

    You have been told, repeatedly, and possibly moved to another room. You wake with a dry mouth and a sore throat and you do not feel like you slept for eight hours even when you did.

    Do this now

    Nose first, then the throat

    3 minutes

    1. Sit on the edge of the bed. Breathe out, pinch the nose, nod gently until you want to breathe, then release and breathe in small through the nose.
    2. Three to five rounds, until the nose is clear. A blocked nose forces mouth breathing, and mouth breathing is most of the noise.
    3. Then the tongue: push the tip hard against the roof of the mouth and slide it backwards, twenty times.
    4. Then say a strong, held "aaah" ten times, and swallow deliberately with the tongue pressed up, ten times.
    5. Lie down on your side, mouth closed. Side sleeping alone reduces snoring for many people.
    Run it with a timer

    Where the noise comes from

    Snoring is soft-tissue vibration in a narrowed upper airway — soft palate, tongue base, pharyngeal walls. During sleep, muscle tone in those structures drops. If the airway is already narrow, or the mouth is open so the tongue falls back, the air passing through sets the tissue flapping. That is the whole mechanism, and everything useful follows from it.

    Why oropharyngeal exercises have evidence

    Randomised trials of daily tongue, soft palate and pharyngeal exercises — sometimes called myofunctional therapy — report meaningful reductions in snoring intensity and frequency, and in mild to moderate obstructive sleep apnoea a reduction in the apnoea-hypopnoea index of roughly half in meta-analysis. Playing a wind instrument, and the didgeridoo specifically, has produced the same effect in a controlled trial. It is training the airway muscles, not a breathing pattern.

    The nose is the cheap half

    An obstructed nose makes mouth breathing obligatory, and open-mouth sleep both narrows the airway at the tongue base and dries the tissue, which increases vibration. Getting the nose open and keeping the mouth closed is the least glamorous and most reliable half of the job.

    What changes it, over a week

    • Daily, ten minutes

      The tongue, palate and swallowing exercises. Trials that worked ran for three months — this is a slow build, not a week.

    • Every night

      The nose unblocking sequence before lying down, and side sleeping rather than on your back.

    • All day

      Nose breathing. Daytime mouth breathing predicts night-time mouth breathing.

    • Alcohol and late meals

      Both relax the airway and worsen snoring. Test a fortnight without either in the three hours before bed.

    When this is not a breathing pattern

    See a clinician — promptly, and before assuming any of this applies to you — if any of these describe you:

    • Witnessed pauses in breathing, gasping or choking in sleep — that is a sleep-study question and outranks everything on this page
    • Falling asleep involuntarily during the day, or sleepiness while driving — seek assessment urgently
    • Morning headaches, high blood pressure, or an irregular heartbeat alongside snoring
    • Snoring in a child, which is not benign and needs a paediatric opinion
    • Sudden onset snoring with weight gain, nasal obstruction or a neck lump

    This page is education, not medical advice, and no part of it is a diagnosis. Full disclaimer.

    Questions people ask

    Do these exercises work for sleep apnoea too?
    In mild to moderate cases, meta-analysis shows they reduce the apnoea-hypopnoea index substantially — about half. They are an adjunct to proper care, not a replacement for CPAP or a diagnosis, and apnoea needs diagnosing first.
    How long before the snoring changes?
    The trials ran for three months of daily practice. People often notice something by four to six weeks; nobody should expect a week to do it.
    Is mouth taping a shortcut?
    For a healthy adult with a clear nose who has been screened for apnoea, small studies suggest it may reduce mild snoring. It is unsafe with untreated apnoea, nasal obstruction, evening alcohol or nausea, so the screening comes first.
    Does losing weight help?
    It is one of the most effective interventions there is for snoring and for apnoea severity, because airway calibre is directly affected. It is also the hardest, which is why the exercises and the nose are worth doing in parallel rather than instead.

    What this page is built on

    • — Guimarães et al., 2009, American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine — randomised oropharyngeal exercises in moderate OSA
    • — Camacho et al., 2015, Sleep — meta-analysis of myofunctional therapy in obstructive sleep apnoea
    • — Puhan et al., 2006, BMJ — didgeridoo playing for snoring and mild to moderate sleep apnoea, randomised
    • — Traditional: singing and wind-instrument training as long-standing upper-airway conditioning

    Named by author and year. The DOIs live in the journal.

    Put a number on it

    Most of what is on this page tracks one measurement: the Control Pause. It takes sixty seconds, needs no account, and it is the thing that tells you whether any of this is working.

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    Go deeper

    From the journal

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