Your child will spend thousands of hours of sleep on a crib mattress, making it one of the most important items to buy at the nursery and essential for your baby’s safety and well-being.
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) encourages parents to use a firm and flat crib mattress to reduce the risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Studies have also shown that some crib mattress designs can reduce exposure to harmful chemicals, increase breathability and airflow, and reduce the risk of choking. Below we have listed a list of recommended mattresses for cribs.
1. The Newton Crib Mattress
Newton, with its completely breathable (and washable!) design, is the safest crib mattress on our list. Recommended by Dr. Sears, this top-of-the-line Newton Wovenaire crib mattress is made in the USA, is Greenguard GOLD certified, and has won the JPMA Innovation Award. Unlike other crib mattresses, Newton is not double-firm, in other words, it doesn’t have a hard side for babies and a soft side for toddlers. Instead, Newton found the sweet spot between firmness and softness for the entire mattress, so you never have to worry about which side of the mattress your baby sleeps on. Truth be told, they do an excellent job of finding the perfect mattress firmness for babies and toddlers. Using foam will make it easier to place a denser foam on one side than on the other. Instead, Newton developed a food-grade Wovenaire polymer core that allowed them to completely eliminate the use of polyurethane foam and metal springs.
Wovenaire cores offer three main benefits. First of all, since it is 90% air, the mattress is very breathable and lightweight. High breathability reduces the risk of suffocation, while the lighter weight makes changing sheets a breeze. Secondly, the Wovenaire core avoids the harmful chemical emissions of the polyurethane foam and offers greater durability. Thirdly, the core is completely washable: just remove the zipper lid and you can spray it with a shower head or garden hose! Made with the same polymer as food-grade yogurt cups, Newton has been widely praised for its innovative core!
2. Naturepedic Organic Breathable Crib Mattress
The Naturepedic crib mattress stands out for its high-quality organic construction and breathable cover, this American-made organic mattress is made of high-quality materials with double hardness (softer on the side of the cribtress and on the side of the toddler’s mattress), and you can choose between a core with coil springs or a lightweight wave support. We opted for a more traditional coil core instead of a wave-supported polyethylene core. The coil core has 252 springs, organic cotton padding, and an organic cover. In our experience, coil cores can help mattresses avoid indentations or bumps over time, maintain good support for years, and you don’t need to worry about nasty venting from foam cores. Although a bit heavy (19 pounds) and a bit pricey, we think the coil core is a good choice. This mattress is Greenguard GOLD and GOTS certified, made with seamless edges, square corners, and has received good reviews. It’s also hypoallergenic, and it’s not just that the lid is organic, it’s all the material (except, of course, the spring itself).
The mattress label on the inside of the bedspread indicates that it is made of organic fiber batting and non-GMO PLA cotton wool (polylactide batting). Everything about this mattress looks, smells and feels great, and for double firmness, the baby side is very firm and the toddler side is soft and soft. The seams and stitching are of high quality, the overlay is breathable and comfortable, and the waterproof core lining is made of organic cotton with a water-repellent coating.
One of the unique features of this mattress is that the breathable cover is not zippered, it is like a fitted sheet. Well, this coil-spring crib mattress weighs 19 pounds, which makes it cumbersome to completely pull out of the crib to replace the bedspread. However, this type of bedspread simply pulls over the edges, so you don’t need to pull the mattress out of the crib. In addition to the Greenguard GOLD and GOTS certifications, this mattress is also MADE SAFE certified, one of the most rigorous certification processes in existence (Avocado also holds this certification).
3. The Emily Crib Mattress
The Emily crib mattress stands out for its natural construction, certified organic materials, and sturdy built-in spring core. Emily is made by My Green Mattress Company, which may sound cheesy, but we guarantee it’s great!Emily crib mattresses are made in the USA and are of very high quality, with certified organic materials, and have GOTS, GOLS, and Greenguard GOLD certifications. Emily features a coil spring core (150 springs) covered in a layer of organic wool and organic quilted cotton cover. It has a highly breathable organic cotton hood with wool lint underneath, cotton provides superior airflow and keeps you cool in the summer, while wool keeps you warm in the winter. Under the luxurious and comfortable bedspread is a very high quality mattress core with 150 loops of built-in springs, edge and corner supports, organic coconut coir and organic wool lint.
4. Avocado Green Crib Mattress
This crib mattress stands out for its extremely high-quality organic construction and sustainable materials!Avocado is most similar to Naturepedic, but there are some key differences. Avocado does not have a waterproof layer or a 3D mesh vent. It does, however, have a beautifully quilted surface and a completely organic construction, and is certified by GOTS, GOLS, MADE SAFE, and Greenguard GOLD. It offers everything a discerning parent could want, including all the proper organic certifications, organic coconut shell and latex cores, breathable surfaces and cores, and truly beautiful handcrafted structures from the United States (California). It is also important that this mattress does not contain: polyurethane or polyurethane foam, chemical adhesives or flame retardants, vinyl, heavy metal springs, chemical flame retardants, plastics or polymers, or exhaust gases. Instead of using a plastic polymer core like Newton Wovenaire or Naturepedic WaveSupport, Avocado uses an organic coconut shell core infused with flexible organic latex. Like the Newton, Emily, and Naturepedic, the Avocado crib mattress is completely flat when transported, so you don’t need to spend time worrying about whether it will expand properly after being rolled up tightly.
The only downside is that Avocado doesn’t include a removable cover – you can buy one separately from your Avocado mattress, or use a cover of your own choosing. Either way, we highly recommend using a waterproof lining or waterproof cover so you don’t spoil this beautiful mattress!
5.Halo Dreamweave Crib Mattress
The Dreamweave crib mattress features a design very similar to Newton, combining a washable, food-grade polymer core with a breathable, machine-washable, and hypoallergenic zippered quilted mattress topper. The mattress is completely free of polyurethane foam, latex, springs, glues and adhesives, as well as chemical flame retardants, using a mesh polymer core. You and your child can breathe with peace of mind knowing that this mattress doesn’t have any nasty foam emissions, features a fully breathable lid and core, washes thoroughly in the event of an accident, and is Greenguard GOLD certified. In our tests, we liked Dreamweave and considered it a strong competitor to the popular Newton. It’s shipped flat in a large box, which means there’s no need to unfold or unfold – just pull it out of the box and bag and you’re ready to go! In fact, Halo makes the 3d mesh vent comfortable enough that you don’t need to buy separate sheets, and it’s washable, so you don’t need to buy a mattress protector.
One of the main differences between the Halo Dreamweave and Newton crib mattresses is that the toddler side of the Halo mattress cover is waterproof, while Newton’s charges around $50 more for this feature. Basically, the mattress prioritizes breathability on the baby’s side and excludes a waterproof barrier, but this barrier is added on the toddler’s side – this is when you really need it (when their bladder gets bigger, then during potty training and possibly during nighttime wetting).