Canvas8 reports are available to Canvas8 subscribers. What follows is an adaptation of the research; the full report can be accessed via the View Report link.
Abstract
The phone is still lit up at 11 p.m. There's a snack at midnight, a meeting with a team three time zones away, and a red-eye later in the week. Modern life keeps everything switched on, and the body's internal clock is paying for it. Now that clock is going viral: TikTok and Reddit are full of "sleepmaxxing," cortisol-alignment hacks and morning sunlight walks. Circadian health has gone from a lab topic to a lifestyle. In wellness, the question is shifting from what you do to when you do it.
The research draws on interviews with Lynne Peeples, author of The Inner Clock; Dr. Mariana Figueiro (Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai); Dr. Eugene Chang (University of Chicago); and Dr. Ali Hashtroudi (National School of Occupational Health).
The findings
"The science is finally affirming what our bodies have been trying to tell us all along – that (the times) when we eat, sleep, and get light matters. A lot," says Peeples. Sleep is where people feel it first: nearly 77% of Americans get less than the recommended seven to nine hours a night, and 23% get under six, a threshold linked to higher risk of chronic illness.
Bio-optimizers like Dr. Andrew Huberman explain the hormonal effects of light and food with clinical precision. Carnivore Aurelius swaps SPF for sunlight and raw liver. Ayurveda and traditional Chinese medicine have preached daily rhythms for centuries. They agree on almost nothing else, except that timing matters.
29% of Americans now use sleep trackers and another 34% are interested, rising to 37% of Gen Z who already track their sleep. "Wearables are becoming more accessible and give people constant feedback on sleep and performance," says Figueiro. Apps like Timeshifter help shift workers and travelers reset after time-zone changes.
"The midnight snack is very disruptive of circadian rhythms," says Chang. "Our biology is shaped by cycles of feeding and fasting, not constant consumption." Intermittent fasting, long sold for weight loss, is being recast as circadian alignment, and Lumen, which reads metabolic state from breath, reports over 300,000 users and a 50% jump in search interest.
Skin keeps time as well, protecting by day and repairing by night, and brands are formulating around that. Noble Panacea, founded by Nobel Laureate Sir Fraser Stoddart, makes an overnight peel that releases its actives in three phases over eight hours. Circadia builds its range around melatonin and day-phase exfoliants, and topical melatonin is gaining ground for its antioxidant benefits.
Light is the strongest signal the body's clock responds to, and circadian lighting was long used mainly in hospitals and shift-work settings. Now Equinox Hotels and Six Senses sell rooms with tunable lighting, cool in the morning and amber at night. Sleep tourism is projected to grow from $72.6 billion in 2024 to $237.9 billion by 2034, and circadian lighting from $329 million to $777 million by 2030.
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What this means for brands
- Sell the timing: a serum that works overnight or a snack built for the morning window can say so on the label.
- Serve the jet-lagged: shift workers, frequent flyers and late-night scrollers are the people most out of sync, and the most willing to pay to fix it. "I don't think our knowledge is keeping pace with the increasing number of people doing shift work," says Hashtroudi.
- Make light a product: people now treat light as a health tool, and wearable light therapy like Retimer, smart bulbs and hotel rooms that adjust by the hour are already selling it.
Canvas8 is a behavioural insights agency whose reports are used by brands and agencies worldwide. This page highlights key findings from the report; the full version is available to Canvas8 members.
Alice Sweitzer
