Otty original hybrid mattress review: Supported sleep at an affordable price

Otty original hybrid mattress design and features

The Otty original hybrid arrives rolled up tight in a sturdy, recyclable box – the cardboard is reassuringly thick and secured with staples to keep your mattress free from damage in transit. The delivery team will also drop it off in any room in your home for a £10 charge, which we’d say is well worth the money if you want it shifting up some stairs. It’s pretty weighty, and you’ll definitely need two people to lift it if you decline this offer.

The packaging means a bit of elbow grease is required to roll the hybrid from its container, but once you do, you’ll find that Otty has thought of the finer details from the get-go, including a handy paper guide and your very own comma-shaped cutting tool to release it from the inner plastic without any accidental nicks to the fabric.

Forgive our excess enthusiasm, but watching this mattress “reinflate” is actually, if we’re honest, really fun. It comes out flat as a pancake with a slight curl, but once the shrink wrap is cut, it instantly begins to puff up proudly – think of it like watching one of those slow-mo dough rising clips in real time and you’ll get a sense of why we found it quite so satisfying. Otty says it can be used 2-4 hours after opening, but we were seriously impressed with how quickly it plumped itself back to life (there was barely any of the slightly odd, lingering scent you get with competitors we’ve tried in the past, we must note).

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Its 25cm height is ideal for a standard fitted sheet, and the exterior of the Otty original hybrid is a washable thick-knit cover that you can zip off and wash at 40C – a handy way to keep your investment clean with fairly minimal effort and no mattress protector. But as anyone who’s ever slept on a rubbish mattress will know, it’s what’s on the inside that really counts when it comes to upgrading your sleep space. And happily, this one delivers on that front too.

On top is a 3cm layer of temperature-controlling memory foam, which we definitely noticed the benefit of during an unseasonal week of heatwave during testing. This is followed by another 3cm of high density reflex foam, intended to offer superior support for your joints in any number of awkward positions.

Then come the springs – 2,000 of them in our king size, to be precise, with a 16cm height that’s pretty sizeable when compared with the rest of the market (Eve’s springs measure 12cm, Simba’s 2.5cm, and Emma’s just 2cm, for example). Otty says this gives it a medium-firm feel, although from our experience we’d say it skews further towards the firm end of that definition. Followed up with airflow side support and an HD base foam foundation, this is a strapping high-spec mattress that’s built to last the duration of its 10-year guarantee.

Otty original hybrid mattress comfort and performance

Our first impression upon sitting on the Otty original hybrid was that it offers just the right amount of bounce – it doesn’t simply sink beneath you like a memory foam mattress, but equally doesn’t feel excessively “springy” like some of its more enthusiastic companions. These first impressions only improved when we lay down on it – it supports you from head to toe with equal weighting, with no sagging and minimal give.

Whether or not the Otty is the right fit for you will depend on your firmness preference. If 0 is very soft and 10 is very firm, for instance, we’d rate the Otty at around 7.5 or possibly even an 8 on that scale. It’s dense and relatively rigid, which takes a little bit of adjustment if it’s something you’re not used to. However, this is not to the detriment of its comfort – those generously-sized springs really do make all the difference, and we found it snug rather than stiff throughout our four weeks of testing.

Another factor that got a tick from us is its motion transfer, or lack thereof – when our partner gets up for a 5:30am alarm, we stay sound asleep, and have to reach out to check if they’re actually gone in the morning. We don’t even feel each other fidget in the night.

Read more: Emma vs Simba: Which hybrid mattress is best?

Maintenance-wise, you’re not supposed to flip this hybrid mattress, simply rotate it once a month for the first year, and periodically thereafter, to ensure even wear. Again, this is a job that we think requires two people (or one rather strong one!), so that’s worth considering before you click “add to basket”.

Overall, as a package that costs substantially less than some of the luxe options in the current bed-in-a-box arena, with prices from £439.99, and frequent offers that mean you can often get as much as 40 per cent off, it represents good value for money – especially when backed by a 100-day trial, which means you can return it if you find it’s not for you.