Thicker duvets make sense in winter
In the cold winter months, a warmer duvet is the best choice to keep at optimum sleeping temperature (ideally between 16 and 18 degrees). In our experience, most people seem happy with a TOG 12 duvet or TOG 13.5 duvet – it’s rare to need more than this unless you’re in an older house with poor heating, or you are elderly and feel the cold easily.
A 13.5 tog duvet can be made up from two duvets – one at at TOG 4.5 and one at TOG 9. This means that when they are combined – usually by poppers or buttons on the corners or edges, they make up a single TOG 13.5 duvet for wintertime. These are known as ‘all seasons duvets‘ – click link for more information.
Natural or synthetic filling for a winter duvet?
The main consideration for a winter duvet is how bulky you mind your duvet being. Synthetic duvets will simply need more polyester / hollowfibre filling to be warmer – the more you put in, the warmer it is. This means that some cheaper 13.5 tog duvets can be rather chunky and not drape so well over the bed. If you don’t mind that, and you need to stick to a budget, then there are plenty on offer – read ‘synthetic duvet reviews‘.
Natural fillings are down, feather, wool and silk
If you want a duvet that is very warm but not so bulky and drapes well, then consider down, feather and down, wool or silk. These natural fillings are much better at keeping you warm without the need for more and more filling. Down and wool have fantastic insulating properties – keeping the geese, ducks or sheep warm throughout the cold winter, without having to grow an extra skin! So it figures that they do the same for you. Down is particularly clever as the tiny down feathers trap air in between the filaments, and the better quality down it is (often the further north it comes from), generally the more warmth it creates with the same amount of down. This is called ‘fill power’ – there’s more about this on our ‘About Down Duvets‘ page, or at Wikipedia for some more technical information.
Wool is a good choice if you’re prone to allergies or want a really eco-friendly option; you can buy organic wool duvets now too. Wool is naturally anti-allergenic, fire retardant and wicks away moisture in case you get too hot through the night after cosily snuggling down in bed. We’ve put some more information here in our ‘About Wool Duvets’ page.
Read reviews of 13.5+ tog duvets here.