There’s no shortage of quality sleep machines out there for babies. But when it comes to the cream of the crop, few stand above Hatch Rest and Hatch Rest Plus. Both of these machines offer great features at a reasonable price point, but when they go head to head, which one comes out on top?

Let’s break it down: Hatch Rest

The Hatch Rest is the original sleep machine released by Hatch Baby (now just Hatch) and quickly became one of the top infant must-haves on the market. With a huge range of features like great volume, the ability to turn it on via touch, and the ability to choose from hundreds of combinations of colors and sounds to make your favorites, the Hatch Rest is no slouch. Let’s take a look at the pro’s and cons:

What we love:

• At $59.99 USD the Hatch Rest is cheaper than the Hatch Rest Plus and very much in line with competitors in the market

• Works primarily as a sound machine (and does that incredibly well)

• Has a night-light function

• Has a programmable touch ring that can be used to power the unit on and off, as well as to cycle through your favorite presets

• Can be programmed for “Time to Rise” which helps when sleep training toddlers

• Can be paired with the Hatch Sleep app

What we don’t:

• The Hatch Rest connects with your phone and app via bluetooth. Bluetooth has a limited range and the sound machine can lost connection with your phone if there are too many walls between you and the device

• No backup battery which means this unit has to be plugged into the wall to work

• Does not have an audio monitor like the Hatch Rest +

Hatch Rest Plus

The Hatch Rest Plus is the newest, biggest, baddest sound machine on the block for any smart nursery. With all of its upgraded features it seems like this would be the best option, but let’s go quickly through the pros and cons.

What we love:

• Works primarily as a sound machine (and does that incredibly well)

• Has a backup battery so it can be moved from room to room and will work if your power goes out

• Has a night-light function

• Has a programmable touch ring that can be used to power the unit on and off, as well as to cycle through your favorite presets

• Can be programmed for “Time to Rise” which helps when sleep training toddlers

• Can be paired with the Hatch Sleep app via Wifi

• Device connects to your phone via the app and wifi, which gives it a much greater range. This means you can essentially control it from anywhere.

what we don’t:

• At $89.99 USD the Hatch Rest Plus is more expensive than the Hatch Rest and most other sound machines on the market.

• The backup battery only lasts for a few hours, great for naps but won’t last for an entire nights sleep

• If your wifi goes out, you can’t use the smart app to control the device

OVERALL WINNER: Hatch Rest+

Now that we’ve had a few months using both machines we’ve been able to come to some pretty solid conclusions about which one is the better value. While the Hatch Rest is an incredible sound machine and has some killer features, the Rest Plus just takes all of those up a few notches and adds a backup battery, which gives you much more flexibility in how and when you use this sound machine to help your little one (and you) get a more restful nights sleep. With the added bonus of long-range control via wifi, the Hatch Rest Plus has just enough tweaks and upgrades to make up for the $30 price difference.