Temporary or chronic impairment of sleep quality results in fatigue, irritability, slowed responses, and general daytime dysfunction. 31 In the common cold, nasal congestion and cough are the most commonly reported disruptive symptoms causing reduced sleep quality.32,33 Studies in allergic rhinitis have demonstrated that relief of nasal congestion improves sleep quality,34,35 and efficient symptom relief significantly improved the difficulty of falling asleep or waking up at night.28,36 In this study, participants who experienced nasal congestion due to the common cold reported improvements in sleep quality from day 1 after xylometazoline hydrochloride 0.1% usage, with similar findings for the associated QoL factors ‘sleep well’ and ‘snoring’. Analysis of individual symptom scores showed that nasal congestion (‘plugged nose’) positively correlates with the ‘sleep well’ factor (r = 0.60). These data suggest that alleviating nasal congestion during the early stages of the common cold is associated with improved sleep quality, thereby improving overall QoL.