How long can you go without sleeping before you die?

Answer 1

That depends,

There is some sort of a condition (very very rare), where the brain won't realease the chemicals needed to make you go to sleep, the result is fatal. (source: a Discovery channel documentary, the person in question went around 28 days without any sleep before dying.)

In a normal person it is very unlikely as the brain has its defense mechanisms, even if you try to keep yourself awake, with caffeine etc, everything will stop having effect.

Your brain will shut-down automaticaly to prevent permanent damage etc.

On your second week you should start to experience halicinations, this is probably due to the fact that your subconcious is slowly taking over and you see what would normally be dreams while awake.

As a side note: you will have to eat more and more to provide the energy needed to keep up the abnormal function (from personal experience). Also the odds are this does permanent damage to your body/mind/brain, i would sugest to avoid depriving yourself of sleep as much as possible.

Answer 2

Though it is possible to die from this, it is highly unlikely that anybody's body will allow them to get to that point. It varies from one person to the next, but the average human will/can experience fatigue, nausea, restlessness, and lightheadedness after 48 hours of no sleep. By the 72 hour mark, those symptoms can build up to audial, visual, and other basic sensory hallucinations. Though after roughly 96 hours of uninterrupted conciousness, the body will usually shut itself down, as a defense mechanism, or will begin to experience bouts of unconciousness. Whereas most people will fall asleep and stay asleep after 96 hours of no sleep, some people may fall asleep for a matter of moments and do this off and on until the body is recharged enough to stay awake for more than 5 minutes or so. The heart, brain, and lungs all are run by the medula oblongata, and without sleep, this part of the brain will "reset" the whole body to assess how much actual recooperative sleep is needed to maintain involuntary funtions.

Answer 3

Staying asleep will not make a person die but an underlying medical condition might make the person die. Your body will only allow you to sleep for a certain amount of time if you are healthy.

Answer 4

some have went 8+ days... but you suffer from lack of focus day 2 and hallucinations by day 4... Have fun

Answer 5

well this is my fourth night and i'm going to crash any moment. I think one week is the answer

Answer 6

you can't die of exhaustion. You can get some pretty odd symptoms such as hallucination, etc. Your body will just give up and fall asleep.