Hard and cool is a short shopping list, and a fair few people walk into Dreams with exactly those two words in their heads: they sleep best on something firm, and they're tired of waking up hot. TheraPur is Dreams' own cooling range, sold in no other shop, and its ActiGel Combination mattresses climb in five rungs: Polar 2000, Arctic 3000, Glacier 4000, Tundra 5000 and Alaska 6000. Dreams calls a hybrid a Combination. The Arctic is the second rung and the firmest of the five, graded Firm to Very Firm, and it's the way into the range for someone who wants firm without the Tundra's thicker build and padded top. I lay on it again in a Dreams store on 31 October 2026. Mostly it's a bed you notice for what doesn't happen: you stay up on the surface and nothing gives way under your hips. What you do notice is the cover, cold the moment you lie down.
Side is how I sleep at home, though in the shop I gave it all three positions. On my side, my shoulder and hip never went in. They stayed on top of the mattress and the pressure gathered at my shoulder, which is what a bed this firm does to a lighter side sleeper. Turned onto my back, it was a different bed: flat and even underneath, with my hips level. My front was just as good. The surface stayed cool for as long as I lay there, and it felt noticeably harder than the Tundra 5000, which is a firm bed in its own right.
I'd tried it at Dreams in March 2026 too, and that visit agrees: my lower back felt held, the bounce was controlled without feeling dead, the edge was secure to sit on, and my shoulder had too little room to sink.
For heavier back and front sleepers, and anyone told to go very firm
That's who I'd buy it for. A heavier back or front sleeper presses further into a mattress, so the firmness that kept me perched on top gives them a level spine, and if they overheat as well, the cool surface comes with it. The other buyer is anyone who has been told to sleep on a very firm mattress and would like it to stay cool. Weight first, then position, is the rule I use, and here the bed and the rule point the same way.
Side sleepers should walk past it, and the lighter you are, the quicker you should walk. Average-weight back sleepers are better off one rung down on the Polar 2000, which gives a little more under the hips and shoulders and costs less. Leave the Arctic out of the spare room as well. A guest needs a bed most bodies can sleep on, and very firm isn't that.
Harder than the Tundra 5000, for less money and without the top
The build is the same quality as the Tundra 5000 two rungs up, in a thinner, cheaper mattress. Both sit at the firm end of Dreams' scale and both put gel foam over micro pocket springs and full-height pocket springs. The differences are depth and what's sewn on top. The Tundra is 30cm, with two sheets of micro springs and a padded panel on its sleeping face. The Arctic is 26cm, with one sheet of micro springs and a flat quilted face. A padded top is worth weighing if you keep a mattress for many years, because it takes the wear and you can't turn it under. The Arctic spares you that question.
What the thinner build costs you is give. Under the graphite cover sit a fibre layer and two layers of ActiGel foam, one of them zoned, with 3cm of gel between them, and on a bed graded Firm to Very Firm that isn't enough to take the harshness off. I felt it, and I'll say it straight: the gel cools this bed, it doesn't soften it. If you want firm with a kinder first inch, that's what the Tundra's extra depth is for, and you pay for it.
As a cheaper way into TheraPur for someone who likes firm, it's good value. Of the five rungs it's the cheapest with the long guarantee, where the Polar 2000 below it carries a far shorter one, and it shares the cooling cover and the gel with every bed above it. The Glacier 4000 one rung up lists the same seven layers and adds springs, a little depth and a pillow top at a softer Medium grade, which makes it a softer bed for a different sleeper.
The cover stays cool, and the gel under it helps
Cooling covers usually leave me unmoved. Plenty feel lovely for a minute and then warm up against your skin like any other fabric, and gel foam is the half of a cooling story I'd normally back. This cover stayed cool the whole time I lay on it, so the graphite in the knit is doing its job, with the ActiGel underneath doing its share. There's no memory foam anywhere in the bed, and the springs leave plenty of air moving through the core.
The owners who bought it in the summer heatwave are the happiest about the cooling. One owner felt no cooling from it at all, a fair reminder that the room does half the job: open a window and drop the duvet tog for the season. I'm on iced coffee whatever the weather, so I understand the appeal of a bed called Arctic.
Then there's the protector. Dreams asks for one from the first night if you might want to use its exchange, and a thick waterproof one puts a layer of plastic between you and the very cover you paid for. Buy a thin, breathable one.
The 3000 is a tier name, and a double has 2,586 springs
Don't read the number as a count. Dreams scales the count with the size of the bed, so a single has 1,713 springs, a double 2,586, a king 3,015 and a super king 3,625, and the name marks the rung, the way 2000 and 4000 mark the rungs either side. The step up from the Polar 2000 is a modest one, and it buys a firmer grade, a second gel layer, a foam border round the springs and nine more years of guarantee. That's a fair trade.
Owners find it hard, and a few found it too hard
Owners who bought it for firm support mostly got what they came for, and several say a sore back or shoulder eased once they'd switched. Where owners complain, it's about the firmness, and the complaints run one way: harder than they expected, and in one case harder than the model they'd lain on in the shop. A couple who already liked firm beds found it too much and swapped it. That sits squarely with what I found, so take the grade at its word and expect the Very Firm end of it.
A harder bed is no favour to a back that doesn't need one, and I'd start most people with a bad back on medium firm. The back-pain owners here do well on it because they're the people it was built for. If you're not sure you are one of them, lie on it for ten minutes in your own sleeping position before you buy, and expect the one delivered to you to feel firmer than the shop's at first. If it's still wrong after the first month, the 100-Night Comfort Guarantee lets you swap it once for another Dreams mattress, for a charge.
One owner had a dip in the middle measured by a Dreams expert at 4.5cm below the edge and was told it had to pass 5cm to count as a fault. A dip that comes early is the fault that worries me most, so put one question to Dreams before you buy: how deep must a dip be before it's treated as a fault? Get the reply in writing. The edge is the other thing owners raise. A couple of owners say the sides sink a little, and on a double shared by two adults that's one more reason to buy the king. One owner says a partner turning over barely registers.
One face, 36kg in a double, and a version that bends for tight stairs
There's only one side to sleep on, so you rotate it and never flip it: end to end once a week until it's three months old, and once a month after that. A double weighs 36kg, so make it a two-person job. A mattress you can turn spreads its wear over two faces, and given the choice I take one every time, so that's the one change I'd make to this bed. Ordinary fitted sheets go round its 26cm (about ten inches), and Dreams delivers it flat, in one piece.
If your staircase has a tight turn, look at the Sleepmotion version, which Dreams makes to flex on its adjustable bases. One owner bought it for exactly that reason and got it up and round the bend without trouble. Order that version for an adjustable base too, since the standard one won't flex with it.
What to buy instead
If you're an average-weight back sleeper, buy the TheraPur ActiGel Polar 2000 instead. It's one rung down, graded Medium Firm, with the same graphite cover and zoned gel over pocket springs, and it gives a little more under your hips and shoulders for less money. Its catch is a far shorter guarantee than the Arctic's, so weigh the saving against the years of guarantee you give up.
For very firm without the gel, Dreams also sells the Dream Team Amersham 1200 Pocket Ortho Mattress. That one is graded Very Firm. Its tufted top has British wool beneath it, and both faces are made to sleep on, which means turning it over is part of the routine. The Ortho in its name is a label word, and on a mattress it usually means firm. Its double has 1,073 springs, a little light to my mind, and its guarantee runs a year, but it's the Dreams bed I'd point anyone at who wants to turn their mattress.
