Queen-Size Bed vs. Double-Size Bed
Standardized bed sizes are relatively new in the history of modern bedding. For the most part, people have made beds custom-fit their needs. Standardization in bed size became part of the landscape with the Industrial Revolution and the advent of mass production. Queen and double are two popular standardized bed sizes. Does this Spark an idea?
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Queen Mattress Basics
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A queen bed mattress is approximately 60 inches wide by 80 inches long, for a total of 4,800 square inches of sleeping area. This gives each sleeper about 30 inches of individual room -- about three-quarters of the space they would have sleeping alone in a twin bed.
Double Mattress Basics
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Double mattresses, also called full-size mattresses, are 53 inches wide by 75 inches long. This is a total of 3,975 square inches. Although the width is spacious for an individual sleeping alone, it leaves only 26 1/2 inches per person when sharing a double mattress. This is less than the average shoulder width of most adults.
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International Variations
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The dimensions described above are for mattresses made in North America. Both Europe and Asia have their own dimensions, both smaller than the North America's, for double and queen mattresses. European queens are also sized differently, longer but narrower than their North American counterparts. Asian standard mattress sizes don't include a queen option.
Purpose
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Despite its name, double mattresses aren't intended to serve the co-sleeping market. They are intended as a spacious bed for people who normally sleep alone -- with enough room to be reasonably comfortable when occasionally sharing a bed. By contrast, queen beds are built for and marketed to couples who regularly share a bed. Though it's quite comfortable to sleep alone on a queen and feasible to share a full bed, those aren't the intended purposes of either mattress.
Price
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Larger mattresses are naturally more expensive than their smaller cousins. As of 2011, you can expect to pay about 10 to 20 percent more for a queen mattress than a double mattress of similar quality and brand, according to pricing information at Amazon.com. Also, full mattresses often "top out" in quality at a lower level than queen mattresses, so you can potentially spend a great deal more on a queen than a double bed.
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References
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