Sleep and anti-calcitonin gene related peptide (CGRP) drugs: current evidence and perspectives

Migraine and sleep share a bidirectional relationship: sleep disruption can trigger migraine attacks, while migraine impairs sleep continuity and quality. Calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP), central to migraine pathophysiology, also contributes to sleep regulation through hypothalamic and brainstem circuits that control arousal and circadian rhythms. This overlap raises the question of whether pharmacological inhibition of CGRP with monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) or gepants could affect sleep. This scoping review summarizes evidence on anti-CGRP therapies and their impact on sleep quality, efficacy, and tolerability. Although results are inconsistent across instruments, emerging data suggest that anti-CGRP mAbs and gepants, particularly erenumab, galcanezumab, and atogepant, can improve subjective sleep quality and objective measures such as sleep efficiency in some cases. Evidence for fremanezumab and eptinezumab remains scarce, whereas large-scale pharmacovigilance datasets indicate low rates of insomnia, somnolence, or abnormal dreams. Overall, current findings suggest that CGRP inhibition impacts the sleep system, but the mechanisms of this interaction remain partly understood, representing a promising area for mechanistic exploration and clinical application. Future studies with standardized sleep endpoints are needed to distinguish direct neuropharmacological effects from indirect benefits mediated by improvement in migraine burden.