Long-haul flight essentials for sleeping on a plane

A neck pillow with a rigid skeleton, adjustable in three separate places to fit necks from 28 to 53 cm around.

Most travel pillows are a ring of foam. Foam gives way. That is why a head that drops forward in the second hour ends up folded against the chest by the fourth. Cabeau put precision-molded plastic shells inside the memory foam, and the company says the shape stops the head falling more than 10 degrees in any direction. The foam is what touches you; the shell is what does the holding.

The three adjustments each solve a different fit problem. A strap behind a rear zipper sets the circumference. The upper and lower lobes slide to change height, so a long neck and a short one both get support under the jaw. A cord with a ball lock at the front sets how firmly the two ends meet, and that setting decides whether the chin rests on something or slides off it.

Cooling vents run through the cover to let heat out, and the cover itself comes off for a cool machine wash. The foam insert stays out of the machine. Wipe it with a damp cloth and let it air dry.

It rolls into a coil for its travel case, and the case has straps to clip it to the outside of a bag, so it never takes space inside one. Cabeau adds a lifetime warranty for owners who register it.

Expect it to feel firmer than a pillow. The support is the point, and the first ten minutes in it feel more like a brace than a cushion.

Evolution X Travel Neck PillowCabeau$55 at Amazon

The first product from Loop that goes over your eyes instead of into your ears, with a foam pad that comes off for the washing machine.

Loop made its name with earplugs, and co-founder Maarten Bodewes describes the Eclipse as the start of the company's next chapter after earwear. The logic carries across. Earplugs that nobody wears block nothing, and the same is true of a mask that slips off at 3 a.m.

Loop shaped the foam eye pad into cups. They seal around the eye sockets without pressing on the lids or the lashes. On a flat mask the fabric sits on the eyelids, and the eyes move under them all through the night. The cups also leave the lashes room, which matters if you fly with mascara on.

Anti-slip grip zones inside the mask hold it in place, and Loop designed them for every sleep position. On a plane that means the lean against the window, where the side of the head presses the strap into the wall. The strap closes with hook-and-loop on a curved band, and the fabric is 85% nylon and 15% elastane.

The pad detaches completely from the shell. That turns a mask from something wiped occasionally into something that goes through the wash with everything else after a trip, and the part against your face after a nine-hour flight is the part that needs it.

Loop had the Eclipse validated by SleepScore Labs in a study of more than 1,000 nights. Pair it with earplugs and the two senses that keep you awake in a cabin are both covered.

Eclipse Sleep MaskLoop Earplugs$50 at Amazon

A 160 by 110 cm ground sheet that packs to 11 by 7 by 3 cm and weighs 108 grams.

This one is for the part of a long-haul trip spent off the plane. A six-hour connection turns the gate area into a waiting room with too few chairs, and the carpet by the window is often the only place long enough to lie down. The Pocket Blanket makes that floor a clean, dry surface in about the time it takes to unfold it.

The face is 20-denier recycled nylon with a water-resistant finish that keeps damp from coming through. It is not a warm blanket and makes no claim to be. On board, the airline fleece does that job; this one keeps you off whatever the fleece would otherwise be lying on.

Matador prints the fold lines onto the fabric, a pattern it calls Easy-Pack, so repacking follows the printed lines and ends up the same size as it left the factory. Printing them on, not sewing them, keeps needle holes out of the fabric and helps it stay water resistant. The storage pouch stays sewn to the blanket, which removes the usual way a stuff sack gets lost: separately, in the dark.

The corners carry integrated stakes and sand pockets, which have nothing to do with airports and everything to do with the beach or park at the other end. Open, it seats two to four adults.

At 108 grams, it weighs less than a paperback and folds to the size of a deck of cards, so it can live permanently in the carry-on.

Pocket BlanketMatador$35 at Amazon

A Bluetooth transmitter that plugs into the seatback headphone jack and sends the film to your own wireless headphones, two pairs at once.

Nearly every seatback screen still outputs audio through a 3.5 mm analogue socket, and nearly every good pair of headphones sold now has no cable to plug into it. The AirFly Pro 2 sits between the two. It weighs 16.5 grams and measures 56.6 by 29 by 11.2 mm, small enough to hang from the jack without pulling it loose.

The reason to use it on a long flight is noise cancelling. Airline earbuds block nothing, and a pair of noise-cancelling headphones connected through the AirFly lets you hear dialogue without raising the volume over the engines. Two sets of headphones can pair at the same time, each with its own button, so two people watch the same film without sharing earbuds.

Twelve South rates the battery at more than 25 hours, which outlasts the longest scheduled routes, and it charges over USB-C in two hours. It supports aptX, and reviewers testing it have confirmed Qualcomm's aptX Adaptive. Volume buttons sit on the unit, and a double press on minus mutes it when the cabin announcement starts.

A switch flips it from transmit to receive, which turns a car or speaker with an aux input into a Bluetooth one after you land.

One thing to check before you fly: some older aircraft use a two-prong socket. The standard Pro 2 has no adapter for it; the Deluxe version adds an international airline adapter and a travel case.

AirFly Pro 2Twelve South$60 at Amazon

An organiser that opens wide enough to see every cable at once, with a port that lets a charger run in while it stays zipped.

In a dark cabin, with the tray table down and a neighbour asleep, finding one cable in a bag is a job done by feel. The Tech Pouch answers that by laying its contents out in origami-style pockets and elastic loops that stand open when the main zip goes round. Nothing sits on top of anything else. An SD card, a pen, a spare cable and a battery each have a fixed place, which is what lets you find them without a torch.

The Regular size is 2 litres, about 24 by 15 by 10 cm outside, and it comes in a Small as well. Peak Design says it fits every Apple brick-style charger. The shell is weatherproof recycled nylon canvas, and it holds its shape instead of slumping, so it stands upright on a tray table.

The detail that matters on a plane is the cable pass-through. A lead runs out of the zipped exterior pocket to the seat's USB socket, and a phone or battery charges inside without the pouch staying open on your lap. Small handles on the outside let it come out of the overhead bin in one grab.

It fits inside Peak Design's own travel bags and works as a standalone bag on a short walk. Next to the frequent flyer accessories we covered earlier, it is the one that stays under the seat in front for the whole flight.

Tech PouchPeak Design$60 at Amazon

Pillow and mask stay in the seat with you. The AirFly goes into the seat's audio socket before the safety video. The Tech Pouch goes under the seat in front, where the pass-through reaches the USB port. The blanket stays in the carry-on until the connection. Of the five, it does its work on the ground.