The first study ever to examine sleeping behavior in a wild group of primates has challenged a central tenet of sleep science: that we must make up for lost sleep. Even after sleeping poorly, wild baboons still spent time on other priorities, such as socializing with group-mates or looking out for predators, rather than catching up on lost sleep. The team of scientists from the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior and the University of California, Davis used non-invasive technology to monitor sleep patterns across almost an entire group of individuals at once. The findings lay bare the competing priorities that suppress sleep homeostasis in wild primate societies—raising the possibility that humans have navigated sleep deprivation throughout our evolutionary history.