Context-It is not known whether short duration of sleep is a predictor of future cardiovascular events in hypertensive patients.Objective-To test the hypothesis that short duration of sleep is independently associated with incident cardiovascular diseases (CVD).Design, Setting, and Participants-We performed ambulatory BP monitoring (ABPM) in 1255 subjects with hypertension (mean age: 70.4±9.9 years) and they were followed for an average of 50±23 months. Short sleep duration was defined as <7.5 hrs (20 th percentile). Multivariable Cox hazard models predicting CVD events were used to estimate the adjusted hazard ratio (HR) and 95% CI for short sleep duration. A riser pattern was defined when average nighttime SBP exceeded daytime SBP.Main Outcome Measures-The end point was cardiovascular events: stroke, fatal or non-fatal myocardial infarction (MI), and sudden cardiac death.Results-In multivariable analyses, short duration of sleep (<7.5 hrs) was associated with incident CVD (HR=1.68; 1.06-2.66, P=.03). A synergistic interaction was observed between short sleep duration and the riser pattern (P=.089). When subjects were categorized on the basis of their sleep time and riser/non-riser patterns, the shorter sleep+riser group had a substantially and significantly higher incidence of CVD than the predominant normal sleep+non-riser group (HR=4.43;2.09-9.39, P<0.001), independent of covariates.Conclusions-Short duration of sleep is associated with incident CVD risk, and the combination of riser pattern and short duration of sleep that is most strongly predictive of future CVD, independent of ambulatory BP levels. Physicians should inquire about sleep duration in the risk assessment of hypertensive patients.