Hi there -- Thanks for your question. This is an interesting question because there are two opposite conclusions that could be drawn from these data points. The interesting part is that either conclusion would be incorrect. :)

The first conclusion was that since Consumer Reports said it was the "best choice," that it must be a good choice for you. This is wrong because the fundamental reality is no mattress is a "best choice" for everyone -- nor even a "good choice" for everyone. Mattresses are highly personal, so the best choice for you is one that best meets your unique needs and preferences -- across dozens of different considerations.

The second conclusion was that since some people didn't like a given mattress or brand (as evidenced by some negative reviews) that it must not be good. The reality here is threefold. First, you have the issue of adverse selection -- unhappy people are more likely to write a review than happy people, so negative experiences are disproportionately represented in the reviews of any product. Second, you have the issue of how long people have owned the product -- star ratings on GoodBed are lower across the board because people are much less generous when assessing their mattress after owning it for a year or more (which is the average for GoodBed) than they are in the first few weeks of ownership (which is the average for sites like Amazon and other retailers). Lastly, you have the issue of personal fit -- when left to their own devices, most people are not good at choosing the right mattress for them (this is one of the fundamental reasons that we created this site, and has even been scientifically proven in a study done by Duke University) -- their poor choice will surely result in a low star rating, but that does not mean the same mattress would be a poor choice for you.

Net, there is a lot of noise to sort through when choosing a mattress, and unfortunately there is no easy list of recommended or top-rated mattresses that will give you the answer. The reality is that mattresses are highly personal, which is why we ultimately created a sophisticated quiz that searches across all brands and stores (both online and offline) and uses an intelligent matching algorithm to identify choices that best match your personal needs and preferences. If you haven't already taken it, I would highly recommend it as a starting point:

https://www.goodbed.com/mattress-finder/

In your quiz results, you will see 3 top matches from both online and your local stores -- click your match score for any of them to see an explanation of how we calculated it. If you want to see more than 3 options from either online or local stores, just look for the button in your results to view a more comprehensive list. You will also find that after taking the quiz, your experience on GoodBed becomes highly personalized -- e.g., as you view various product pages on this site, you will see your personal match score for that product along with an explanation of how we calculated it.

I hope that helps.