Your 4 month old baby's development milestones

What can a baby do at 16 weeks? How can you encourage their learning and development? Here are the key developmental milestones to look out for at 4 months, plus need-to-know tips on feeding, sleep regression and encouraging early social skills

baby on tummy with head help up and weight propped on elbows

Published: July 26, 2023 at 10:13 AM

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At 16 weeks, your baby is fast developing a little personality and becoming quite the social animal – in what can seem quite a marked change from even a few weeks ago at the 3-month mark.

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Your baby can focus much more easily on everything around them and they're fascinated by what and who they see. They respond to the sight of you – or their feet or a bright, fun-looking looking toy – with smiles and gurgles and, if anything gets close enough, a nicely and newly co-ordinated reaching arm.

They're also capable of sleeping for longer at night – but don't hang out the bunting just yet. Sadly, 'capable of' doesn't mean 'always will', and there's a key developmental stage that's likely to put a bit of a disruptive sleep spanner in the works...

A baby's first laugh is a magical milestone, bringing joy to parents and marking the beginning of their little one's unique sense of humour and social connection. Discover our article on a Baby's first laugh and what to expect.

At 4 months, the key baby milestones are:

Your baby may also be able to:

Remember: every baby will develop at their own pace. Please don't worry if your baby's development is not exactly tracking what's written here. This is simply a guide to the new skills babies will be developing at this age. If you have any concerns, always speak to your health visitor or GP.

Your baby's movement and head control at 4 months

Your baby's now feeling much more comfortable and secure when you place them on their tummy. From this position, they can hold their head up for longer periods and can probably prop themselves up on their elbows, doing a kind of "mini push-up" and having a good look around.

Your baby will now have good independent head control, and is being much much deliberate with their arm and leg movements. In fact, you'll find they can now reach out with one hand and swipe at toys and other objects nearby.

They may well be able to roll from tummy to back and, if you hold them upright with their feet on the floor, they may push down with their legs in a kind of practice walk.

Your baby's hand-eye coordination is much improved now, which means they can grasp and shake toys that are handed to them. This is a purposeful grasping; very different from the reflex grasping your baby did from birth in response to you touching or stroking their palm (this reflex grasp will gradually disappear over the next few weeks.)

Your baby will also be able to bring their hands (and any grasped toys) towards their mouth, where they'll look at them with fascination or suck on them in dribbly delight.

You can help your baby's physical development by:

Now that your baby's moving more, you should also (if you haven't already):

Your baby's vision and hearing at 4 months

Your baby 's eye muscles are much stronger, which means they can see further and focus much better. This means they can now concentrate their gaze on objects in their hands, as well a detect objects moving away from them and towards them. They are also starting to be able to recognise people they are familiar with from a distance.

Their ability to see colour is improving all the time and they'll probably be able to differentiate between similar shades of colours and even detect variations in shading.

But the key progress this month is how well your baby is beginning to co-ordinate what they're seeing with how they're moving – meaning they're now able to spot something interesting and make a move towards it with their arm.

You can help your baby's sensory development by:

Your baby's social and communication skills at 4 months

With their improved vision and movement, your baby is becoming much more interested in joining in with what's going on around them. They can smile spontaneously to get your attention (not just in response to your smile) and may even reach for your nose or place their hand on your cheek when your face is close to them.

As the weeks tick by, you many find that your baby is also starting to mimick your facial expressions. They are showing clearer preferences for what they like (smiling, chuckling, kicking legs, opening their mouth when they see the bottle or breast) and don't like (crying when playtime stops). You may even be finding it easier to tell, when they cry, if they're hungry, hurt or just plain tired.

Your baby will be babbling and cooing and copying sounds they hear, turning their head towards you when you speak and making sounds back: they're beginning to learn the art of conversation.

You can help your baby's social development by:

Your baby's sleeping at 4 months

Your baby will be sleeping for longer at night – maybe 6 to 7 hours at a stretch – but we can't promise this will be consistent (sorry). During the day, your baby will probably take 3 or 4 'naps' of about 30 minutes to 2 hours at a time, and spend several hours awake. In total, most babies of this age will sleep for 12 to 16 hours per (24-hour) day.

Doesn't sound too bad? Well, brace yourself: the 4th month is a time when your baby is quite likely to have a "sleep regression" – which, as the name sounds, is a period when their night-time sleep goes all disrupted and unpredictable, a bit like it was when they were just a few weeks old.

It's a very common thing (not that this is much comfort in the middle of the night, we know) and is a sign that your baby's transitioning away from a newborn sleep pattern to a more adult pattern of cycles of light and deep sleep. If this seem to be happening with your baby, first check that they're not ill and then grit your teeth: it should all be over within 2 weeks or so.

You can help your baby's sleeping by:

Your baby's poos and wees at 4 months

Your baby should be getting through about 4 to 6 wet nappies a day.

By the 4th month, your baby may be pooing once a day (especially if they are formula-fed) but they may also go 3 to 4 days without doing a poo.

As long as the poo is soft and your baby is not straining, this is absolutely fine. Tell your GP is your baby's poos are very smelly, very watery or hard.

Your baby's feeding at 4 months

Your baby should be feeding 'on demand' (as much as they want) but, as a general rule of thumb, you'd expect babies of this age usually have about 4oz to 6oz of breast milk or formula every 3 to 5 hours.

You may notice that your baby starts to signal their hunger to you by putting their hands near their mouth.

Other key things to know about your baby at 4 months

With thanks, for additional material, to our colleagues at Netmoms, Germany

Pic: Getty. Graphic: Jordan Edmonds-Moore

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Authors

Helen BrownHead of Content Delivery

Helen is author of the classic advice book Parenting for Dummies and a mum of 3. Before joining MadeForMums, she was Head of Community at Mumsnet and also the Consumer Editor of Mother & Baby.

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