If I put my baby to sleep later will she wake up later?

What the evidence says

A study that tracked infants' sleep with actigraphy (a movement-sensor watch) found that babies who fell asleep earlier at night also slept longer overall, while keeping them up later only shifted their wake time slightly later the next morning. In other words, a later bedtime tends to eat into total sleep rather than buying you a later morning.

This fits with how sleep works biologically: wake time is influenced heavily by the body's internal circadian clock and light exposure, not just by when sleep started the night before. A related study in toddlers found that internal circadian timing was linked to wake time, but bedtime itself only loosely predicted when they woke up.

Pediatric sleep guidance generally recommends keeping bedtimes at an age-appropriate, fairly early hour and using a consistent bedtime routine, since this is linked to longer, more consistent nighttime sleep rather than trying to delay bedtime to get a later wake-up.

Every baby is a little different, and some may naturally sleep in a bit more with a later bedtime, but on average the research does not support using a later bedtime as a strategy for a later wake time.