Abstract Objective Medical staff, especially nurses, suffered great anxiety and stress from the COVID-19 pandemic, which negatively affected their sleep quality. In this study, we aimed to analyze the sleep quality of nursing staff after terminating the Zero-COVID-19 policy in China. Methods 506 participants were involved in our study. The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) was used to evaluate the sleep status of the participants. Binary regression was performed to evaluate the impact factors related to sleep difficulty. Results The majority of participants (96.44%) suffered from sleep disturbances. There were significant differences in age, education level and front-line activity between participants with good sleep quality and sleep difficulty. Younger age (16–25 years old) was independently associated with less sleep difficulty, while front-line activity was independently associated with severe sleep difficulty. Conclusion Sleep disorder was very common among nurses after ending the Zero-COVID-19 policy in China. More front-line nurses suffered severe sleep difficulty in particular, which should be worthy of attention.