How long does it take to walk 1,000 miles?
A thousand miles is 1,609 km, roughly twice the Camino Francés across northern Spain. On foot it is a journey of two months or more.
The numbers
1,609 km · 1,000.0 miles, in steps
| A child, 1.2 m (3 ft 11 in) | about 3,239,400 steps |
| 1.6 m (5 ft 3 in) | about 2,429,600 steps |
| 1.7 m (5 ft 7 in), the average adult | about 2,286,600 steps |
| 1.8 m (5 ft 11 in) | about 2,159,600 steps |
| 1.9 m (6 ft 3 in) | about 2,045,900 steps |
| A giraffe, 5.5 m (18 ft) | no idea, sorry |
Step length is about 41% of height. Give or take 10% for how you walk.
How long it takes to walk
| A stroll, 4 km/h | 17 days |
| A normal walk, 5 km/h | 13 days |
| A brisk walk, 6 km/h | 11 days |
Walking without stops, on level ground.
Calories, by body weight
| 55 kg (121 lb) | about 56,424 kcal (75,011 incl. resting) |
| 70 kg (154 lb) | about 71,812 kcal (95,469 incl. resting) |
| 85 kg (187 lb) | about 87,200 kcal (115,927 incl. resting) |
| 100 kg (220 lb) | about 102,588 kcal (136,385 incl. resting) |
The walk's own cost at 5 km/h. The second number adds what you would have burned sitting still, which is what some fitness trackers show.
On a reTrek route
1,609 km is about 2 times the Camino de Santiago.
About the Camino de Santiago routeTry your own distance
Steps
about 2,286,700
2,058,000 to 2,515,300 depending on your stride, about 0.70 m a step at this height.
Distance
1,609.3 km · 1,000.0 miles
Time on foot
13 days
at 5 km/h, no stops
Calories
Depends on your weight more than anything else. Enter it to see an estimate.
That is about 2 times the Camino de Santiago.
How long does it take to walk 1,000 miles?
Walking time alone is about 322 hours at a normal pace of 5 km/h (3.1 mph), 268 at a brisk 6 km/h and 402 at a stroll of 4 km/h. Nobody walks that without sleeping, so the real answer is in days: at 25 km a day, it takes about two months. At 20 km (12 miles) a day it is about 80 days, at 25 km (16 miles) about 64. A thousand miles is 1,609 km, roughly twice the Camino Francés across northern Spain. On foot it is a journey of two months or more.
Does age change it?
Yes, but less than people expect. A meta-analysis of 41 studies and 23,111 healthy adults measured normal walking speed by decade: the fastest group, men in their forties, averaged 1.43 m/s, which is a mile in about 19 minutes, and the slowest, women over eighty, averaged 0.94 m/s, about 28 minutes a mile. Everyone in between is within that band. Over 1,000 miles, that difference adds up to days, so pick a daily distance that suits your own pace.
How many steps is 1,000 miles?
About 2,286,600 for an adult of average height, from about 2,045,900 at 1.9 m to 2,429,600 at 1.6 m. At 25 km a day, that is about 35,000 steps a day for two months.
How many calories does walking 1,000 miles burn?
About 71,810 kcal for a 70 kg (154 lb) adult at a normal pace, from roughly 56,425 kcal at 55 kg (121 lb) to 102,590 kcal at 100 kg (220 lb). Weight decides most of it, pace barely matters between 4 and 6 km/h on the flat, and that is the walk’s own cost above sitting still. Some fitness trackers add the resting share and come out about a third higher.
Walking with a finish line
The hard part of walking more is not the walking. It is having a reason to go out today. reTrek gives your walks a finish line: pick a famous route, like the Camino de Santiago or the Inca Trail, and every walk moves you further along it, with a short film about the place waiting at each milestone. The walk you would have skipped becomes the one that gets you to the next milestone.
Walk it with a friend and pool your steps, or race them there. Everest Base Camp is free. Get reTrek.
Other distances
Sources: Normal walking speed, a descriptive meta-analysis, Bohannon and Williams Andrews, Physiotherapy, 2011 · Energy expenditure during level human walking, Ludlow and Weyand, Journal of Applied Physiology, 2016