How long does it take to walk 50 miles?
Fifty miles is 80.5 km. Very few people walk it in one go: it is the distance of an ultra-distance walking event, or three to four days on a trail.
The numbers
80.5 km · 50.0 miles, in steps
| A child, 1.2 m (3 ft 11 in) | about 162,000 steps |
| 1.6 m (5 ft 3 in) | about 121,500 steps |
| 1.7 m (5 ft 7 in), the average adult | about 114,300 steps |
| 1.8 m (5 ft 11 in) | about 108,000 steps |
| 1.9 m (6 ft 3 in) | about 102,300 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 | 20 h 7 min |
| A normal walk, 5 km/h | 16 h 6 min |
| A brisk walk, 6 km/h | 13 h 25 min |
Walking without stops, on level ground.
Calories, by body weight
| 55 kg (121 lb) | about 2,821 kcal (3,751 incl. resting) |
| 70 kg (154 lb) | about 3,591 kcal (4,773 incl. resting) |
| 85 kg (187 lb) | about 4,360 kcal (5,796 incl. resting) |
| 100 kg (220 lb) | about 5,129 kcal (6,819 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.
Try your own distance
Steps
about 114,300
102,900 to 125,800 depending on your stride, about 0.70 m a step at this height.
Distance
80.5 km · 50.0 miles
Time on foot
16 h 6 min
at 5 km/h, no stops
Calories
Depends on your weight more than anything else. Enter it to see an estimate.
That is halfway to Hadrian's Wall Path.
How long does it take to walk 50 miles?
Walking time alone is about 16 hours at a normal pace of 5 km/h (3.1 mph), 13 at a brisk 6 km/h and 20 at a stroll of 4 km/h. Nobody walks that without sleeping, so the real answer is in days: most people would split it over three or four days. At 20 km (12 miles) a day it is about 4 days, at 25 km (16 miles) about 3. Fifty miles is 80.5 km. Very few people walk it in one go: it is the distance of an ultra-distance walking event, or three to four days on a trail.
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 50 miles, that difference adds up to days, so pick a daily distance that suits your own pace.
How many steps is 50 miles?
About 114,300 for an adult of average height, from about 102,300 at 1.9 m to 121,500 at 1.6 m. Spread over four days, that is about 29,000 steps a day, still a very long day each time.
How many calories does walking 50 miles burn?
About 3,590 kcal for a 70 kg (154 lb) adult at a normal pace, from roughly 2,820 kcal at 55 kg (121 lb) to 5,130 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.
A reason to walk today
Most of us know we should walk more and still skip it, because “go for a walk” has no finish line. reTrek gives you one: 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