how long does it take to walk a mile?
About 23 minutes at an everyday pace, if you are 170 cm tall — 29 at a stroll and 18 brisk. At the same pace a taller walker is a little quicker, because each step is longer: about 21 minutes at 185 cm. The calculator below works out any distance, and the table under it has the distances people ask about most.
Work it out for your walk
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Walking time for common distances
At 170 cm, for the three paces every calculator on this site uses: a stroll at 80 steps a minute, everyday at 100 and brisk at 130. Walking 5 km is about 7,121 steps at that height.
| distance | stroll | everyday | brisk |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 mile | 29 min | 23 min | 18 min |
| 2 miles | 57 min | 46 min | 35 min |
| 3 miles | 1 h 26 min | 1 h 9 min | 53 min |
| 5 miles | 2 h 23 min | 1 h 55 min | 1 h 28 min |
| 5 km | 1 h 29 min | 1 h 11 min | 55 min |
| 10 km | 2 h 58 min | 2 h 22 min | 1 h 50 min |
Is a mile a 20-minute walk?
Only at 3 mph. For someone 170 cm tall, 3 mph works out to about 115 steps a minute — quicker than an everyday pace of 100 and slower than a brisk 130. Speed is steps a minute times step length, so the same speed asks a shorter walker for more steps. The whole speed table by height is on steps per minute, as mph and km/h.
What is a normal walking speed?
There is no single figure, because it depends where it is measured. On a short lab walkway, healthy adults aged 20 to 79 walked at a comfortable 127.2 to 146.2 centimeters a second — from women in their seventies to men in their forties. Everyday walking is slower: wrist sensors worn by 92,022 adults aged 45 to 79 in the UK Biobank put usual walking at 1.15 meters a second, at a median of about 101 steps a minute.
This page's everyday pace — 100 steps a minute at 170 cm — comes to 1.17 meters a second, close to that everyday figure rather than the lab one. That is why it is the pace every answer here leads with.
Do taller people walk faster?
At the same pace, yes: a taller walker's step is longer, so 100 steps a minute is about 4.2 km/h at 170 cm and 4.6 km/h at 185 cm. Whether taller people choose a quicker pace is a weaker link. In a national survey of US adults over 50, height was one of several predictors of walking speed, alongside age, sex and leg strength; in another study, cadence was not associated with height at all.
Why the stroll and brisk times are estimates
Real steps are not one fixed length. In a lab study, men in their twenties took steps of about 53 cm walking slowly, 62 cm at a normal pace and 71 cm walking fast. The formula here keeps one step length, 0.413 × height, for every pace — so the stroll time is probably a little quick and the brisk time a little slow. The everyday figure is the one the measurements back.
What counts as brisk walking?
The US Physical Activity Guidelines give walking briskly as 2.5 miles per hour or faster — about 96 steps a minute for someone 170 cm tall. Crossing signals use a different kind of number: the US manual for traffic signals times the walk for 3.5 feet per second, a design speed that leaves room for slower walkers rather than an average of anyone.
These are estimates for planning a walk, not measurements of one. Nothing here is medical advice.
Sources
- Bohannon (1997) — comfortable and maximum walking speed of healthy adults aged 20 to 79, timed over a 7.62 m walkway. Europe PMC
- Chan et al. (2024) — usual and maximal walking speed and cadence from wrist sensors in 92,022 UK Biobank adults aged 45 to 79. PMC
- Öberg, Karsznia and Öberg (1993) — step length, cadence and speed at slow, normal and fast walking, by age. VA Rehabilitation R&D
- Bohannon (2008) — walking speed of US adults over 50 in a national survey, and what predicts it. Europe PMC
- Samson et al. (2001) — gait at a preferred speed; cadence was not associated with height. Europe PMC
- US Department of Health and Human Services (2018) — Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans, 2nd edition. HHS
- Federal Highway Administration — Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, section 4E.06, pedestrian intervals. FHWA
Updated