Most people take between 10 and 20 years of regular visits to walk all 214 Wainwrights. If you go three or four times a year and bag four or five fells a trip, you can finish in five to seven years.
Those figures come from The Lakes Guide, and they match what completers write down.
Why it takes years
The limit is getting there, not fitness. Most walkers doing the Wainwrights don't live in Cumbria, so every trip means a drive, a bed for the night and a forecast that has to cooperate. The gaps between trips are usually weeks or months.
The fells don't come in even batches either. Castle Crag or Latrigg is one summit and a morning out, while the Fairfield Horseshoe gives you eight in a day. The early fells tend to go quickly, because so many sit on well-trodden rounds from Keswick, Grasmere and Patterdale. The last few dozen are slower. They tend to be remote western tops, or satellites of the Scafells that everyone walks past on the way to the famous summit.
People who finish often talk about the span, not the rate. The Wainwright Society's magazine Footsteps once carried an account from two walkers whose round ran from a camp at Elterwater in 1955 to Loughrigg Fell six decades later. Irene Wright, profiled by All Women All Trails, took 29 years, and about 20 of those were active. Both completion registers list finishers by date. Neither ranks anyone by speed.
How many walking days to plan for
Two published schemes link all 214 fells into set day walks:
- Stuart Marshall's book Walking the Wainwrights (2000) set out a scheme in 36 walks, and The Walking Englishman publishes a version of it with maps and GPX files. Its longest day is a 14.6 mile Buttermere round.
- go4awalk splits the 214 into 59 circular walks. These run from about 3 hours and 5.5 miles up to 8.5 hours and 12.5 miles.
Real rounds take more days than either scheme. You will turn back in cloud, start a day late because of the weather, and do some fells twice because you liked them or because a friend hasn't been up yet. A realistic budget is 40 to 60 full walking days, plus a handful of short half days for the low fells you mop up on the drive home. If you prefer gentler days of five or six hours, plan for the top end of that range.
As a rough guide:
- A long weekend twice a year gives you 4 to 6 walking days a year, and a round of 10 to 15 years.
- Three or four trips a year of several days each gives you 10 to 15 days a year, and a round of 5 to 7 years.
- Living in or near the Lakes and getting out most weeks gives you 40 days or more a year, and a round of 1 to 2 years.
Winter shortens every day you walk, and the high passes that lead to the western and Coniston fells can be closed or unwise in snow. The winter Wainwrights guide covers which fells still work in short daylight.
Can you walk them in one year?
Yes, if you can get there often enough. One year means 40 to 60 walking days packed into twelve months, so in practice it suits people who live in or close to the Lake District, or who have just retired and have the time. go4awalk says you could easily finish its 59 walks in a single year, and also that very few people do.
For many people, finishing isn't the end. In the LDWA Hillwalkers' Register, 133 of the 955 Wainwright completers (14%) have done more than one round. The top of the list is Stephen Moore, on 61 rounds. The Keswick Reminder covered his 60th in 2023, when he was 75. The register even has a column for the number of rounds each person did last year.
The continuous round record
Continuous rounds are a different sport. The route links all 214 summits in one push, and the fastest people run it with a support team.
- Fastest overall: John Kelly ran it in 5 days 12 hours 14 minutes, finishing on 7 May 2022, with support. That is the current supported record on Fastest Known Time, and it beat Sabrina Verjee's 2021 time by about 11 and a half hours.
- Fastest woman: Sabrina Verjee, 5 days 23 hours 49 minutes, in June 2021.
- Winter, self-supported: Tom Hollins, 8 days 9 hours 44 minutes, finishing on 28 February 2025.
- Earlier landmarks: Joss Naylor beat Alan Heaton's 1985 time of 9 days 16 hours 42 minutes, running 7 days 1 hour 25 minutes in 1987. Steve Birkinshaw's 6 days 12 hours 58 minutes stood from 2014 until 2019, when Paul Tierney ran 6 days 6 hours 5 minutes.
For walkers, the more relevant benchmark is James Forrest. He walked a single self-supported round in 14 days 11 hours in 2020. He carried his own kit, camped alone, and restocked from boxes he had left in churches, barns and pub outbuildings. The BMC's interview with him puts the route at about 530 km with 36,000 metres of ascent.
Total height and distance
That 530 km and 36,000 metres is about as efficient a line through the 214 as you will find. It links summits along ridges and never goes back to a car. A round of separate day walks covers a good deal more, because every day starts and finishes in a valley. The Walking Englishman's 36-walk scheme alone adds up to 403.5 miles, or about 650 km.
So for a normal round, expect to walk well over 650 km and climb well over 36,000 metres. The exact figure depends on how many fells you link on each day. The Wainwrights in numbers page has more figures on the fells themselves.
Making the years work
- Group fells by valley. Plan trips around a base such as Keswick or Glenridding and Patterdale, and clear the fells around it before you move on.
- Pick off the awkward ones early. The out-of-the-way fells are the ones that stall a round, and the hardest Wainwrights to bag lists them. Do one whenever you are nearby.
- Keep a record with dates. Both registers ask for dates, at least of your first and last fell. After fifteen years you won't remember them. A notebook works fine. Upfell, a free iPhone app, keeps the dates for you and lets you backdate fells you bagged years ago.
- Save a good one for last. Plenty of people choose a short, friendly fell so family can join them. Where people finish the Wainwrights shows the favourites.
Whatever your pace, carry a map and compass and check the Mountain Weather Information Service (MWIS) forecast before you go up.