Free tool

How much time does a habit add up to?

Twenty minutes, five days a week, for 48 weeks comes to 80 hours a year. Enter your own minutes and days to see your habit's yearly total, what it adds up to over ten years and what that time could look like in books or kilometres.

Deep Focus quest art from XP Tracker, Shaman version

Your habit

The math

The calculator multiplies three numbers you enter:

hours per year = minutes per session × days per week × weeks per year ÷ 60

Then it shows the same total as full 24-hour days (hours ÷ 24) and as 40-hour work weeks (hours ÷ 40), and multiplies by 5 and 10 for the longer view. Reading uses your pages per hour and a 300-page book. Walking uses an easy pace of 5 km an hour, about 3.1 miles an hour.

For example, 20 minutes on 5 days a week for 48 weeks is 80 hours a year: a little over three full days, or two work weeks. Over ten years it is 800 hours.

Practice an instrument quest art from XP Tracker, Shaman version — Short daily practice adds up faster than most people expect.

What common habits add up to

Habit	Schedule	Per year	In 10 years
Reading, 30 pages an hour	20 min, every day	122 hours, about 12 books	1,217 hours
Walking at 5 km/h	30 min, every day	182 hours, about 910 km (about 570 miles)	1,825 hours
Language practice	15 min, 6 days a week, 48 weeks	72 hours	720 hours
Stretching	5 min, every day	30 hours	304 hours
Meditation	10 min, 5 days a week, 48 weeks	40 hours	400 hours

How to use the result

Pick the schedule you will keep, not the one you admire. Ten minutes on five days a week that really happen beats an hour a day that lasts two weeks. See consistency over intensity.
Use it to protect the small version. On days you only have five minutes, the total shows that five minutes is still part of something.
Run it the other way too. The same math shows where time goes. The screen time calculator does this for your phone.

Limits

Hours spent are not the same as progress. Twenty focused minutes of practice may teach you more than an hour of half-attention, and reading speed changes with the book. Treat the totals as a picture of your time, not a forecast of what you'll achieve.

Your next step: choose the minutes and days you can keep on a normal week, and put the first session in your calendar for tomorrow.

Questions people ask

How many hours a year is 30 minutes a day?

Every day for a full year, 30 minutes comes to about 182 hours, which is more than seven full days or four and a half 40-hour work weeks. On 5 days a week for 48 weeks it is 120 hours.

How many hours a year is 1 hour a day?

365 hours if you never miss a day. With weekends off and a few weeks of holiday, say 5 days a week for 48 weeks, it is 240 hours, which is six 40-hour work weeks.

How many books can I read in 20 minutes a day?

At 30 pages an hour, 20 minutes every day comes to about 3,650 pages a year, or around 12 books of 300 pages. Reading speed varies a lot, so time yourself for 10 minutes and enter your own pages per hour. Our guide on reading more books has more.

Is it true you need 10,000 hours to master something?

The 10,000-hour figure was made popular by Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers (2008), drawing on research by Anders Ericsson and colleagues (1993). Ericsson later pointed out that it was an average from one group of violinists, not a rule. The useful part is that skill comes from many hours of focused practice.

Why does the calculator use 48 weeks?

Most people lose a few weeks a year to holidays, illness and travel. 48 weeks is a fair default. Set it to 52 if you really do the habit every week of the year.