Road Trip Calculator
Enter your route distance, average driving speed, planned breaks, your car's fuel economy, and the local fuel price to see your total travel time, pure driving hours, litres of fuel needed, and the trip's fuel cost.
How this calculation works
Driving hours are simply distance divided by average speed: driving hours = distance ÷ average speed. Total travel time adds your planned break time on top, so it reflects a realistic arrival time rather than just time behind the wheel.
Fuel needed is calculated from your car's consumption rate: litres = (distance ÷ 100) × L/100km. That figure is then multiplied by the local fuel price per litre to get the total fuel cost for the trip.
Average speed should be your realistic overall pace including slower stretches — city driving, traffic, and mountain roads — not just your highway cruising speed, or the time estimate will run short.
Worked example
Break schedule for long drives
Fatigue is a major factor in road-trip crashes, and breaks are the simplest way to counter it. Use this general schedule as a starting point and adjust for your own alertness:
| Driving time | Recommended break | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Every ~2 hours | 15–20 minutes | Resets attention and reduces fatigue-related risk |
| After ~4–5 hours total | 30+ minutes (meal stop) | Longer rest for sustained alertness |
| Overnight drives | Avoid or add a co-driver | Night driving raises drowsiness risk sharply |
| Every fuel stop | 5–10 minutes | Good natural point to stretch and refocus |
Speed vs. fuel economy trade-off
Driving faster shortens your travel time but almost always increases fuel consumption once you pass your car's most efficient cruising speed, typically somewhere between 50 and 80 km/h. Above about 100–110 km/h, aerodynamic drag rises sharply with the square of speed, so pushing from 100 to 130 km/h can increase fuel use by 15–25% for only a modest time saving on most trip lengths.
For a long trip, it is often worth comparing two speed scenarios in this calculator: your usual highway pace and a slightly slower one. The time difference is frequently smaller than expected, while the fuel savings can be significant.
Planning your fuel stops
- Refuel before your tank drops below roughly a quarter, especially on rural or mountain routes with fewer stations.
- Budget the fuel cost from this calculator as a minimum — prices vary by region and can be higher at highway service stations.
- If your route crosses a border or region with notably different fuel prices, consider filling up on the cheaper side.
- Combine fuel stops with your rest breaks to avoid adding extra stopped time to your total travel estimate.
Getting a more realistic arrival time
This calculator assumes a constant average speed and a single block of total break time, which is a simplification of real driving. Add extra buffer for known trouble spots — city traffic at the start or end of the trip, mountain passes, border crossings, or weather — by either lowering your average speed input or adding those minutes to your break time. It is generally safer to slightly overestimate travel time than to arrive rushed.