Marathon Pace Calculator

About this calculator

A marathon pace calculator converts a goal finish time for the 42.195 km (26.2 mile) marathon distance into the pace per kilometer and per mile you need to hold to hit that time, assuming an even-effort or negative-split strategy rather than starting fast and fading.

Runners and coaches use goal pace throughout marathon training, not just on race day: tempo runs, marathon-pace long runs, and race-day pace bands are all built around this single number, because running even slightly faster than goal pace early in a marathon reliably leads to a much larger slowdown later from glycogen depletion, a phenomenon runners call 'hitting the wall.'

This calculator takes your target finish time and returns the exact pace per kilometer and per mile, so you can write it on a pace band, program it into a GPS watch, or use it to check your split times against goal pace during training runs.