Treadmill pace converter
Type the pace you want to run and get the number to dial into the belt — or type the belt speed and see the pace it really is. Both units, rounded the way a treadmill rounds.
| km/h | mph | min/km | min/mile |
|---|
How to use this
If you know the pace you want to run — the pace a plan prescribes, or the pace you ran your last race at — leave Work out on belt speed, type the pace and read the number to dial in. If you are already on the machine and want to know what the display means, switch it to pace and type the belt speed. Tell it whether your treadmill reads in km/h or mph and the result is rounded to the tenths that console can actually be set to.
The table underneath is the whole range of running speeds, so you can leave the page open on your phone and glance at it between intervals without typing anything.
Why the speed is rounded
A pace of 5:41 per kilometre is 10.56 km/h, and no treadmill will take that number. It will take 10.5 or 10.6. The converter snaps to the nearest tenth of your unit — a tenth of a mile per hour is not a tenth of a kilometre per hour — and then shows you the pace that snapped speed really gives, so you are never doing mental arithmetic mid-session to work out whether 10.6 was close enough. This is the same rounding the Outrunr app uses when it hands a treadmill runner the belt speed for each step of a session.
Treadmill pace and effort
A belt does two things the road does not: it removes the air you would be pushing through, and it keeps the pace perfectly even. Both make a given pace feel slightly easier than outdoors, which is where the habit of setting a one per cent incline comes from. For an easy run it does not matter; the aim is time on feet at a conversational effort, and the number on the belt is a guide rather than a target. For a session with a prescribed pace, the incline is a fair way to make the effort honest.
What the converter cannot tell you is which pace you should be running in the first place. That comes from your own fitness, not a table. The training pace calculator turns one recent 5K into your easy, steady, threshold and interval paces; bring those here and you have the belt speed for each.
Where these numbers come from
Pure arithmetic: speed is distance over time, the mile is 1.609344 km, and the belt is set in tenths. The snapping rule is a port of the one in the Outrunr app's treadmill readout, pinned to the app's own test fixtures so a pace converts to the same belt speed here and on the phone. For splits at a given pace, the running pace calculator is the better tool; for what you could run at another distance, the race time predictor.
Common questions
How do I convert a running pace to treadmill speed?
Speed is sixty divided by the pace in minutes. A 6:00/km pace is 60 ÷ 6 = 10 km/h; a 5:00/km pace is 12 km/h; 4:00/km is 15 km/h. For a pace with seconds, turn it into decimal minutes first: 5:41 is 5.68 minutes, and 60 ÷ 5.68 = 10.56 km/h, which the belt rounds to 10.6. This tool does the arithmetic and the rounding for you.
Why does the pace shown differ slightly from the one I typed?
Because a treadmill can only be set in tenths. If you ask for 5:41/km the belt cannot run 10.56 km/h; it runs 10.6, which is 5:40/km. The tool shows the pace the snapped speed actually gives you, so the number in your head and the number on the belt agree. Over a 10 km run that one-second difference is ten seconds — worth knowing, rarely worth worrying about.
Is my treadmill in km/h or mph?
Most treadmills sold in Australia, the UK and Europe read in kilometres per hour; most sold in the United States read in miles per hour, and many gym machines can be switched between the two in their settings. If the display says 6.0 for what feels like a comfortable jog, it is in mph (9.7 km/h). If it says 10.0 for the same effort, it is in km/h.
Should I set an incline to match running outdoors?
A one per cent incline is the figure most often quoted for matching the energy cost of running outdoors at the same pace, because the belt removes the air resistance you would otherwise be pushing through. The effect is small at easy paces and grows as you run faster. It is a reasonable default for a session that is meant to mimic a road run, and unnecessary for an easy run where the point is time on feet. This converter does not adjust the pace for incline; it tells you the belt speed, and the incline is a separate dial.
Does treadmill pace count the same as outdoor pace in training?
For the purpose of getting fitter, yes — a session run at the right effort does its job whether the ground moves or you do. The belt removes wind and hills and can make a given pace feel a little easier, which is one reason the one per cent incline is popular. For what a treadmill run says about your race fitness, treat it as an honest training run rather than a time trial, unless the machine has been calibrated.
Is anything stored?
No. The calculation runs in your browser. Nothing is sent anywhere and nothing is saved.
More free tools
The belt speed is the easy part. Knowing which speed to run today is the hard part.
Outrunr prices every treadmill session from your own race times, shows the belt speed for each step as you run it, and calls the changes in your ear so you never have to look down.