Climbing Everest

A body count has no denominator. Divide by a century, by 12,000 summits, or by the 25,000-plus people who have climbed above base camp and you get three different stories. Averaging 1920s expeditions with modern guided clients hides that the risk depends on who you are and which decade you climb in.

Calculate Your Risk

Everest expeditions you join this year1 expeditions per year

Days spent on the mountain above base camp, through the Khumbu Icefall and up to the summit push40 days per expedition

The misleading stat

Over 330 people have died on Everest

(global average, including people never exposed)

Your actual annual risk

1 in 101

(0.9950% chance per year)

For comparison

Car crash (US annual): 1 in 8,000
Skydiving, one tandem jump: 1 in 500,000
Lightning strike (US annual): 1 in 16,000,000

Methodology & sources

This calculator multiplies chained probabilities:

Expeditions
Days above base camp
Death rate per day: 0.00025 — ~1% of members above base camp die per expedition (Huey et al. 2020, members only, 1990-2019; Firth et al. 2008 BMJ: 1.6% climbers, 1.1% Sherpas, 1.3% combined, 1921-2006) spread over a ~40-day expedition. The real risk is concentrated in the Icefall and on summit day, not spread evenly

Read the full analysis →