Bug-Out Bag Weight Calculator
Calculate ideal bug-out bag weight by body weight, fitness level, and trip duration.
Get a target pack weight that you can carry for 72 hours without injury.
Bug-Out Bag (BOB) Weight Targets
The classic military rule of thumb: a sustainable pack weight is 20-25% of body weight for trained personnel. For civilians, 15-20% is more realistic without prior load-carrying experience.
Pack weight targets by fitness level:
| Fitness | Target % of Body Weight |
|---|---|
| Sedentary / unprepared | 10-12% |
| Average / casual hiker | 15-18% |
| Fit / regular hiker | 20-25% |
| Trained / military / load athlete | 25-30% |
Examples:
- 150 lb person, average fitness: 22-27 lb pack
- 180 lb person, fit: 36-45 lb pack
- 220 lb person, sedentary: 22-26 lb pack
Above 25% of body weight, performance drops sharply. Pace falls off, injury risk climbs, and you stop being able to move usefully for more than a few hours. This is why the calculator refuses to recommend more than 25% no matter which boxes you tick.
Trip duration scaling:
- 24 hours (Get-Home Bag): 12-15% body weight
- 72 hours (Standard BOB): 15-20%
- 7+ days (INCH “I’m Never Coming Home”): 20-25%, or split between people
What drives weight up most:
- Water: 8.3 lb per US gallon, the biggest single item by some way. A gallon is the 24-hour minimum, and it matches the 4 L a day the water storage calculator plans around
- Food: 1.5-2 lb per day for high-calorie, dehydrated rations
- Shelter (tarp, hammock, bivy): 1-3 lb
- Sleep system (bag/quilt/pad): 2-4 lb
- Cold-weather clothing: 3-8 lb
- Tools (knife, multitool, axe): 1-3 lb
- Medical / first aid: 1-2 lb
- Communication / navigation: 1-2 lb
- Cooking / fire kit: 1-2 lb
Reality check: most “ultimate bug-out bag” videos show packs of 50 to 70 lb, and for a 175 lb civilian that is 29 to 40% of body weight. Nobody is walking out on that.
Test your loaded bag over five miles before you call it field-ready. It is a cheap experiment and it changes what people carry more than any article does.
Weight-cutting strategies:
- Cache water along your route instead of carrying it all
- Switch from canned to dehydrated food (saves 60-70%)
- Replace heavy multitools with a fixed-blade knife + small repair kit
- Use a quilt instead of a sleeping bag (saves 30-40%)
- Skip the “nice to have” items. Weigh each one and ask what it does that something already in the bag cannot
How we build and check this calculator
This calculator runs entirely in your browser, so the numbers you enter stay on your device. The math behind it is written by hand and tested against worked examples and standard references before the page goes live.
SuperGlobalCalculator is independently built and maintained. See how we build and verify our calculators.