We compare your cumulative mileage against real-world distances. Some of these comparisons are encouraging. Some are deeply unsettling. All of them are accurate.
Numbers without context are just numbers. 0.47 miles sounds modest. The same distance is also 836 times the length of a standard swimming pool, or roughly the width of a small English village. Context changes everything.
This is why BangMiles includes a comparison section. When you calculate your mileage, the app checks it against a set of real-world reference distances and lights up the ones you've exceeded. Here's what those comparisons actually mean.
The classic endurance benchmark. Achieving marathon-equivalent mileage is, statistically, more likely via BangMiles than via actual running for the majority of adults in the UK. We're not judging the runners. We're just noting that 26.2 miles is a significant distance and both routes are legitimate exercise.
People have swum this. People have paddled it in bathtubs. People have crossed it in ways we will not detail here. At its narrowest — from Dover to Cap Gris-Nez — it's 21 miles. If your BangMiles score exceeds this, you have, in a meaningful sense, crossed something significant.
The orbital motorway that encircles Greater London and serves as a monument to optimistic traffic planning. At 117 miles, it takes approximately 3–4 hours to drive at 2am when conditions are good. Reaching M25-level mileage on BangMiles requires either a long relationship, a high monthly frequency, or unusual personal dimensions. Sometimes all three.
The full length of mainland Britain. People walk this. People cycle it. People attempt it on unicycles for charity. It is 874 miles of road, moor, and persistent drizzle. Achieving this figure on BangMiles is a multi-year commitment that speaks well of both the relationship and the participants' general health.
Transcontinental. A long way by any measure. At an average monthly frequency and default settings, reaching this milestone takes roughly 12–15 years of consistent dedication. We think that's worth a chip lighting up.
We include this because someone will reach it. Not many, but some. The Moon is 238,855 miles from Earth on average, give or take the orbital eccentricities. Achieving lunar mileage on BangMiles requires either extraordinary longevity, extraordinary frequency, or extraordinary personal dimensions — ideally in a unit that makes the numbers work. If you get there: submit to the leaderboard. You've earned it.
The comparison chips update every time you run a calculation. Each one shows the distance and how close you are, relative to the benchmark. Once you've exceeded a milestone, the chip lights up in lime green with a tick. It doesn't do anything functional. It's just a small acknowledgement that something has occurred.
The comparisons are also a useful sanity check. If your mileage is coming out at several thousand miles for a single month, something is probably off with your inputs. The comparisons make implausible numbers obvious quickly.
Human bodies, over the course of a long relationship, accumulate distance in ways that are easy to underestimate. At a completely average frequency of 10 sessions per month, default thrust count, and average reported dimensions:
These are not small numbers. They represent cumulative effort, consistency, and — if the calculator is to be believed in any sense whatsoever — an ongoing commitment to the research programme.
Once you have a figure you're proud of, you can submit it to the BangMiles Global Leaderboard. We store your display name and your miles total, nothing else. The highest mileages tend to belong to people who have been running the numbers since long before BangMiles existed and are simply finally getting the recognition they deserve.
All reference distances sourced from publicly available geographic data. The Moon distance is the mean orbital distance and will vary slightly depending on time of year and other factors that do not affect your BangMiles score.