Guide

Tour Physical Ratings: What the Number Actually Means

2026-10-18 · TourFax editorial team

Tour Physical Ratings: What the Number Actually Means

Photo: Diego Delso (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Every tour page carries a physical rating, and every operator runs its own scale. Intrepid grades out of five stars, G Adventures prints a number with a word, Exodus publishes hours and ascent, TourRadar reduces everything to five adjectives. Scales below checked November 3, 2026.

Intrepid's five stars measure exertion, not hours

Intrepid publishes its scale on a dedicated page. It opens: "These aren't comprehensive breakdowns - just handy little guides so you can tell, at a glance, if a trip is right for you. The more stars, the more challenging."

  • 1 of 5: 'these trips are a relaxing break. You don't have to worry about doing anything physically demanding unless you want to.'
  • 2 of 5: 'Some easy physical activities included in your trip. No physical preparation is required to make the most of the journey.'
  • 3 of 5: 'This trip will raise your heart rate. Moderate physical activities are included and a good level of fitness is required.'
  • 4 of 5: 'Be prepared for some serious physical activity. The fitter you are, the more you'll enjoy it, as most activities will be challenging.'
  • 5 of 5: 'Our highest physical rating. Get ready for a heart-pumping adventure with plenty of challenges and some extreme conditions. You'll be required to be seriously fit for this trip as difficult activities are included.'

Notice what is missing: no hours, no distances, no altitude. A 3 could be a day of medina walking or a day hike at 3,500 metres. The star is a prompt to read the day-by-day, not a substitute for it.

The page carries one caveat of its own: most Intrepid itineraries are built for an average level of fitness, with specialist trips such as trekking the Himalayas or cycling through Vietnam needing some training beforehand.

G Adventures prints a number and a word, and no public key

G Adventures trip pages show a "Physical Grading" line such as "2 - Light". The Classic Morocco page, trip code DCKM, displayed exactly that on November 3, 2026.

No page on the G Adventures site defines each grade. Its multisport FAQ confirms only the range, telling readers to "look for our Physical Rating from an easy 1 to a challenging 5".

So the grades run 1 to 5 with a word attached, and the trip details document for each tour is the place that describes what the grade means for that itinerary.

If the page shows a 3 or above, open that document before booking rather than guessing from the word.

Exodus publishes hours and metres, which is the useful kind of number

Exodus grades every trip on an Activity Level that ranges "from Easy to Tough", and for walking trips it publishes what each level means in hours and ascent. From the walking and trekking guidelines page, checked November 3, 2026:

  • Level 1, Easy: two to four hours of walking per day, maximum ascent 500 m (1,640 ft). 'Ideal for those new to walking trips.'
  • Level 2, Easy and Moderate: three to five hours per day, ascents no more than 700 m (2,295 ft).
  • Level 3, Moderate: four to seven hours per day, up to 1,100 m (3,600 ft) in one day, for 'fit and frequent hikers'.
  • Level 4, Moderate and Challenging: five to seven hours per day, maximum 1,300 m (4,265 ft), 'sometimes at altitude'.
  • Level 5, Challenging: six to eight hours per day, 1,500 m (4,920 ft), technical terrain with loose rock and narrow paths.
  • Level 6, Challenging and Tough: seven to nine hours per day, 1,700 m (5,580 ft), 'experienced mountain hikers and trekkers only'.
  • Level 7, Tough: eight to ten hours, up to 1,900 m (6,230 ft), summit days often above the snowline using crampons and ice axes.

This is the format worth asking any operator for. 'Five to seven hours with up to 1,300 metres of ascent' can be tested on a hill near home.

'Moderate' cannot. If an operator's page only gives a word, ask the booking team for the longest walking day in hours and metres; they have it.

TourRadar's five words are a filter, not a measurement

TourRadar lists trips from many operators and maps them onto five tiers: Relaxing, Easy, Moderate, Serious and Heart-pumping. Its support article defines Moderate as "comfortable with somewhat demanding activities" and Heart-pumping as "very good physical condition" with "continuous demanding activities".

Because the marketplace is translating each operator's own grade into a common word, the tier is useful for narrowing a search and not for deciding. Once you have a shortlist, go to the operator's own page and read the scale the trip was graded on.

Comparing two look-alike itineraries shows why a G Adventures 2 and an Intrepid 3 can describe nearly the same week.

What none of the scales count: the vehicle

Physical ratings describe walking, cycling, trekking and the like. They do not describe eight hours in a minivan across the Atlas, a 5 a.m. start for a flight, or three consecutive 400-kilometre days on a Ring Road loop.

For most people on a touring trip, that is what hurts.

Add the transfer legs yourself from the day-by-day. Operators often give approximate drive times in the itinerary notes, including stops.

If they do not, the distance between two towns on a map divided by 60 km/h is a rough rule of our own, not an operator figure, on mountain and rural roads.

Jet lag and long travel days covers how itineraries are built around those legs.

Altitude is the other gap. Trekking grades sometimes mention it; touring grades rarely do. The Peru checklist explains why the acclimatisation days matter more than the walking grade for a Machu Picchu package.

Torres del Paine trekking checklist

How to test a trip against your own fitness

  • Find the longest activity day in hours and the biggest single-day ascent in metres. If the operator only gives a word, ask for both numbers.
  • Walk that many hours with that much ascent at home carrying a daypack, two weekends before you book. If you cannot, the trip is a grade too high regardless of the label.
  • Add the longest driving day and the earliest start. Decide whether you can do a full walking day the morning after.
  • Check the maximum altitude on the itinerary and how many nights are spent high before the hardest day.
  • Read the operator's rule on leaving a group. Intrepid's conditions say that if you leave a trip before completion, "no refund will be made for unused services". A grade too ambitious is a cost, not just a bad day.
  • If you have a medical condition, do the pre-trip checks in health preparation before a package tour with the hours and altitude figures in hand.

Questions people ask

Is an Intrepid 3 the same as a G Adventures 3? No. They are separate scales written by separate companies, and neither publishes a conversion. Compare the day-by-day itineraries, the longest walking day and the maximum altitude instead of the digit.

Do physical ratings account for age? No operator page read for this note mentions age in its physical rating. The grade describes the itinerary.

Minimum ages appear separately. Intrepid's booking conditions say that for the majority of its trips the minimum age is 15 at the time of travel. The G Adventures Classic Morocco page sets an age requirement of 18 to 39.

Which operator gives the most useful grade? Of the four scales here, Exodus is the only one that publishes hours and ascent per level, which can be tested in advance.

For other operators, the trip notes PDF usually contains the same information even when the web page does not.

Bottom line

A physical rating is one company's shorthand for one itinerary.

Read it on that company's own scale, ask for the longest day in hours and metres, add the driving time and altitude that the rating ignores, and test the longest day at home before paying the deposit.

The number tells you where to look; the day-by-day tells you whether you can do it.

Compare small-group operators

Sources