Tabletop Miniatures Paint Time Estimator
Estimate how long it takes to paint an army of tabletop miniatures and how many hobby sessions you will need.
How it works
total time = miniatures × minutes per mini · sessions = ⌈total hours ÷ session length⌉
Painting time scales almost linearly with the number of models once you settle on a finish level, so the big lever is how much detail each mini gets. Speed-painting an army with contrast or slapchop can be three to seven times faster per model than a display piece with blending and edge highlights. Estimating up front tells you whether a project is a couple of evenings or a months-long campaign, which is the single most useful thing to know before committing to a full army.
Worked example
Twenty tabletop-standard miniatures at 45 minutes each is 900 minutes = 15 hours. In 2-hour sessions that is ⌈15 ÷ 2⌉ = 8 sessions.
Frequently asked questions
How can I paint faster?
Batch-paint identical models one step at a time, use contrast or speed paints for base colours, and reserve slow techniques like blending for characters. Priming and varnishing whole batches at once also saves a lot of time.
Do these times include assembly and priming?
No — they cover painting only. Add assembly, gap-filling and priming separately; for plastic infantry that is often another 10–20 minutes per model spread across a batch.
Are these times realistic for beginners?
New painters usually run slower than these figures at first and speed up quickly with practice. Treat the estimate as a mid-experience baseline and scale it up 30–50% for your first army.
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This calculator is for educational purposes. Double-check important results before acting on them.