CaminantesCamino Portugués elevation profile
620.2 km and 6,519 m of ascent, between 0 m and 466 m. Measured from the route's own GPS track rather than copied from anywhere, which matters more than it should: almost every ascent figure published for these routes, including ours until August 2026, was an estimate nobody could source.
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Metres up the side, kilometres along the bottom. Ticks are stage boundaries. Sampled every 100 m against SRTM 30m, smoothed over 500 m, climbs under 3 m discarded as noise.
Move across the profile to read any point, or drag to measure a stretch. With the keyboard: focus the profile, then arrow keys to move, shift for finer steps, Enter to start and end a measurement, Escape to clear. Each stage in the table below can also be measured directly.
What the profile shows
The Camino Portugués climbs 10.5 m per kilometre on average, which makes it the gentlest of the 10 routes measured here. A total on its own mostly measures how long a route is; per kilometre is what decides whether your days feel hilly.
The climbing is not spread evenly. The final third of the route carries 42% of the total ascent (22%, 36% and 42% across the three thirds), so pace yourself for that section rather than for the average.
The longest sustained climb runs from km 458 to km 477, gaining 369 m over 18.3 km, an average grade of 2.0%. The high point, 466 m, comes at km 192, 31% of the way in.
The hardest days
Ranked by climbing rather than distance, which is a different list and the one that decides how the evening feels.
- Day 31, Infesta to Santiago de Compostela : 417 m over 28.3 km
- Day 24, Ponte de Lima to Agualonga : 408 m over 15.5 km
- Day 10, Areias to Ansião : 393 m over 26.1 km
- Day 16, Branca to São João da Madeira : 371 m over 20.9 km
- Day 9, Tomar to Areias : 346 m over 19.4 km
Every stage
| Day | From | To | km | Ascent | High point |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lisbon | Póvoa de Santa Iria | 23.9 | 101 m | 48 m |
| 2 | Póvoa de Santa Iria | Vila Franca de Xira | 16.8 | 30 m | 44 m |
| 3 | Vila Franca de Xira | Azambuja | 19.9 | 28 m | 15 m |
| 4 | Azambuja | Porto de Muge | 16.8 | 3 m | 12 m |
| 5 | Porto de Muge | Santarém | 15.8 | 101 m | 110 m |
| 6 | Santarém | Pombalinho | 21.4 | 54 m | 110 m |
| 7 | Pombalinho | Entroncamento | 20.7 | 57 m | 54 m |
| 8 | Entroncamento | Tomar | 20.2 | 239 m | 144 m |
| 9 | Tomar | Areias | 19.4 | 346 m | 258 m |
| 10 | Areias | Ansião | 26.1 | 393 m | 466 m |
| 11 | Ansião | Condeixa-a-Nova | 29.9 | 303 m | 298 m |
| 12 | Condeixa-a-Nova | Coimbra | 17.4 | 227 m | 199 m |
| 13 | Coimbra | Mealhada | 22.8 | 175 m | 146 m |
| 14 | Mealhada | Águeda | 25.8 | 222 m | 81 m |
| 15 | Águeda | Branca | 24 | 293 m | 187 m |
| 16 | Branca | São João da Madeira | 20.9 | 371 m | 229 m |
| 17 | São João da Madeira | Mozelos | 15.3 | 186 m | 305 m |
| 18 | Mozelos | Vila Nova de Gaia | 16.8 | 203 m | 234 m |
| 19 | Vila Nova de Gaia | Vilar de Pinheiro | 18.9 | 227 m | 115 m |
| 20 | Vilar de Pinheiro | São Pedro de Rates | 20.8 | 236 m | 108 m |
| 21 | São Pedro de Rates | Barcelos | 16.3 | 199 m | 147 m |
| 22 | Barcelos | Balugães | 15.8 | 248 m | 191 m |
| 23 | Balugães | Ponte de Lima | 17.9 | 153 m | 180 m |
| 24 | Ponte de Lima | Agualonga | 15.5 | 408 m | 395 m |
| 25 | Agualonga | Valença | 18.8 | 200 m | 271 m |
| 26 | Valença | O Porriño | 21.1 | 187 m | 74 m |
| 27 | O Porriño | Redondela | 15.9 | 235 m | 229 m |
| 28 | Redondela | Pontevedra | 20.3 | 304 m | 151 m |
| 29 | Pontevedra | Caldas de Reis | 21.1 | 184 m | 123 m |
| 30 | Caldas de Reis | Infesta | 15.6 | 178 m | 164 m |
| 31 | Infesta | Santiago de Compostela | 28.3 | 417 m | 258 m |
Stages are a suggested split, not a rule. Most people walk their own.
Where the numbers come from
The GPS track carries position but no height, so the altitude was measured rather than read off: 6,202 points along the route, one every 100 m, each looked up against the SRTM 30 m elevation dataset.
One check worth stating, because it is the difference between plausible and correct. Total ascent minus total descent comes to +217 m. The profile's own start and finish differ by +230 m, so the two agree to within 13 m over 620.2 km.
They do not match exactly, and the reason is the noise floor: climbs under 3 m are discarded as sensor jitter, which removes a little real height along with a lot of imaginary height. A tool claiming these two numbers agree perfectly would be hiding that.
Ascent depends on method. Sample more finely and you measure noise as climbing; smooth harder and you flatten real hills. Anyone quoting a single authoritative number for a route this long is hiding that choice, so the settings used here are stated above and you can compare like with like.
Route facts, stages and the full description are on the Camino Portugués route page. Every route's profile is on the elevation profiles page, and how the ten routes compare puts the totals side by side.
Compare with another route
All measured the same way, so the numbers are comparable. Ordered by total ascent, hardest first.
- Camino del Norte : 14,663 m of ascent over 831.6 km
- Vía de la Plata : 11,724 m of ascent over 994.6 km
- Camino Francés : 10,446 m of ascent over 768.6 km
- Camino Primitivo : 6,777 m of ascent over 306.6 km
- Camino Invierno : 4,941 m of ascent over 263.1 km
- Camino Mozárabe : 4,452 m of ascent over 419 km
- Camino Lebaniego : 2,134 m of ascent over 66.5 km
- Camino Inglés : 1,802 m of ascent over 110.5 km
- Camino Finisterre : 1,431 m of ascent over 85 km