How many climbers?

Was having a discussion with my partner the other day and we were wondering how many people in the world climb 5.12? 5.13? 5.14?  Wild speculation encouraged, but any thoughtful insight welcomed as well

Assuming you define “climb” as having sent at least one outdoor climb of the grade…

 5.14: 10,000+
5:13: 100,000+
5:12: well over a million.

Only one took a dump in a Nalgene and then played Plinko with it on Epinephrine. 

I’m curious about ratio of folks sending 5.12 on gear vs sport? Maybe there are 5% sending on gear compared to  sending on sport?  So if there are 150,000 people who climb 5.12 sport outdoors, then there’d be 7,500 people climberinv 5.12 on gear? Thoughts? :) 

Wow. Does it really matter?

Climbing was sooo much better before there was an internet.

#of people who “climb 5.12 in the gym”: apparently everyone 

Ben B wrote:

#of people who “climb 5.12 in the gym”: apparently everyone 

5.13 in my gym

Lena chita wrote:

Assuming you define “climb” as having sent at least one outdoor climb of the grade…

 5.14: 10,000+
5:13: 100,000+
5:12: well over a million.

Really? You think there are over 1.1 million outdoor climbers in the world? That seems crazy high to me. Outside of our little bubbles I think outdoor climbing is still pretty esoteric.

Creed Archibald wrote:

Really? You think there are over 1.1 million outdoor climbers in the world? That seems crazy high to me. Outside of our little bubbles I think outdoor climbing is still pretty esoteric.

That's one out of like 7300 humans.  Seems pretty low to me.  Wild speculatificating is fun.

Andy Shoemaker wrote:

That's one out of like 7300 humans.  Seems pretty low to me.  Wild speculatificating is fun.

That’s fair. Although there’s also about a billion people living on less than $1 a day. I doubt those folks are very concerned with red pointing. 

Creed Archibald wrote:

Really? You think there are over 1.1 million outdoor climbers in the world? That seems crazy high to me. Outside of our little bubbles I think outdoor climbing is still pretty esoteric.

These kinds of questions always bump against what the definition of “climber” is…

But yes, I think that there are WAY more than a million climbers in the world. There are around 6-10million of climbers in the US alone. 

and to be clear, my estimate was for approximately 5-10 year window, not cumulative lifetime numbers. Old-school climbers tho were on the cutting edge of breaking into 5,12, and have long since passed away, or gave up climbing, or are now climbing 5.8 aren’t figuring into my guess. 

Creed Archibald wrote:

Really? You think there are over 1.1 million outdoor climbers in the world? That seems crazy high to me. Outside of our little bubbles I think outdoor climbing is still pretty esoteric.

If you are saying a total of 1.1 mil outdoor climbers around the world, I’d guess that’s a very low estimate.
If you are saying 1.1 mil people who climb 5.12 (worldwide), that seems a bit high.

Creed Archibald wrote:

That’s fair. Although there’s also about a billion people living on less than $1 a day. I doubt those folks are very concerned with red pointing. 

I dunno, sounds like a billion potential dirtbaggers to me.

Lena chita wrote:

These kinds of questions always bump against what the definition of “climber” is…

But yes, I think that there are WAY more than a million climbers in the world. There are around 6-10million of climbers in the US alone. 

and to be clear, my estimate was for approximately 5-10 year window, not cumulative lifetime numbers. Old-school climbers tho were on the cutting edge of breaking into 5,12, and have long since passed away, or gave up climbing, or are now climbing 5.8 aren’t figuring into my guess. 

I found some sources saying that around 10 million people in the US “participated in rock climbing last year.” I’d guess that at least 9 million of them went to the gym once, but your numbers could still be correct. 

Eric Craig wrote:

Don't be so sure of that honey, I am one of those old school climbers, that was there for the development of the first 5.12's in Yosemite. I took me a little longer to get there myself.

 Even though I followed a 10a a week ago, 5.8 is about it for me.  But there are others in my age group climbing hard as, or harder than, ever,  including 5.12's. Those folks didn't take 20+ years off, like me. And, they are out there, and still "sending".

And yes, sadly, a few have passed. 

If you are still climbing 5.12, in the past 5-10 years,  then you are factoring in my estimate. If you aren’t climbing it NOW, then you aren’t counted. I know crushers who climb hard in their 60s and 70s  I also know crushers who used to climb that hard, who no longer do.

My guesstimate attempts to look at “current time”, and I gut-feel defined “current times@ as roughly 5-10 years.

The numbers would be higher, if the question is phrased as “since the dawn of technical climbing, how many people have climbed grade X”, it is different than the answer I am providing, which is estimate for a slice of time.

It was not specified in the question, but this is how I had thought of the answer.

I thought “how many people climbed 5.12 in the 90s”, “how many people were climbing 5,12 in 2000’s”, “how many people have climbed 5.12 in 2010’s”, etc. and the answer I provided was, basically, for 2020’s. 

Lena chita wrote:

Assuming you define “climb” as having sent at least one outdoor climb of the grade…

 5.14: 10,000+
5:13: 100,000+
5:12: well over a million.

Where did you get these numbers?  (Not being snarky, just curious.)

https://www.climbingbusinessjournal.com/ifsc-releases-its-2019-annual-report/

Estimated number of climbers 5 years ago was 44.5 million worldwide. 10+ million in the US. Climbing 5.12 is not that usual, 15-25%? If anything Lena's 1 million estimate is probably low

Cory B wrote:

https://www.climbingbusinessjournal.com/ifsc-releases-its-2019-annual-report/

Estimated number of climbers 5 years ago was 44.5 million worldwide. 10+ million in the US. Climbing 5.12 is not that usual, 15-25%? If anything Lena's 1 million estimate is probably low

While there are some days at the Gunks or the Red River Gorge in October, where it seems all those climbers are there at the same time, I feel that those numbers are significantly inflated, and would love to know how they were derived, including the perennial question of how 'climber' was defined. In my 'normal' life ( outside my climbing circle) virtually no one I know is what I would consider to be 'a climber'--and only a small percentage of them have even experienced a single climbing wall session--most want to have nothing to do with the activity---and that 'population' is a much larger one than that of the climbers whom I know and am aware of. I don't think this is a unique situation. Add this, as posted above, to the very large percentage of the world's population that is struggling hard just to survive, ---I just don't believe those numbers of climbers mentioned above are close to accurate. But, as with the posts claiming otherwise, this is just my opinion, based upon personal experience and anecdotal evidence, so without any firm statistical basis.

And then, again just from the same limited personal and anecdotal experience, within the climbing circles I interact with--and I am very active and get around/-, while there are numerous individuals who climb 12s, and many, though fewer, who climb 13s and above ( at least within the gym context --many fewer outside) those individuals still represent a relatively small percentage of those climbers I know and observe. Obviously there are places where those percentages are higher, but still doubt that they reach the numbers quoted above.

Gunkiemike wrote:

Where did you get these numbers?  (Not being snarky, just curious.)

Guesstimate based on people I know, and some numbers I remember seeing a couple of years ago, like the estimate that 10 million people in US “participated regularly” in gym climbing for the last year that the numbers were crunched. Probably 2022-ish.

I extrapolated from that to worldwide, fudge-factored a bit for what I think is leisure activity participation in wealthy countries vs developing countries… 

I do think my numbers are not wildly off. 

That would mean 1 in every 30 Americans regularly gym climbs. Maybe in Boulder, but among the people I know that is not anywhere close. Maybe the number of gym climbers total (people who have ever paid money in a gym) but not regular participants. 

There are about 600 gyms in the US, 10 million regular participants would amount to 16,666 per gym!

Eric Craig wrote:

Don't be so sure of that honey

You know, not everything has to relate to 40 years ago