It is the question everyone asks and nobody answers honestly, usually because the honest answer is longer than people want to hear. But an estimate is genuinely useful: it tells you whether that Christmas piece is realistic in October, and whether a first project is going to be finished or abandoned.
Start with stitches per hour
The unit that matters is stitches per hour, and it varies enormously with experience and with the chart.
| Stitcher | Simple chart, few colours | Detailed chart, lots of colour changes |
|---|---|---|
| Beginner | 150 to 250 per hour | 80 to 150 per hour |
| Comfortable | 300 to 450 per hour | 180 to 280 per hour |
| Fast and experienced | 500 to 700 per hour | 300 to 450 per hour |
Those are full cross stitches on aida with two strands. Take them as a starting point rather than a rule, because personal variation is wide. Some people are simply quicker, and everyone is quicker on a good day in good light.
The second column is the important one. A chart with heavy colour changes can halve your rate, which is why two designs with identical stitch counts can take very different amounts of time.
Worked examples
Assuming a comfortable stitcher at 300 stitches per hour on a moderately detailed chart:
| Project | Stitch count | Rough hours | At 5 hours a week |
|---|---|---|---|
| Small motif, 50 x 50 | 2,500 | 8 | Under 2 weeks |
| Card or ornament, 70 x 70 | 4,900 | 16 | 3 weeks |
| Medium piece, 140 x 180 | 25,200 | 84 | 4 months |
| Large piece, 200 x 250 | 50,000 | 167 | 8 months |
| Full coverage portrait, 300 x 400 | 120,000 | 400 | Over a year and a half |
Two things stand out. Small projects finish quickly enough to keep you motivated, which is why beginner project ideas are mostly small. And a full coverage portrait is a serious commitment that people routinely underestimate by a factor of two.
What actually slows you down
The stitch count is only half the story.
Colour changes. Every thread change costs you time you are not stitching. A chart with scattered single stitches can add half again to the total. This is the confetti problem, and it is worth understanding before you commit: confetti and how to tame it.
Fabric count. Finer fabric means more stitches per inch, so a given design has the same stitch count but each stitch takes slightly longer, especially in poor light. On 18 count and above most people slow down noticeably.
Fractional stitches. Quarter and three-quarter stitches take longer than full crosses, particularly on aida where you have to pierce the block. A chart full of them will run slower than its count suggests. See fractional stitches explained.
Backstitch. Usually done at the end, and usually underestimated. A detailed outline can add several hours to a piece that looked finished.
Frogging. Unpicking. Everyone does it, nobody budgets for it. Add ten percent and you will be closer to reality. Fixing common mistakes will at least keep it down.
Setup and finishing. Gridding the fabric, washing, pressing and framing are all real hours that never appear in a stitch count. Allow an evening or two at each end.
A quick way to estimate
- Take the stitch count from the chart.
- Divide by your honest stitches per hour, using the detailed column if the chart has lots of colour changes.
- Add ten percent for unpicking.
- Add two to four hours for backstitch on a medium piece.
- Add an evening for setup and an evening for finishing.
Then divide by the hours you genuinely stitch in a week, which for most people is less than they think. Two hours a week is a perfectly normal amount, and it turns an 84 hour piece into a ten month project.
Or let the project work it out
Guessing at your own rate is the weakest part of any estimate, because most people have never measured it.
If you track a project stitch by stitch, the software knows your actual rate: how many stitches you did on which days, and therefore how long the rest will take. HobbyTub's pattern tracker shows a projected finish date calculated from your own pace, and it gets more accurate the longer you stitch. It is a more useful number than any table, because it is about you rather than about an average.
Is it worth estimating at all?
Yes, for one reason: it changes what you start. Knowing that a portrait is 400 hours might lead you to a smaller version, or to a design with fewer colour changes, or to simply starting it anyway with your eyes open.
The projects that get abandoned are rarely the ones that were too hard. They are the ones that turned out to be much longer than expected.
You can browse the pattern library where every design lists its stitch and colour counts, or see all the tools for tracking one you have already started.