How many steps to the top of Burj Khalifa?

The world's tallest building has 2,909 steps in its fire stairwell and none of them are open to visitors; the At the Top observation decks on floors 124, 125 and 148 are reached by lift. The stairwell is pressurised and includes refuge floors every twenty-five storeys, because a full evacuation on foot from the upper floors would take hours. Occasional charity stair climbs have used it under close supervision. The building's lifts travel at 10 m/s, which is a large part of why nobody climbs.

The numbers

Steps

2,909

Reaches

the 160th floor, via the emergency stairwell — no public access

Public access

Not climbable by the public

Where

Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Height climbed

585 m — 1,919 ft

Average rise per step

201 mm

This count describes a stairwell the public cannot use. Published step figures for famous structures very often refer to service or emergency stairs — worth knowing before planning a visit around one.

Published counts for the same structure routinely disagree by five to ten per cent, and nearly always for one of three reasons: whether intermediate landings count as steps, whether the final platform step counts, and where the climb is deemed to start. The figure here says what it reaches.

How it compares