Following publication in 1873, various people attempted to follow Fogg's fictional circumnavigation, often within self-imposed constraints:
- In 1889, Nellie Bly undertook to travel around the world in 80 days for her newspaper, the New York World. She managed to do the journey within 72 days, meeting Verne in Amiens. Her book Around the World in Seventy-Two Days became a best seller.
- In 1889, Elizabeth Bisland working for the Cosmopolitan became a rival to Bly, racing her across the world to try to achieve the global crossing first.[12]
- In 1894, George Griffith carried out a publicity stunt on behalf of C. Arthur Pearson by circumnavigating the world in 65 days, from 12 March to 16 May.[13][14] The tale of his journey was told in Pearson's Weekly in 14 parts between 2 June and 1 September 1894, bearing the title "How I Broke the Record Round the World".[14][15] It was later published in book form in 2008 under the title Around the World in 65 Days.[15]
- In 1903, James Willis Sayre, an American theatre critic and arts promoter, set a world record for circling the earth using public transport: 54 days, 9 hours and 42 minutes.[16]
- In 1908, Harry Bensley, on a wager, set out to circumnavigate the world on foot wearing an iron mask. The journey was abandoned, incomplete, at the outbreak of World War I in 1914.
- In 1928, 15-year-old Danish Boy Scout Palle Huld travelled around the world by train and ship in the opposite direction to the one in the book. His trip was sponsored by a Danish newspaper and made on the occasion of the 100th birthday of Jules Verne. The trip was described in the book A Boy Scout Around the World. It took 44 days. He took the Trans-Siberian Railway and did not go by India.
- In 1984, Nicholas Coleridge emulated Fogg's trip, taking 78 days; he wrote a book titled Around the World in 78 Days.[17]
- In 1988, Monty Python member Michael Palin took on a similar challenge without using aircraft, as a part of a television travelogue, called Around the World in 80 Days with Michael Palin. He completed the journey in 79 days and 7 hours.
- Since 1993, the Jules Verne Trophy has been given to the boat that sails around the world without stopping and with no outside assistance in the shortest time.
- In 2009, twelve celebrities performed a relay version of the journey for the BBC Children in Need charity appeal.
- In 2017, Mark Beaumont, a British cyclist inspired by Verne, set out to cycle across the world in 80 days. He completed the trip in 78 days, 14 hours and 40 minutes, after departing from Paris on 2 July 2017. Beaumont beat the previous world record of 123 days, set by Andrew Nicholson, by cycling 29,000 km (18,000 mi) across the globe visiting Russia, Mongolia, China, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, US and a number of countries in Europe.[18]
