The Time

If your viva begins at 2pm there might be a limit on how long your viva could be.

If your viva starts at 10am that doesn’t make you more likely to be discussing your work still when the sun sets.

Wondering about viva length is a distraction. It doesn’t correlate to anything useful about the outcome. It is helpful to get a sense of viva length to manage your expectations. If you have concerns about being present for a long time because of health reasons then you can figure out what you need to make the viva fair for you.

Long viva, short viva or somewhere-in-between-viva, the time you’re in the viva is very, very short compared to the rest of your PhD: all the time you’ve invested in becoming good and doing something good.