How long does the entire water cycle take?
March 26th, 2010 | 
Author: How long does the water cycle process take? I’m talking about the process from evaporation to precipitation.
The conditions vary. For example, how long would it take during the spring, in a cool state, like Virginia? It’s for a report and it doesn’t really specify.
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what are the other conditions ? like heat or light? the factors that cause the evaporation?
I cannot answer without knowing all the details.
But if your putting a glass of water outside and waiting for rain, I will say 4 to 7 days
many variables, wind, heat, humidity, pressure
that varies greatly.
in tropical areas the cycle can be 24 hours, and is called evaporation transpiration, where water evaporate in the morning and condenses again in the afternoon.
but the cycle of water evaporating from oceans, condensing over land, flowing into the ground and finally returning to to ocean is very slow, since the amount of water in the ocean is vast and only a minute fraction of it evaporates in a given time.