The list has no 1248 entries and several community members have passed or are close to 1000 visits. In general I feel travelling has become easier (more flight connections, less visa restrictions), making many sites very accessible. Did anyone have a deeper look into how many WHS could currently be visited without a huge additional effort?
If we exclude sites that are currently in a war zone or a "I should really not travel there right now" country, in a country you need a visa you won't get within a day or two, sites that need a ridiculous amount of money to get there, or those who are simply closed to public, how many could I still visit? I feel like currently it is possible to get to 1000 without having visited a site others have to ask you how you got there.

That depends on what you define as a ridiculous amount of money. If it is 1000 USD per site, then even St. Kilda qualifies. If it is 10k, then very few sites fulfill this condition (even Macquarie and NZ Sub-Antarctic Islands can be combined in one trip costing around 10k).

I think you can reach 1100 or even 1150.

War zones: Tell Umm Amer (Palestine), Zabid, Sanaa, Kingdom of Saba (Yemen), 5 in DR Congo, 1 in CAR. You may also add some that are visitable (so may fall into category "I shold really not travel there right now"): 6 in Syria, 3 in Sudan, 5 in Ukraine, 4 in Burkina Faso, 4 in Mali, 5 in Libya, 2 in Afghanistan, 2 in Ivory Coast, 2 in Niger, Sukur in Nigeria. 44 in total. Russia or Israel may fall into that category for many, but not for security reasons.

Difficult visa regime - country dependent, but for Westerners: Algeria (7), Cameroon (2), Congo (1), Ghana (2) North Korea (3), Chad (2), Eritrea (1) Mount Athos (1). 19 in total.

As I am now close to 1,000, I would say that the answer would lie around 1,050-1,100.
To get to my current count, I only have maybe a few very expensive ones (in Chad, C.A.R., etc).
And I still have easy ones that I have not been to (2 in Egypt for example).
The only difference beyond 1,000 is that you run out of clusters. So each trip gets more and more expensive just to see a few extra WHS.

But in the end, there are maybe 50 that are so costly or so off-limits (like some sites in Yemen right now) that you (I) will never get there, or which do not appeal to me at all such as the pure remote diving sites.

I think 1000 will get continuously easier. With 30 sites being inscribed each year, the options just widen. Key bit is to find the future inscriptions to save yourself the revisits.

You can have "run out of clusters" long before 1000..... that is partly a function of when one "does" a country or region....... even if you try to pick up likely active T List entries whilst "doing" the WHS in a country, each year which passes thereafter adds the odd "singleton" or doubleton which is difficult to justify going back for unless one is very committed to one's count.
Countries I "completed" or virtally so in the 20 years between say 1999 and 2019 (ie. before Covid) now have quite a number of sites which were not inscribed or even on T Lists then. I presume the same will be true in 2030-50 for those reaching 1000 now - thus creating a new "target". A mitigating factor might be that T Lists could be more realistic than they were and hence more useful for picking up future inscriptions!!

Only 5 people have achieved 75% of the World Heritage List

25% of the List: 312 (140 of us)
50% of the List: 624 (37 of us)
75% of the List: 936 (5 of us)

Zoë has proven 90% is possible (only 22 WHS away), but beyond that? 100% is a near impossibility. On top of it all, I suspect the last 10% is either incredibly dangerous or random low-interest sites that were inscribed long after you already completed ___ country. As Solivagant pointed out for these type of WHS its 'difficult to justify going back for unless one is very committed to one's count'.

For me, I celebrate my modest WHS achievements by creating a coffee table book with a nice two page spread for each WHS, which includes inscription year and the year I (or we - spouse) visited. Each book includes 50 WHS, so I have a grand total of 2 coffee table books since I only recently passed 100 WHS! 25% of the list sounds like a realistic goal for me!

And congrats on reaching Site #100! Twenty-five percent is certainly achievable, though the target number keeps changing with each year's new inscriptions. I may aim for at least 50%, but it helps to be overseas in Europe right now, where there are more hotspots than North America.

I'm hoping its like that quote about getting rich, the first million is the hardest. In this case, the first 100 world heritage sites. What I really need to do is spend some time with relatives in Sweden and buy a property in Korea, giving me better access to Northern Europe and Northeast Asia.

I think I'm in the lower quadrant of collectors but that's ok. I try to visit a few 'new' countries each year and if there are WHSs then I try to get to at least some of them without breaking the bank. To get really high I'd probably need a time machine and start collecting earlier, or win the lottery :D Would be totally cool though to collect a lot more, and see lots of marvelous things.

In my opinion, this website is not about a competition on who visited more. A great community member is someone, who participates and shares useful information with others. winterkjm is a fantastic example of someone with fewer visits, but loads of helpful information shared. Especially about South Korea.

Thanks kintante! I'm constantly inspired by many users within this community.