I was reading in a post on time lapse photography that some people recommend not using a good camera to do time lapse because it will prematurely wear out your shutter. I have read several books on time lapse and none of them have ever brought up wearing out your cameras shutter.
In doing some research on the issue I've determined that the camera manufacturers really don't know how many actuations a shutter can take prior to failure. Apparently when they, the manufacturer, say a shutter is rated for 150,000 actuations, what it means is they have tested that particular shutter to a minimum of 150,000 actuations and have not had a failure. The shutter could fail at 150,003 or it could keep going for another 95,000 actuations or for some miraculous reason, just keep on klicking for a very long time, until eventually it finally fails. I believe I read it costs on average around $150 to $300 to replace a shutter, depending on make and model.

Now don't get me wrong here; if you can afford a separate camera just for time lapse, all the better. I personally generally use an older camera, one that I don't take out shooting anymore, like a 40D or 50D or 60D, for longer time lapse projects, but since my newer cameras have built in intervalometers, I will use one of them for short term time lapse projects.

Bottom line is, I wouldn't be overly concerned about wearing out your shutter, unless you are planning on doing a whole lot of time lapse projects, in which case I strongly recommend you get a camera that has an electronic shutter option; no mechanical shutter to wear out.

Also, many of my long term time lapse projects only require maybe 4 exposures an hour which comes to around 2900 for an entire month and that's not really all that many. Of course some take more and some less.

None of these manufactuer's ratings are independently verified. Like so much else today, it's a liar's contest.

Are you talking about slowing down motion, or speeding it up? Normally, "time-lapse" means speeding up
motion. So you are exposing every few seoconds, minutes or hours. It takes a long time to wear out your
shutter that way.

Also, you didn't say what type of camera.

DSLRs have focal plane shutters. The best ones are titanium blades. The titanium blade shutter in my
mid-1970s Nikon F2 Photomic still works great. God only knows how many exposures it's taken. But even the
cloth screen shutters last for decades. My c. 1970 Minolta SRT-101's shutter still works fine. I have a leaf shutter
camera from 1916 that still works fine.

What usually kills shutters is that the lubricants dry out. But high quality modern cameras are all lubricated with
synthetic oils. When I recondition a shutter. I only use Swiss-made Moebius Synt-a-Lube watch and clock oils.
Some leaf shutters require a more viscus oil to restrain the speed. But all these top-quality syntehtic oils last decades.
My cameras will outlast me--without a doubt.

With proper maintenance, it's possible to keep a mechanical clock, watch or camera running for centuries.
All DSLR shutters are mechanical or electro-mechanical. "Global shutters" -- a type of sensor in low-end mirrorless
cameras--last foever. But digital cameras tend to die beause of switches, battery contacts, SD card contacts, or
plastic gears. Wear on the shutter is the least of your worries. All digital cameras are disposable cameras.

Take pictures. Have fun. Don't worry about shutter life.

Why do people say things like this? This is a conversation and social media website sites such as this are about conversations. If you are no longer interested in contributing to this conversation, then don't. But telling everyone to give it a rest?! It's not up to you to declare this or any conversation over, unless you are the OP or admin.

This conversation has gone 3 pages and I've seen lesser conversations go a heck of a lot longer. Besides, I'm pretty sure I originally said, shutter failure due to time lapse photography is NOT an issue. I also believe I said I've never had a shutter fail.

There is more than one shutter design. So far as I know and I am not an expert there are two types. Overlapping leaves that are spring powered and a curtain with a thin slit and maybe spring powered. The point is the shutter is a mechanical device and the parts can wear out. I have been hoping to hear about an electronic shutter. While you are focusing and fussing with exposure light is falling on the sensor, could the charge state of the sensor be time sampled and fed to a buffer circuit. If the charge state of the sensor is sampled briefly, is that equivalent for illuminating the sensor for a time interval.