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How many sessions does it typically take for a player character in your game to earn their next level of experience?

Depends largely on class and current level. Had a gunslinger who was outleveled by a merc twice...but the merc has an easier table and contributes more than just a pair of pistols to the group.

But as a hard number, it hasn't taken less than 5 sessions since level 3.

When I ran regularly, I did things old-school, using the XP tables as-is, and went with Kev's words as my model:
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In my original Palladium Role-Playing Game play-test campaign, after two years of regular, weekly, long (averaged 9 hours) playing sessions; the characters averaged 7th to 9th level and progressing, ever so slowly, towards tenth level.

If I were to start a new campaign today, I'd probably be more liberal with the XP.
Really, I'd probably get together with the players, and see how fast they wanted to level up, and how much they wanted their performance to factor into things.

As it goes I would make sure to get chars from level 1 to level 2 within the 1st four session....to hook the players.

i'd say generally pretty slow to level but i take in character backstory as well to start a level , an 18 yr old green recruit will start at level 1, but someone wanting to play someone in their mid 50's is going to be more established (but will have a modified starting list for equipment, maybe enemies etc)

but for actually leveling it's kind of up to the player how active they are, if they sit back and let everyone else do everything they are not going to level nearly as fast

I made it to just short of second level during the first session once. Epic battle.

This question comes up a lot.

My group gets approx 800xp per night (4 hr session). Thats an average; some nights they might wander a town and shop, other nights they might be waist deep in action a deduction.

In my own critique I think I may be a tad stingy. I think about 1000xp works well (but theyve still gotta earn each point).

Over the last two years, about 24 game nights, 4-6 hours long:

Mind Melter and Juicer are now level 5

Everyone else keeps changing characters and are anywhere from level two to four...

It depends on a number of factors how fast they level up. Chiefly among those factors are what people are playing, whether there is any combat or not and how much they get done towards resolution of the quest or mission. Truth is Rifts is all about the combat (by the book exps). My last group was led by thinkers not combat junkies. I had to make allowances for creative solutions instead of combat. The standard book exps weren't gonna work so it ended up being between four to six sessions for leveling.

On average?
Roughly 8 adventures.
It starts quickly but slows down as levels get higher.

My players typically earn anywhere from 1,500 to 3,000 xp per game. They can also earn xp in between games for writing up character logs and other stuff.

It must be nice to have players that motivated. My last group was like herding angry cats. They just didn't have time to do that stuff. Even the ones who should have had the time couldn't be bothered.

Some are more motivated than others.

I can barely get my guys to remember to level their characters when they do actually ding.

While I'm sorry to hear that; I'm glad I'm not the only GM who has that problem. I had a player that refused to check his email or update his character so he spent most of game being two levels lower than the other characters.

We're always levelling up the players characters sheets cos they cut be arsed.

I'm sorry, what? You don't like the character sheets? If that's the case, welcome to the club. The sheets are complicated but if you keep looking you may find a style you like.

Don't think he's talking about the sheets themselves...

Okay, then perhaps he's unhappy with his players. Thanks for clearing that up for me.

We typically received somewhere between 1k and 1.5k XP in a session. However, we burned through characters pretty fast, so it was pretty rare for any character to last long enough to hit level 6 or 7.

Yeah, we had a TPK -1 between our last two games. urban warfare, a bit of investigation and intrigue, partying it up, demon hunting, closing an apocalyptic level rift, building a smart and skilled little merc unit...my boys were good.

but level 8 did just about all of them in, lol.

cos they cut be arsed = because they can't be bothered to

On average, it takes 3 sessions to get to 2nd level depending on O.C.C./R.C.C. and of course the players. The rest will come with an average factor 2x of reaching 2nd level. So 2nd to 3rd level will take 6 sessions, 4th level around 8 sessions and so on.

So 8 more or they level every two sessions?

Leveling every two session is more like rate that would be more like what DND would be.(with it's flat exp. rate pre-level). With PB, with it's Progressive exp. tabled it takes longer and longer with each level to level up to the next level.

Even then after the initial bump I would give new chars, after the initial leveling from 1 to 2 I would start just handing out exp. at a normal level, for what the chars did during the game.

Glad to hear, I'm not the only one. Years ago they were on it. Now they're all into resolving plots going after their goals and building character, and personaities n' stuff. Which is great, but still, LEVEL YER DARN CHARACTERS WHEN YOU MAKE A LEVEL! My players leveled 2 months ago, and I'm still texting them to level up.

You can easily get to second level in an adventure or two. Heck, if you got some 'EP prostitute' players, they can scrounge EPs up before you get them out of the rowdy bar the Palladium Fantasy campaign usually starts in, they'll just use some "Good Judgment and Deductive Reasoning" to "Avoid unnecessary violence," and get out of the bar without a fight. Bam, already on the road to level 2, and just getting started. lol

When I first started GMing mid to late 90s, I was strictly by the book, I'm a lot more free flow now, and think I have a good feel for when leveling is right (whether I really do or not, everyone seems happy, and I'm okay with that). I read the leveling system in the Savage Worlds recently and that seems interesting...

Levels mean less in PB games than D&D so the need to quickly level up isn't there as much at the low levels. The power difference between a 1st and 4th level PC in Rifts isn't so startling as it can be in D&D.

I rank races and classes and give XP based on a sliding point scale. AKA, if your race and class are hugely front loaded, you gain less XP, thus level up slower. The players know this in advance so if they want to level up quickly, they pick a "low point" race/class combo. Want psi? Want magic? Want to be a MDC beastie? Great, you level slower than the human with skills and a popgun.

except the system already factored that in...
that is why there are so many different exp charts.

I find the deviations in XP to be so minor in general that in order to create some semblance of balance (aka, justification for players to pick sub-optimal races and classes). Thus, I incorporate another level of modification so the player with the Human Rogue Scholar feels useful in the party with the Dragon Juicer because he levels notably faster and thus deepens skills much faster.

But since my campaigns usually cap out between 4th and 6th level, its not much of an issue for me.