To explore the impact of the community built environment on the walking time of elderly people, and considering gender differences among the elderly group, a CatBoost model was constructed and the SHAP (Shapley additive explanations) explanation method was integrated. The relative importance and nonlinear relationships of the community built environment features with the walking time of elderly people of different genders were comparatively analyzed. The study findings indicate that the community built environment variables have a more significant influence on the walking time of the elderly compared to personal socioeconomic attributes. However, the impact varies between genders. Compared to elderly males, elderly females pay more attention to built environment variables closely related to social needs, such as NDVI and population density. In contrast, the walking time of elderly males is more closely associated with personal socioeconomic attributes, often linked to transportation convenience and travel efficiency.