Hallways take more abuse than any room in the house — bags, shoulders, bikes, kids' hands, the dog. A flat matt emulsion looks lovely for about a fortnight before it starts marking up and burnishing where people brush past. So the answer is durability over flatness, and that means a washable finish.
For the walls, the smart move is a wipeable matt. Little Greene Intelligent Matt is a genuinely tough, scrubbable emulsion that looks like a proper flat finish but takes a wipe with a damp cloth without polishing up. Dulux Easycare is the budget-friendly workhorse here — stain-repellent and built for exactly this kind of traffic. If you want premium, Benjamin Moore Scuff-X in matte or eggshell is the most abrasion-resistant wall paint going; it's engineered specifically for scuffs and it's brilliant in a hallway.
The usual "but what about a full eggshell on the walls?" question — you can, and a modern eggshell wipes beautifully, but the extra sheen shows every lump and trowel mark on imperfect plaster, and hallways often have dodgy old walls. A wipeable matt hides sins better. Reserve the sheen for where it earns its keep.
Which is the woodwork. Skirting, architrave, dado, the lot. Put a satin or eggshell on it — never matt. The trim is where the real knocks land, and a harder oil-modified or modern water-based eggshell (Little Greene Intelligent Eggshell, or Dulux's trim ranges) cleans up and resists chipping far better.
Colour-wise, hallways are often dark and narrow, so don't fight it — either lean into the gloom with something rich, or lift it with a warm off-white. Farrow & Ball Pointing or Skimming Stone keep it bright and forgiving; Slipper Satin is a gorgeous soft neutral; or go bold and embrace a windowless hall with Mole's Breath.
Practical tip: prime any bare or repaired patches with Zinsser before topcoat, and give walls two full coats minimum — durability comes from film build, not just the formula on the tin.