Guide, Cricket
How cricket scoring works: runs, wickets, overs and run rate
A plain guide to reading a cricket scorecard, from 184/6 (20.0) to required run rate, extras and how results are worded.
By Editorial team. Published .
A cricket score like 184/6 (20.0) packs three facts into one line: the batting side has scored 184 runs, lost 6 wickets, and faced 20 overs. Once you can read that line, every scorecard on this site makes sense.
Runs and wickets
Runs are scored by running between the wickets or by hitting boundaries: four if the ball reaches the rope after touching the ground, six if it clears the rope on the full.
A wicket falls each time a batter is dismissed: bowled, caught, leg before wicket (LBW), run out, stumped and a few rarer ways. A team has eleven players, so an innings ends when ten wickets have fallen, because the last batter has no partner. Australian and English scorecards sometimes write wickets first (6/184); most of the world, and this site, writes runs first.
Overs
An over is six legal deliveries from one bowler. The figure 14.3 means 14 complete overs and 3 balls, not fourteen and three tenths. That matters when you do sums: 14.3 overs is 87 balls.
Limited-overs formats cap each innings:
| Format | Overs per side | Typical length |
|---|---|---|
| T20 | 20 | About 3.5 hours |
| ODI (one-day international) | 50 | About 8 hours |
| Test | No limit, two innings each | Up to 5 days |
Extras
Some runs are not credited to a batter. Wides and no-balls add a run to the batting side and must be bowled again. In limited-overs cricket a no-ball for overstepping also earns the next ball as a free hit, from which the batter can't be out in most ways. Byes and leg byes are runs taken when the ball hasn't come off the bat.
Run rate and required run rate
Run rate is runs scored per over: 184 runs from 20 overs is a run rate of 9.20. Convert overs to balls first when the over isn't complete: 87 runs from 14.3 overs (87 balls) is 87 ÷ 87 × 6 = 6.00 an over.
When a side is chasing, the target is one more than the opponent's total. The required run rate is the runs still needed divided by the overs left. If a side needs 54 from the last 36 balls, that's 9.00 an over.
How results are worded
- The side batting first wins by runs: the gap between the totals. "Won by 23 runs."
- The chasing side wins by wickets: how many wickets it had left when it passed the target. "Won by 4 wickets."
- Rain-shortened limited-overs games use the DLS method to reset targets, so you may see "won by 12 runs (DLS method)".
- Test matches can also end in a draw if time runs out before a result, which is different from a tie, where the scores finish level after both sides are bowled out or the chase ends exactly level.
Reading our cricket scores
On match pages we show each innings with its run rate, the target once the chase is on, and a line of match status such as "India need 34 runs from 21 balls". Follow a team with the star, and the scores page will surface its games first.