Below, we rank the top 10 in ascending order, ending where cricket logic breaks down entirely: a Universe Boss at the crease, doing things that simply shouldn't be possible.
| Rank | Player | Score | Match | Year |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | Rishabh Pant | 128* | DD vs SRH | 2018 |
| 9 | Chris Gayle | 128* | RCB vs DD | 2012 |
| 8 | Shubman Gill | 129 | GT vs MI | 2023 |
| 7 | AB de Villiers | 129* | RCB vs GL | 2016 |
| 6 | KL Rahul | 132* | KXIP vs RCB | 2020 |
| 5 | AB de Villiers | 133* | RCB vs MI | 2015 |
| 4 | Quinton de Kock | 140* | LSG vs KKR | 2022 |
| 3 | Abhishek Sharma | 141 | SRH vs PBKS | 2025 |
| 2 | Brendon McCullum | 158* | KKR vs RCB | 2008 |
| 1 | Chris Gayle | 175* | RCB vs Pune Warriors | 2013 |
10. Rishabh Pant: 128* | DD vs SRH | 2018
Rishabh Pant was 20 years old when he walked out for Delhi Daredevils against Sunrisers Hyderabad in 2018 and produced an innings that made the entire country sit up. because nobody believed in Pant, quite the opposite, but because this level of clarity and aggression from someone so young felt almost unfair.
He smashed 128 runs off just 63 balls, hitting 15 fours and 7 sixes in an innings that left SRH's bowlers looking genuinely helpless. Pant's ability to hit through the line, improvise in the death overs, and keep a wicket throughout made this knock special even beyond the raw numbers. Unfortunately for Delhi, the team total wasn't enough to win, but nobody who watched remembers that. They remember Pant.
What this innings signalled to Indian cricket, and to the world, was the arrival of a new kind of left-handed maverick, one who would go on to redefine wicketkeeper batting. For now, though, he sits at the entry point of this elite list, and that tells you everything about the company he's keeping.
9. Chris Gayle: 128* | RCB vs DD | 2012
A year before his record, Chris Gayle was already producing innings that felt like they belonged in science fiction. Against Delhi Daredevils in 2012, he scored 128 not out off 62 balls for Royal Challengers Bangalore, an innings laced with 16 fours and 7 sixes, and one that had RCB fans questioning if this man was a real human being.
What makes this particularly fascinating is that Gayle has two entries on this list, which means this knock, as devastating as it was, only ranks ninth all-time. He would go even further the following year. But for Delhi's bowlers on that evening in 2012, there was no consolation in knowing that worse was coming for other opponents. This was brutal enough.
Gayle's technique, if you can call a process that involves standing still and swinging from the hip a technique, was perfectly suited to T20 cricket. He gave himself room, hit through the leg side with frightening power, and played with the kind of calm that suggested he was never really being challenged.
8. Shubman Gill: 129 | GT vs MI | 2023
Shubman Gill is the kind of batter who makes difficult things look effortless, which is both his greatest gift and, occasionally, the reason critics underestimate just how dominant he is. Against the Mumbai Indians in 2023, he produced a 129-run innings for the Gujarat Titans that was simply a masterclass in modern attacking batting.
Gill's innings came off 60 balls, with 12 fours and 8 sixes. But the numbers don't convey the elegance. Where Gayle bludgeons and Pant freestyles, Gill drives. He covers drives, pulls, and flicks, all with a wristiness that makes even slog sweeps look like textbook shots. This innings contributed directly to Gujarat Titans' dominant run in that IPL season and announced Gill as the heir apparent to India's batting throne.
At just 23 at the time of this knock, Gill joining this list at #8 suggests there could be more to come. His inclusion here, ahead of two AB de Villiers entries, speaks to the weight of a 129-run innings in any era of this competition.
7. AB de Villiers: 129* | RCB vs GL | 2016
AB de Villiers and Royal Challengers Bangalore were a partnership that regularly defied cricketing logic, and in 2016 against Gujarat Lions, ABD delivered one of his most ferocious IPL innings. A 129 not out off just 52 balls, that's a strike rate north of 248, featuring 12 fours and 12 sixes.
Twelve sixes. The capacity to clear the boundary twelve times in a single innings in the world's most competitive T20 league requires a combination of hand-eye coordination, power, and self-belief that only a handful of people in history have ever possessed. De Villiers possessed all three in abundance.
What made ABD so difficult to bowl at was his 360-degree threat. Bowlers couldn't set a field because there was no legitimate 'off' side or 'leg' side for him. He hit the ball where there were no fielders, full stop. This 2016 innings is a perfect example: Gujarat's captain Suresh Raina would have changed his field fifteen times, and it wouldn't have mattered. ABD was making the decisions, not the fielding side.
6. KL Rahul: 132* | KXIP vs RCB | 2020
KL Rahul is sometimes described as a classical batter, elegant, orthodox, technically correct. All of that is true. What is less often said is that this classical batter, when given a platform, can dismantle an attack with the same ferocity as anyone else on this list. His 132 not out off 69 balls for Kings XI Punjab against Royal Challengers Bangalore in the 2020 IPL (played in the UAE) is the proof.
This was Rahul captaining the side and keeping wicket, a dual responsibility that would exhaust most players physically and mentally. Rahul responded by scoring at almost a run a ball through the early overs before accelerating savagely, finishing with 14 fours and 7 sixes. He put on a stand with Mayank Agarwal that effectively ended RCB's hopes of defending a competitive total.
Rahul's innings also highlights something important about this list: the highest IPL scores don't always come from traditional six-hitters. Elegance, when applied at pace and with clarity of intent, can be just as destructive. This was KL Rahul at his absolute peak.
5. AB de Villiers: 133* | RCB vs MI | 2015
If you want a single innings to show someone who has never watched T20 cricket what the format is capable of at its highest level, this is it. AB de Villiers against the Mumbai Indians in 2015, 133 not out off 59 balls, is arguably the most technically spectacular innings on this entire list. Strike rate: 225.42. Fours: 9. Sixes: 17.
Seventeen sixes. In one innings. In a single T20 match. The number sounds impossible, but it happened, on April 25, 2015, at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium, one of the most bowler-unfriendly grounds in world cricket. Mumbai's attack that evening included seasoned, quality performers, and de Villiers treated them all the same.
This innings also broke the record for the fastest century in T20 history at the time. ABD reached his hundred off just 52 balls. The full-stadium atmosphere at Chinnaswamy, already one of cricket's most electric venues, was something beyond description, according to those who were there. De Villiers has two entries on this list. Both are justified. This one, the higher of the two, remains one of the most jaw-dropping individual performances in cricket history.
'Seventeen sixes in a single innings. AB de Villiers didn't just win a cricket match in 2015. He changed how the world understood what a T20 innings could look like.'
The Cricket Desk, on ABD's 133* vs MI
4. Quinton de Kock: 140* | LSG vs KKR | 2022
Quinton de Kock is one of those batters who plays with an almost suspicious calm, like someone who has done all his panicking already, before the match, and can now just bat. Against Kolkata Knight Riders in 2022, the South African wicketkeeper-opener produced an innings that had people checking the scoreboard multiple times because the numbers didn't feel real: 140 not out off 70 balls, for Lucknow Super Giants.
The innings included 14 fours and 10 sixes and remains the highest individual score in the history of Lucknow Super Giants as a franchise. De Kock's particular style, upright, still, using the full face of the bat, means his boundaries feel almost deceptively easy. He doesn't look like he's trying hard. That's because, at this level, he isn't. It's effortful genius presented as routine competence.
KKR are a franchise with one of cricket's most fanatical fan followings, and their bowlers and supporters alike would have struggled to process what was happening. A 140-run knock in the IPL puts you in extraordinarily rare company, and at #4 on the all-time list, de Kock belongs there.
3. Abhishek Sharma: 141 | SRH vs PBKS | 2025
The newest entry on this list is also one of the most extraordinary, because of what it reveals about the evolution of T20 batting and the fearlessness of a new generation of Indian cricketers. Abhishek Sharma, the left-handed opener for Sunrisers Hyderabad, smashed 141 runs against Punjab Kings in 2025 in an innings that shook the IPL world.
Abhishek has been built in the Sunrisers laboratory of aggression, a franchise that, under their recent leadership and coaching philosophy, has actively encouraged openers to treat every delivery in the powerplay as a scoring opportunity. This innings was the fullest expression of that philosophy. The young left-hander went after Punjab's bowling from the very first over, using his strong base and fast hands to clear the infield repeatedly.
What makes this innings historically significant isn't just the runs. It's the fact that a 22-year-old from Uttar Pradesh is now third on the all-time IPL individual score list, above AB de Villiers, KL Rahul, and a host of batting legends. Cricket's record books keep getting rewritten by younger, bolder batters. Abhishek Sharma is the embodiment of that shift. This is almost certainly not the last time his name will feature in IPL history.
2. Brendon McCullum: 158* | KKR vs RCB | 2008
The first match in Indian Premier League history. April 18, 2008. Kolkata Knight Riders versus Royal Challengers Bangalore. The world didn't yet know what the IPL was going to become. The crowds were there, the excitement was there, but nobody could have predicted the institution it would grow into. And then Brendon McCullum opened the batting and, quite literally, wrote the template.
His 158 not out off 73 balls, 10 fours, 13 sixes, on the very first night of the IPL, remains, seventeen years later, the second highest individual innings in the competition's history. Think about that for a moment. In every subsequent season, in every high-profile clash between the best T20 players on the planet, only one man has ever surpassed it. McCullum set the tone for what the IPL could be in the very first game, and the bar has rarely been cleared.
The New Zealander, who would go on to become one of cricket's most celebrated captains and later England's transformative Test coach, was perfectly suited to this kind of stage. Fearless, technically versatile, and mentally unshakeable, McCullum turned RCB's bowlers, including some of the world's best, into a highlight reel for his own batting. The Eden Gardens crowd, still figuring out what kind of event they were watching, left in no doubt that something new and spectacular had arrived in Indian sport.
1. Chris Gayle: 175* | RCB vs Pune Warriors | 2013
April 23, 2013. Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bengaluru. Chris Gayle walked out to open the batting for Royal Challengers Bangalore against Pune Warriors India and proceeded to play the single greatest innings in IPL history, and one of the greatest innings ever played in any format of T20 cricket, anywhere in the world.
175 not out. Off 66 balls. With 17 fours and 13 sixes. A strike rate of 265.15. The highest individual score in the history of the Indian Premier League, and a record that has now stood for over a decade through seventeen seasons of intensely competitive batting from the sport's very best players.
Gayle reached his century off just 30 balls, a mark that still stands as the fastest century in IPL history. He was so far ahead of any reasonable expectation that the Pune Warriors' bowling figures for that evening look less like a cricket scorecard and more like a car crash report. Every member of their attack was taken apart. The fielding side had no answers, no field settings that helped, and no option except to bowl and watch the ball disappear.
The Universe Boss nickname, which Gayle coined for himself with a confidence that only he could pull off, was never more apt than on this evening. He wasn't playing cricket on his own terms. He was rewriting what the terms were. RCB finished on 263/5 in their 20 overs, a total that was, given the circumstances, almost beside the point. The match became secondary. The innings was the story, and it has remained the story ever since.
It is worth asking: will 175* ever be beaten? The honest answer is yes, eventually, records always fall. Abhishek Sharma's 141 in 2025 is the most recent reminder that boundaries keep being pushed. But for now, Gayle's record sits undisturbed at the peak of IPL history, a monument to one Caribbean giant's complete, total, and absolute ownership of the world's most watched T20 competition, on one unforgettable April night.
The highest individual scores in IPL history aren't just statistics. They are the sport at its most alive, and the reason millions of people set alarms, clear schedules, and argue about cricket with the intensity of something that genuinely matters. Because, in its own way, it does.
Also Read: IPL 2026 Venues: All 13 Stadiums, Capacity and Pitch Reports
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