Most sixes in ODI World Cup: Rohit Sharma leads on 54

Rohit Sharma has hit the most sixes in ODI World Cup history with 54. He took the record off Chris Gayle during the 2023 semi-final and finished the tournament four clear of the 50 he reached that day.

Gayle is second on 49, Glenn Maxwell third on 43. Complete to 11 September 2026 — the next 50-over World Cup is in 2027, so this list has not moved since November 2023.

Most sixes in ODI World Cup history

Every player with 25 or more World Cup sixes. Source: ESPNcricinfo.

Rank	Player	Team	Span	Innings	Runs	Strike rate	Sixes
1	Rohit Sharma	India	2015-2023	28	1,575	105.49	54
2	Chris Gayle	West Indies	2003-2019	34	1,186	90.53	49
3	Glenn Maxwell	Australia	2015-2023	25	901	160.32	43
4	David Warner	Australia	2015-2023	29	1,527	101.46	41
5	AB de Villiers	South Africa	2007-2015	22	1,207	117.29	37
6	David Miller	South Africa	2015-2023	21	816	113.33	35
7	Ricky Ponting	Australia	1996-2011	42	1,743	79.95	31
8	Brendon McCullum	New Zealand	2003-2015	27	742	120.84	29
9	Herschelle Gibbs	South Africa	1999-2007	23	1,067	87.38	28
10	Sanath Jayasuriya	Sri Lanka	1992-2007	37	1,165	90.66	27
10	Sachin Tendulkar	India	1992-2011	44	2,278	88.98	27
12	Eoin Morgan	England/Ireland	2007-2019	27	672	84.84	26
13	Quinton de Kock	South Africa	2015-2023	27	1,044	96.57	25

How Rohit took the record

Rohit went past Gayle’s 49 in the semi-final against New Zealand at the Wankhede on 15 November 2023, reaching 50 World Cup sixes that day. He hit four more before the tournament ended, finishing on 54.

The gap in innings is the part worth noticing. Rohit needed 28 innings; Gayle took 34, Ponting 42 and Tendulkar 44. Rohit has played three World Cups, Gayle five.

Thirty-one in one tournament

Rohit hit 31 sixes at the 2023 World Cup, the most anyone has hit in a single edition. He made 597 runs at a strike rate of 125.94 across all 11 of India’s matches.

The next best is Chris Gayle’s 26 in 2015, and that came in six innings — one of which was his 215 against Zimbabwe at Canberra, a knock beaten as the highest World Cup score by Martin Guptill’s 237 not out a month later in the same tournament. Shreyas Iyer and David Warner both hit 24 in 2023.

Strike rate tells you who was hitting them

Glenn Maxwell’s 160.32 is the highest in the table by a distance — McCullum is next on 120.84 — and he got his 43 sixes from only 901 runs, against Rohit’s 1,575 and Warner’s 1,527. Maxwell’s 201 not out against Afghanistan at the Wankhede in 2023, made on one leg, was the first double hundred scored in an ODI run chase.

Most ODI World Cup sixes for India

Rank	Player	Span	Innings	Runs	Strike rate	Sixes
1	Rohit Sharma	2015-2023	28	1,575	105.49	54
2	Sachin Tendulkar	1992-2011	44	2,278	88.98	27
3	Sourav Ganguly	1999-2007	21	1,006	77.50	25
4	Shreyas Iyer	2023	11	530	113.24	24
5	Virender Sehwag	2003-2011	22	843	106.17	18
6	MS Dhoni	2007-2019	25	780	89.96	15
7	Kapil Dev	1979-1992	24	669	115.14	14 or more
7	Virat Kohli	2011-2023	37	1,795	88.20	14
7	KL Rahul	2019-2023	19	813	84.33	14
10	Yuvraj Singh	2003-2011	21	738	90.33	13

Why Kapil Dev’s row says “or more”

Ball-by-ball boundary counts do not exist for every old match, so Kapil Dev’s World Cup six tally is recorded as an incomplete 14. ESPNcricinfo marks it with a plus sign; the true figure is at least 14 and cannot be established from the surviving scorecards.

It matters most for the 1979, 1983 and 1987 tournaments, and it is the reason a six-hitting list of this kind reads as a modern list. Shreyas Iyer, on 24 from a single World Cup, is already fourth for India.

When this list can change next

The 2027 World Cup, in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Namibia, is the next chance for anything here to move. Rohit would extend his own record; behind him, Maxwell is six short of Gayle and Warner eight. Rohit’s ODI future was on India’s selection agenda as recently as September 2026.

 

Photo credit: Alamy