West Indian legend Chris Gayle is widely regarded as the greatest T20 cricketer of all time. He still holds the format’s two biggest hitting records, the most sixes and the most hundreds, and he did it at every level, from franchise leagues to the ICC T20 World Cup.

For those accomplishments, Chris Gayle is widely hailed as the God of T20 cricket. Other batters have since passed his run tally, but none has come close to his sixes or his hundreds.

Chris Gayle – God of T20 cricket

Chris Gayle’s statistics do the talking on his behalf. The Caribbean stalwart scored 14,562 runs in 463 T20 matches, and he was the first cricketer to pass 10,000 T20 runs. He is no longer the leading run-scorer: Jos Buttler (15,062), Kieron Pollard (14,999) and Alex Hales (14,581) have all gone past him, which leaves Gayle fourth. His hitting records still stand, though. Gayle hit 1,056 sixes, more than anyone else; Pollard, on 1,013, is the only other batter past 1,000. And his 22 T20 hundreds are nine more than the next best, Babar Azam’s 13.

The Universe Boss as he’s affectionately known was also very successful at the international level in the shortest format. He was an integral part of the West Indies team that won two ICC T20 World Cups in 2012 and 2016. Gayle also scored the first-ever century in T20 Internationals during the opening match of the inaugural ICC T20 World Cup in 2007 against South Africa.

Gayle’s most celebrated spell in this format was with Team Bangalore in the Indian T20 League. After joining the franchise in 2011, he scored a century on debut against Kolkata and went on to win the Orange Cap for most runs that season. He followed it up with another Orange Cap the next season, with 733 runs in 15 matches.

Overall, he scored 4,965 runs in 142 Indian T20 League matches, and his 357 sixes are still the most in the tournament. He also made its highest individual score, an unbeaten 175 for Bangalore in 2013.

Rohit Sharma – God of T20 cricket in India

While there are many cricketers in contention for the title of God of T20 cricket, Rohit Sharma comes very close among Indian cricketers. He is hailed as the God of T20 cricket in India for his accomplishments at the international and franchise level. 

Rohit Sharma captained Team Mumbai to five Indian T20 League titles, in 2013, 2015, 2017, 2019 and 2020. He is the tournament’s second-highest run-scorer, with 7,329 runs in 281 matches behind Virat Kohli’s 9,336, and second on its all-time sixes list with 323. With six titles (five with Mumbai and one with Hyderabad in 2009), he is one of the most decorated players in the tournament’s history.

At the international level, Rohit captained India to the 2024 ICC T20 World Cup title and then retired from T20Is. He finished with 4,231 runs in 159 matches, third on the all-time list behind Babar Azam and Jos Buttler. His five T20I hundreds are the joint-most, level with Glenn Maxwell, and his 205 sixes are the most by any batter from a Test-playing nation. Only Austria’s Karanbir Singh (214) has hit more.

Overall, Rohit Sharma is India’s second-highest run-scorer in T20 cricket, behind Kohli. He has scored 12,531 runs in 472 T20s, and no other Indian batter has hit more T20 sixes than his 568.

Figures are correct to 1 October 2026. For the full lists, see most runs in T20 cricket, most sixes in T20 cricket, most centuries in T20 cricket and most runs in T20 internationals.