What are the best batting seasons of all time in the IPL? Rahul Iyer ranks the top ten.
Honourable mentions - Virat Kohli (2016), David Warner (2016)
Perhaps the two biggest omissions from the top ten. Only four times has a batter scored over 800 runs in an IPL season, and these two were the first to do it, in the same year. Kohli’s 2016 will go down in the annals of league history simply for its ridiculous volume of 973 runs, and while Warner made 848, the support around him was next to none. Recognition is due for both these seasons, but it is unconvincing to place them above the ones that follow.
10. Shreyas Iyer (2025)
604 runs @ 50.33, SR 175.07
Purely on numbers, Iyer’s 2025 season stacks up well, but not spectacularly to some other campaigns – indeed, most would rank Kohli and Warner above this one. But Iyer entered this season as the second-most expensive player in IPL history, and wore his 26.75 crore price tag as lightly as Rishabh Pant wore the 27 crore price tag heavily.
Captaining a revamped Punjab Kings side after the mega-auction, Iyer made six half-centuries in the season, the standout being his unbeaten 87 off 41 balls as Punjab chased down 204 against Mumbai Indians in Qualifier 2 to make the final. Only the trophy was missing.
9. AB de Villiers (2016)
687 runs @ 52.84, SR 168.79
In most seasons, de Villiers’ run tally would have won him the Orange Cap, but in 2016, it was only good enough for third thanks to Kohli and Warner. Batting a place higher than usual, at No.3, he often had to enter the game early as Chris Gayle endured a patchy season.
If Warner this year had next to nothing by way of support, de Villiers and Kohli really only had each other. Of the three, de Villiers found a way to reach that extra gear; he struck at nearly 20 points higher than the other two. At the time, he was only the second player after Gayle in 2012 to score over 650 runs and strike at over 160 in an IPL season – it has only been done four times since, and three of those came since 2025, almost ten years on.
8. Abhishek Sharma (2026)
563 runs @ 40.21, SR 204.72
“Abhishek Sharma 2026” doesn’t quite evoke the same memories as some of the other seasons on this list. Perhaps that is testament to the standards he has set in this league, but Abhishek (and everyone else) was also overshadowed by a certain 15-year-old this season.
In the plainest terms, this was only the third time an IPL batter had scored over 500 runs while striking at over 200, and the other two are placed higher on this list. It might be a touch unfair to have this season down at number eight, but the somewhat easier batting conditions, and Impact Player rule in this era of the IPL, probably dent it.
7. Glenn Maxwell (2014)
552 runs @ 34.50, SR 187.75
The ‘Big Show’ put up his first big show of the IPL in 2014. His two prior seasons with Delhi Daredevils and Mumbai Indians had yielded a combined 42 runs in five games after the latter paid a million dollars to secure his services. Kings XI Punjab snapped him up for 6 crore the following year.
The start of the tournament being in Abu Dhabi meant spin was in abundance, and that was where Maxwell came into his own, starting the campaign with scores of 95, 89 and 95. Ten of his first 11 innings in the competition were double-digit scores, but he only made 21 runs in his last five innings including a golden duck in the final. A better finish could have pushed this season up more than a few spots but even so, Maxwell never recorded a better strike rate than this one in any other IPL season.
6. Suryakumar Yadav (2023)
605 runs @ 43.21, SR 181.13
There is stiff competition between SKY’s 2023 and 2025 seasons here, but the earlier one just about pips it. Over the five preceding years, he maintained a solid strike rate, in the early 140s, but kicked it up two gears in the first Impact Player season.
He failed to cross fifty in his first five innings, but then did so six times in 11 knocks, including in a doomed chase in Qualifier 2 against Gujarat Titans. Like Maxwell, SKY’s strike rate this year was higher than in any other IPL season, and it was the first confirmation that even at the age of 32, he could push the T20 game forward.
5. Rishabh Pant (2018)
684 runs @ 52.61, SR 173.60
Eight years on from this season, it is difficult to imagine Pant ever returning to these levels, the man looking a shadow of his former self. But his 2018 season was one for the ages. Freshly capped by India the previous year in T20Is, a 20-year-old Pant recorded just two single-digit scores in 14 innings for Delhi Capitals.
Four of his five half-centuries came at strike rates in excess of 175, and his one century that year was unlike anything an Indian youngster had displayed thus far in the IPL; Bhuvneshwar Kumar may still have nightmares about that day. This, ostensibly, sealed the deal for the Indian selectors; he debuted in Test and ODI cricket before the year was out.
4. Yusuf Pathan (2008)
435 runs @ 31.07, SR 179.01
Yusuf’s 435 runs are the fewest of anyone on this list, and by a decent margin as well. Coming into the inaugural IPL season, he had been part of India’s T20 World Cup-winning squad, but had only played the final as an opening batter. In the 2007 Inter-State T20 Tournament, he had registered 29 (13), 51(26) and two golden ducks.
He became Rajasthan and Shane Warne’s man for all seasons, batting at every position from No.1 to No.6. Yusuf’s five highest scores of the season came at positions two, three, four, five and six respectively. Even while in 2026, batters speak about the comfort they derive from a fixed batting position, he had mastered the floating role 18 years earlier. In 11 IPL seasons following this one, he never again crossed 400 runs, and never again struck at more than 170. There was also the small matter of the IPL title to show for 2008.
3. Andre Russell (2019)
510 runs @ 56.66, SR 204.81
Into the podium positions now – Russell’s 2019 campaign is a part of IPL folklore. Not only did he score over 500 runs, but he also took 11 wickets, often bowling the death overs. Despite his efforts, Kolkata Knight Riders contrived to finish fifth on net run rate, and miss the playoffs.
But of course, the focus here is on his batting. Russell batted once at No.3 and once at No.4, coming to the crease in the 10th and 11th overs respectively. His other 11 innings were from No.5 or below, meaning that effectively, Russell batted with roughly only half the innings available to him. His brutal 48* off 13 ripped one game away from RCB, and some of his strike rates through the campaign were enough to make the head spin. Russell bludgeoned 52 sixes in just 249 balls that year, the third-most in an IPL season.
2. Chris Gayle (2011)
608 runs @ 67.55, SR 183.13
Between 2011 and 2013, Gayle recorded back-to-back seasons with 700-plus runs. But the one that makes it here is the one where he didn’t. In mid-April 2011, RCB fast bowler Dirk Nannes picked up a season-ending side strain, Gayle was drafted in and the rest is history.
In quintessential ‘Universe Boss’ style, Gayle waltzed off the plane, into Eden Gardens and struck an unbeaten century against Kolkata, who had released him the previous year. Three games later, he enthralled the Bengaluru crowd with another century and in his next home game took 36 off an over against Kochi Tuskers Kerala. RCB rode Gayle’s form all the way to their second IPL final, but he was dismissed for a three-ball duck as CSK beat them. 600 runs in an IPL season, striking at 180-plus was a club of one for the next 12 years.
1. Vaibhav Sooryavanshi (2026)
776 runs @ 48.50, SR 237.30
Before 2026, no one born outside Kingston, Jamaica, had hit 50 sixes in an IPL season. The one to break that monopoly was a 15-year-old from Samastipur, Bihar, India, who obliterated the record.
Gayle’s 59 sixes were the most in an IPL season, and Sooryavanshi hit 72. He belted one century, three nineties (including two in the playoffs), two half-centuries besides and was five yards away from breaking Gayle’s 13-year record for the fastest IPL century. Perhaps the lingering memory of this year will remain his truly unbelievable slap over mid-off for six against a Jason Holder delivery that was head-high, or his cut off a Matt Henry slower delivery for six, or the sumptuous upper cut he played as he swayed out of the way (there are too many to choose from!). He became the fastest Indian to 1,000 IPL runs, in 23 innings, and the joint-second fastest overall.
Freakish, generational, outlandish, unbelievable – none of these begin to come close to describing it, but what can?
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