Cricket betting starts with the format, because the same two teams play three different games: a Test lasts up to five days and can end in a draw, a One Day International gives each side 50 overs, and a T20 gives each side 20. The main bet in all three is the match result, and the draw is the difference: a Test can be drawn when time runs out, while a limited-overs game needs a winner or a tie, and the T20 World Cup settles a tie with a Super Over.
The biggest events on the calendar are the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup, the T20 World Cup, the Indian Premier League and the Ashes. The next World Cup runs from October 4 to November 21, 2027, in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Namibia, and the next Ashes, in England, from June 18 to August 2, 2027.
The three formats
Each format changes what a bet is about:
- Test cricket: up to four innings, two per team, over up to five days, with at least 90 overs scheduled each day. A team wins by scoring more runs across its two innings and bowling the other side out; if time runs out first, the match is a draw.
- One Day International: one innings of up to 50 overs per side. A bowler may bowl no more than 10 overs, so every side needs at least five bowlers.
- T20: one innings of 20 overs per side, the format of the T20 World Cup and the IPL.
The draw is what separates Test betting from the rest. A match-result bet on a Test has three outcomes, and a team that is behind can still save the match by batting out the last day. In the 2025-26 Ashes, Australia won the five-Test series 4-1, so all five Tests ended with a winner. Price the draw each time.
Rain changes the other two formats. When overs are lost in an ODI or a T20, the target is reset by the Duckworth-Lewis-Stern method, which is why a total runs bet has to be read with the book’s rules on shortened matches.
Cricket bet types
The core markets carry across formats, with the settlement rules changing by format:
- Match result: home, away or draw in a Test; win or lose in an ODI or T20, with the book’s rule for a tie.
- Series winner: who takes a multi-match series, with a drawn series possible when the Tests split evenly.
- Top batter and top bowler: the most runs or the most wickets for a team in a match or series.
- Total runs: over or under a line for an innings, a team or a set block of overs.
- Method of dismissal: how a named batter gets out, such as caught or bowled.
- Tournament outright: the winner of a World Cup, the IPL or a series.
Top batter and top bowler markets reward reading the whole series. In the 2025-26 Ashes, Travis Head scored 629 runs, almost twice Alex Carey’s 323 in second place for Australia, and Mitchell Starc took 31 wickets, 11 more than Scott Boland. A series top-scorer bet is a bet on one player out-lasting his own teammates over five Tests.
What moves a cricket price
These are the things to check before any cricket bet:
- The pitch and the ground: some surfaces help batters for five days, others break up and help spin bowlers late in a Test.
- The toss: the captain who wins it chooses whether to bat or bowl first, and that choice is made after the teams can see the pitch.
- The weather: lost overs reset targets in limited-overs games and can save a Test for the side behind.
- The team sheet: how many specialist bowlers a side picks, and whether they are pace or spin.
- Recent form in the format: a batter’s Test record says little about his T20 strike rate.
The toss matters most because it arrives last. Lines posted the day before a match cannot know who will bat first, so that is the moment a price can be out of step with the team sheet and the conditions.
The two World Cups
The 50-over Men’s Cricket World Cup is played every four years. The 2023 final, on November 19, 2023, in Ahmedabad, went to Australia: India made 240 in their 50 overs and Australia reached 241 for 4 in 43, winning by six wickets for a record sixth title against a home side that had been heavily favored. The 2027 edition has 14 teams and 57 matches, from October 4 to November 21 in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Namibia.
The Men’s T20 World Cup has 20 teams and 55 matches. India won the 2026 edition, co-hosted with Sri Lanka from February 7 to March 8, by beating New Zealand by 96 runs in the final, the first team to win two in a row and the first to win it at home. The next edition is set for Australia and New Zealand from October 21 to November 19, 2028.
The Indian Premier League
The IPL is played each spring. The 2026 season had 10 teams and 74 matches from March 28 to May 31, and Royal Challengers Bengaluru beat Gujarat Titans by five wickets in the final at the Narendra Modi Stadium for their second title in a row.
With 74 matches in about nine weeks, across 13 venues in 2026, the IPL is the one cricket event with games nearly every day for two months. Rajasthan Royals’ Vaibhav Sooryavanshi scored the most runs, 776, and Gujarat’s Kagiso Rabada took the most wickets, 29, which is the scale a season-long top batter or top bowler bet is measured against.
The Ashes
The Ashes is the Test series between England and Australia. Australia held it by winning the first three Tests of the 2025-26 series in Australia, from November 21, 2025, to January 8, 2026, and took the series 4-1.
The next series, in England, is scheduled from June 18 to August 2, 2027. Starc, the player of the 2025-26 series with 31 wickets, and Head, with 629 runs, set the marks for the top bowler and top batter markets a series like this carries.
Reading a cricket price
Convert every outright price to a chance before comparing. A +300 price implies a 25% chance and a +900 price implies 10%. An outright bet on a World Cup or an IPL season is worth making only when you rate the team’s chance higher than the price does, and the price should be read against the bracket, the group format and the number of knockout games still to play.
For the terms used above, see our betting terminology guide. For the pick services that cover cricket, see our handicapper site reviews, and before you pick a book, our sportsbook reviews.