India vs New Zealand Test Head-to-Head: Record & Results
Written and checked by CricketTakenPublished Cricket in India12 min read
India and New Zealand have played 66 Tests since November 1955. India have won 22, New Zealand 16, and 27 have been drawn; one, at Carisbrook in Dunedin in December 1998, was abandoned without a ball bowled after three days of rain. That draw column is the first thing worth noticing. Forty-one per cent of the fixture's matches have ended without a result, and it is the residue of two long periods — the 1950s and 1960s in India, the 1990s in both countries — when neither attack could force twenty wickets on the surfaces provided.
The second thing worth noticing is where the recent numbers point. India's home record against New Zealand was, for sixty-nine years, close to unbreakable: 17 wins, 5 defeats, 17 draws from 39 Tests. Then in October 2024 New Zealand won at Bengaluru, Pune and the Wankhede, becoming the first side to sweep India 3-0 in a Test series of any length on Indian soil. In the 2020s as a whole India have won one of eight Tests against New Zealand and lost six.
The rest of this page sets out the full ledger: every series, the split by host country, the highest and lowest totals each side has made, the leading run scorers and wicket takers in the fixture, and the last ten results. All of it is match-by-match data rather than reputation, and where a figure is a count rather than a computation the method is stated at the end.
The ledger at a glance
| Venue | Matches | India won | New Zealand won | Drawn | Abandoned |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| In India | 39 | 17 | 5 | 17 | 0 |
| In New Zealand | 26 | 5 | 10 | 10 | 1 |
| In England (neutral) | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| All Tests | 66 | 22 | 16 | 27 | 1 |
The single neutral-venue meeting is the inaugural World Test Championship final at the Ageas Bowl, Southampton, in June 2021, which New Zealand won by eight wickets. India's home win rate in the fixture is 44 per cent against a 13 per cent defeat rate; in New Zealand those figures invert to 19 per cent and 38 per cent. Both halves of the fixture produced draws for different reasons — flat Indian pitches early, weather-shortened New Zealand Tests later.
Decade by decade
| Decade | Matches | India won | New Zealand won | Drawn |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1950s | 5 | 2 | 0 | 3 |
| 1960s | 11 | 5 | 2 | 4 |
| 1970s | 6 | 3 | 1 | 2 |
| 1980s | 6 | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| 1990s | 13 | 2 | 2 | 8 |
| 2000s | 7 | 1 | 2 | 4 |
| 2010s | 10 | 6 | 1 | 3 |
| 2020s | 8 | 1 | 6 | 1 |
The 1990s is the flattest decade in the fixture: thirteen Tests, eight draws and one abandonment. The 2010s were India's most productive, six wins from ten including a 3-0 home sweep in 2016. The 2020s have gone the other way entirely.
Every series, 1955-56 to 2024-25
Twenty-four series or one-off contests have been played: thirteen in India, ten in New Zealand and one at a neutral ground.
| Season | Host | Tests | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1955-56 | India | 5 | India won 2-0 |
| 1964-65 | India | 4 | India won 1-0 |
| 1967-68 | New Zealand | 4 | India won 3-1 |
| 1969-70 | India | 3 | Drawn 1-1 |
| 1975-76 | New Zealand | 3 | Drawn 1-1 |
| 1976-77 | India | 3 | India won 2-0 |
| 1980-81 | New Zealand | 3 | New Zealand won 1-0 |
| 1988-89 | India | 3 | India won 2-1 |
| 1989-90 | New Zealand | 3 | New Zealand won 1-0 |
| 1993-94 | New Zealand | 1 | Drawn 0-0 |
| 1995-96 | India | 3 | India won 1-0 |
| 1998-99 | New Zealand | 3 | New Zealand won 1-0 |
| 1999-2000 | India | 3 | India won 1-0 |
| 2002-03 | New Zealand | 2 | New Zealand won 2-0 |
| 2003-04 | India | 2 | Drawn 0-0 |
| 2008-09 | New Zealand | 3 | India won 1-0 |
| 2010-11 | India | 3 | India won 1-0 |
| 2012 | India | 2 | India won 2-0 |
| 2013-14 | New Zealand | 2 | New Zealand won 1-0 |
| 2016-17 | India | 3 | India won 3-0 |
| 2019-20 | New Zealand | 2 | New Zealand won 2-0 |
| 2021 | England | 1 | New Zealand won the WTC final |
| 2021-22 | India | 2 | India won 1-0 |
| 2024-25 | India | 3 | New Zealand won 3-0 |
Two of those series carry weight beyond their scorelines. The 1967-68 tour, four Tests won 3-1 under Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi, was India's first Test series victory anywhere outside India — and it followed 0-3 in England and 0-4 in Australia inside twelve months. The 2008-09 tour, won 1-0 after a ten-wicket victory at Hamilton, was India's first series win in New Zealand in forty-one years. Between the two, India lost or drew every away series they played there. The wider arc of how the Test side learned to travel is set out in the history of Indian Test cricket, and the decisions behind those tours in the record of India's Test captains.
Highest and lowest totals
New Zealand hold the fixture's highest innings: 680 for 8 declared at the Basin Reserve, Wellington, in February 2014, built around Brendon McCullum's 302. India's best is 583 for 7 declared at Ahmedabad in October 1999.
| Team | Highest totals |
|---|---|
| New Zealand | 680/8d Wellington 2014; 630/6d Mohali 2003; 619/9d Napier 2009; 503 Auckland 2014; 502 Christchurch 1968 |
| India | 583/7d Ahmedabad 1999; 566/8d Nagpur 2010; 557/5d Indore 2016; 537/3d Chennai 1956; 531/7d Delhi 1955 |
The lowest completed innings — all out, so declarations and unfinished chases are excluded — run the other way for India.
| Team | Lowest all-out totals |
|---|---|
| India | 46 Bengaluru 2024; 81 Wellington 1976; 83 Mohali 1999; 88 Brabourne 1965; 89 Hyderabad 1969 |
| New Zealand | 62 Wankhede 2021; 94 Hamilton 2002; 100 Wellington 1981; 101 Auckland 1968; 105 Auckland 2014 |
The 46 at the Chinnaswamy Stadium on 16 October 2024 came in 31.2 overs on a green surface after a washed-out first day, and it is India's lowest total in a home Test against any opponent. The 62 at the Wankhede in December 2021 is New Zealand's lowest against India anywhere. Both grounds appear repeatedly in the extremes, which says something about how much Indian Test venues have changed in preparation over twenty years.
The batters who own the fixture
Qualification for this table is 500 runs in India-New Zealand Tests.
| Batter | Side | Matches | Runs | Average | Highest | 100s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rahul Dravid | India | 15 | 1,659 | 63.80 | 222 | 6 |
| Sachin Tendulkar | India | 24 | 1,595 | 46.91 | 217 | 4 |
| Brendon McCullum | New Zealand | 10 | 1,224 | 68.00 | 302 | 4 |
| Graham Dowling | New Zealand | 11 | 964 | 48.20 | 239 | 3 |
| Virat Kohli | India | 14 | 959 | 38.36 | 211 | 3 |
| Ross Taylor | New Zealand | 17 | 890 | 30.68 | 151 | 3 |
| Bert Sutcliffe | New Zealand | 9 | 885 | 68.07 | 230* | 3 |
| Virender Sehwag | India | 12 | 883 | 44.15 | 173 | 2 |
| Kane Williamson | New Zealand | 13 | 871 | 37.86 | 131 | 2 |
| Cheteshwar Pujara | India | 12 | 867 | 39.40 | 159 | 2 |
| VVS Laxman | India | 10 | 818 | 58.42 | 124* | 2 |
| John Wright | New Zealand | 9 | 804 | 61.84 | 185 | 3 |
Six centuries in fifteen Tests is Rahul Dravid's return against New Zealand, the most by anyone in the fixture, and his 222 at Ahmedabad in 1999 came in the same innings as India's highest total. McCullum's average of 68 across ten Tests is the highest of anyone with 800 runs here; three of his four centuries were carried past 200, including the 302 at Wellington that saved a match India had dominated for two days.
Bowling: Ashwin ahead of Hadlee
Qualification is 25 wickets in the fixture.
| Bowler | Side | Matches | Wickets | Average | Best innings | Five-fors |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ravichandran Ashwin | India | 12 | 75 | 18.53 | 7/59 | 6 |
| Richard Hadlee | New Zealand | 14 | 65 | 22.96 | 7/23 | 4 |
| Bishan Singh Bedi | India | 12 | 57 | 19.14 | 6/42 | 4 |
| Tim Southee | New Zealand | 13 | 55 | 25.05 | 7/64 | 3 |
| Erapalli Prasanna | India | 10 | 55 | 20.12 | 8/76 | 4 |
| Anil Kumble | India | 11 | 50 | 25.86 | 6/67 | 3 |
| Zaheer Khan | India | 13 | 47 | 31.44 | 5/29 | 4 |
| Srinivas Venkataraghavan | India | 10 | 44 | 22.81 | 8/72 | 2 |
| Harbhajan Singh | India | 13 | 43 | 33.11 | 6/63 | 1 |
| Trent Boult | New Zealand | 10 | 41 | 28.02 | 4/28 | 0 |
| Ravindra Jadeja | India | 11 | 41 | 27.48 | 5/55 | 3 |
| Daniel Vettori | New Zealand | 15 | 40 | 48.42 | 6/127 | 2 |
| Ajaz Patel | New Zealand | 6 | 32 | 23.65 | 10/119 | 3 |
Ravichandran Ashwin's 75 wickets at 18.53 is the leading return in the fixture, and his three ten-wicket match hauls against New Zealand are more than any other bowler has taken here. Ajaz Patel's line is the strangest in the table: 32 wickets from six Tests, all of them played in India, with a best of 10 for 119 at the Wankhede in December 2021 — the third instance of all ten in a Test innings, and the only one against India. He returned to the same ground in November 2024 and took eleven in the match to complete the 3-0 sweep.
The last ten Tests
| Date | Ground | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Sep 2016 | Kanpur | India won by 197 runs |
| Sep 2016 | Eden Gardens | India won by 178 runs |
| Oct 2016 | Indore | India won by 321 runs |
| Feb 2020 | Wellington | New Zealand won by 10 wickets |
| Feb 2020 | Christchurch | New Zealand won by 7 wickets |
| Jun 2021 | Southampton (WTC final) | New Zealand won by 8 wickets |
| Nov 2021 | Kanpur | Drawn |
| Dec 2021 | Wankhede | India won by 372 runs |
| Oct 2024 | Bengaluru | New Zealand won by 8 wickets |
| Oct 2024 | Pune | New Zealand won by 113 runs |
| Nov 2024 | Wankhede | New Zealand won by 25 runs |
That is eleven rows rather than ten, because the 2016-17 home series is only legible as a group: three heavy India wins, then a four-year gap, then seven New Zealand wins in the nine Tests played from February 2020 onwards. India's 372-run win at the Wankhede in December 2021 is the largest victory by either side in the fixture's past two decades and the only India win in that nine-match run.
Five things the tables do not show
- India's margin of victory collapses away from home. Of India's 22 wins, 17 came in India and only 5 in New Zealand — and four of those five away wins came on just two tours, 1967-68 and 2008-09.
- New Zealand went 36 years without a Test win in India. Their victory at the Wankhede in November 1988 was followed by no win on Indian soil until Bengaluru in October 2024.
- The fixture's draw rate has halved. Twenty of the first thirty-three Tests were drawn; seven of the most recent thirty-three have been. Result cricket arrived here with the pace attacks of the 2010s, on both sides.
- Spin has taken more wickets, but seam has decided more recent matches. Ashwin, Bedi, Prasanna, Kumble, Venkataraghavan, Harbhajan and Jadeja account for the bulk of India's wickets in the fixture, yet New Zealand's run of wins since 2020 was built on Southee, Boult, Kyle Jamieson and Matt Henry finding movement, twice in India. How India's spin tradition was answered is the story of the 2024 series.
- Only one meeting has ever been played at a neutral ground. That it was a World Test Championship final rather than a bilateral Test makes New Zealand's eight-wicket win at Southampton the most consequential result in the fixture's history, and it sits outside every home-away split on this page.
For the wider context of the rivalry, including the limited-overs meetings that produced two World Cup semi-finals, see the New Zealand view of playing India and the one-day head-to-head record. The pitch preparation argument that ran through the 2024 series is covered in the guide to Indian pitches and conditions, and the structure around all of it in our India cricket hub.
Sources and method
Match results, innings totals and the batting and bowling aggregates on this page were compiled from ESPNcricinfo's Statsguru, filtered to India versus New Zealand in Test cricket, and checked on 19 August 2026. The series table is grouped from the match-by-match result list rather than copied from a published list, so each scoreline is a count of the individual results above it; the abandoned Dunedin Test of December 1998 is included in the match total but carries no result.
Qualification thresholds are stated on each table — 500 runs for batters, 25 wickets for bowlers — because averages over two or three Tests say nothing useful about a fixture spanning seventy years. "Lowest all-out totals" excludes declared and unfinished innings, which is why scores such as 22 for 0 in a completed chase do not appear. Figures reflect Tests completed up to 19 August 2026, and the decade table counts a match in the decade of its start date.
Descriptive claims — that the 46 at Bengaluru came after a washed-out first day, that New Zealand's 2024 result was the first 3-0 sweep against India at home, that the 1967-68 tour was India's first series win abroad — rest on contemporaneous match reports and ICC and BCCI records rather than on the tables above.