Rohit Sharma vs KL Rahul Stats: Test, ODI, T20I & IPL

Set the two Test records side by side and they are startlingly close. Rohit Sharma finished with 4,301 runs at 40.57 with twelve hundreds from 67 matches. KL Rahul had 4,270 runs at 36.81 with twelve hundreds from 69. Same number of hundreds, thirty-one runs apart in total, two matches apart in appearances.

Nothing else about the two careers matches. Rohit is the leading run-scorer in men's T20 international history, holds the highest individual score ever made in a One-Day International, is the only batter with three ODI double-centuries, and has won two global tournaments as India's captain and five IPL titles as Mumbai Indians'. Rahul has never had a settled position in any format: he has opened, batted at four, batted at five, kept wicket in white-ball cricket, been dropped from all three sides and recalled to all three, and averages 50.0 in ODIs while doing it.

This page starts with the Test column where they meet, and then follows the two records as they separate.

The ledgers

Category	Rohit	Rahul
Tests	67 matches, 4,301 runs at 40.57, 12 hundreds, HS 212	69 matches, 4,270 runs at 36.81, 12 hundreds, HS 199
ODIs	288 matches, 11,895 runs at 48.95, 34 hundreds, HS 264	97 matches, 3,400 runs at 50.0, 8 hundreds, HS 112 not out
T20Is	159 matches, 4,231 runs at 32.05, 5 hundreds	72 matches, 2,265 runs at 37.75, 2 hundreds, HS 110 not out
Wicketkeeping	None	84 ODI catches and 9 stumpings, plus T20I duties
First-class	129 matches, 9,318 runs at 49.04, HS 309 not out	121 matches, 9,097 runs at 45.48, HS 337
IPL	7,329 runs, six winner's medals	5,815 runs, among the competition's five leading scorers
Highest honours	Two global titles and five IPL titles as captain	India's Test vice-captaincy

Rohit's Test and T20I rows are closed and his ODI figures stood as of 22 July 2026. Rahul's are as of 18 January 2026 and every row is live. Both IPL totals run to the end of the 2026 season.

Tests: the same totals, opposite reputations

Twelve hundreds each, and a nearly four-run gap in average — which tells you Rahul got out more often for less. That is the whole difference, and it is the difference that shaped how the two men are talked about.

Rahul's Test career is the more scattered. He made a hundred in his second Test at Sydney in 2015, made 199 against England at Chennai in 2016, made hundreds at Lord's and at Centurion, and was dropped between almost all of them. He opened, then batted in the middle order, then opened again, then kept wicket, and by 2026 was the side's Test vice-captain having never held a single position for two consecutive years. An average of 36.81 across that is a reasonable return; the frustration is that the individual innings suggest a much better one.

Rohit's Test career had exactly two phases. Six years in the middle order from 2013, dropped repeatedly, averaging in the low thirties; then a move to open in 2019 and a good four-year run in the position, which produced most of his twelve hundreds and his 212. He retired in May 2025 after two poor years.

Where they sit against the longer line of Indian top-order players is set out in the page on India's great opening batters.

ODIs: the largest gap in this comparison

Rahul's ODI average of 50.0 is higher than Rohit's 48.95. That is the only line in the format where he leads, and it comes from 97 matches against 288.

Rohit's ODI record is one of the largest anybody has: 11,895 runs, 34 hundreds, the highest individual score in the format's history at 264, the only three ODI double-hundreds, and five hundreds in a single World Cup at the 2019 tournament. He also hit more than 650 sixes in international cricket, more than any player.

Rahul's is a middle-order record achieved from a position he did not ask for. India used him at five and six in ODIs with the wicketkeeping gloves, which is a role that produces averages near 50 with few hundreds because you rarely bat thirty overs. Eight hundreds from 97 matches is a good conversion for the job. His most valuable ODI work has come in exactly the situation his numbers were built for: batting with the tail, finishing an innings, and keeping wicket for fifty overs first.

The column Rohit does not have

Rahul is a specialist batter who was asked to keep wicket for India in white-ball cricket and did it for years — 84 catches and nine stumpings in ODIs, plus T20I duties. Nobody, including Rahul, has claimed it was his best skill, and the decision was about balance: it let India play an extra batter or an extra bowler.

That flexibility is the defining feature of his career and the reason his numbers look less impressive than his ability. A player who is moved between three batting positions and given the gloves does not build the kind of record a specialist does. India's line of keepers is described in the page on India's great wicketkeepers, and Rahul's place in it is that of a stand-in who kept for longer than a stand-in should have to.

T20 internationals

Rohit made 4,231 runs across 159 matches with five hundreds and was the format's leading international run-scorer when he retired after captaining India to the 2024 T20 World Cup.

Rahul averages more — 37.75 to 32.05 — from 2,265 runs in 72 matches, with two hundreds and a highest score of 110 not out. The pattern is the same as in ODIs: a better average from far fewer matches in a role that changed constantly. He has opened, batted at three, kept wicket and been left out, sometimes within the same series.

IPL: fifth on the list against six medals

Rahul has 5,815 IPL runs, which puts him among the competition's five leading run-scorers, achieved across Kings XI Punjab, Punjab Kings, Lucknow Super Giants and Delhi Capitals, with a career average well above most of the names around him on that list. He has captained two franchises and won nothing with either.

Rohit has 7,329 runs, the second-highest total in IPL history, and six winner's medals — one with Deccan Chargers in 2008 as a young player and five as Mumbai Indians captain in 2013, 2015, 2017, 2019 and 2020.

The split is familiar by now: Rahul has the rate and Rohit has the trophies. The auction market that moved Rahul between four franchises is described in the page on how the IPL auction works.

First-class cricket, and the 337

Their domestic records are close — 9,318 runs at 49.04 for Rohit, 9,097 at 45.48 for Rahul — and each contains a very large innings. Rohit's best is 309 not out for Mumbai. Rahul's is 337, made for Karnataka, which is the higher of the two and among the largest scores made in the Ranji Trophy in the modern era.

Neither innings tells you much about the international records, and both are worth knowing, because the objection most often made about Rahul — that he does not convert — is contradicted by the biggest score either man has made in any form of the game.

Verdict

• Test runs and Test hundreds: level, and this is the reason the comparison exists.
• Test average: Rohit, by nearly four runs.
• ODI runs, hundreds, highest score and records: Rohit, by the widest margin here.
• ODI average: Rahul, marginally, from a third as many matches.
• T20I volume, hundreds and six-hitting: Rohit. T20I average: Rahul.
• Wicketkeeping and positional flexibility: Rahul, a column Rohit has nothing in.
• Highest first-class score: Rahul's 337.
• IPL runs and titles: Rohit.
• Captaincy honours: Rohit, and it is the largest single difference in the two careers.

The individual pages for Rohit Sharma and KL Rahul cover both in detail, the player directory has the rest of the top order, and the cricket in India hub carries the wider period.

Sources and method

Rohit's international figures are as of 22 July 2026 and Rahul's as of 18 January 2026, from ESPNcricinfo career records cross-checked against the career-statistics summaries on their Wikipedia entries. Both IPL totals run to the end of the 2026 season on 31 May 2026. Rahul's rows are all live and will move.

Rahul's placing among the IPL's leading run-scorers is as listed in the competition's career records to 31 May 2026. Record claims for Rohit — the highest ODI score, three ODI double-hundreds, five hundreds in a World Cup edition, most sixes in international cricket, second-highest IPL career total — are as carried by ICC and ESPNcricinfo record pages.

The account of how often Rahul's role changed is descriptive, drawn from squad and scorecard records rather than computed, and the suggestion that positional instability depressed his averages is an argument rather than a measurement — no adjusted figure is offered. Figures current as of 27 August 2026.