What Is a Powerplay in Cricket? It Is a Percentage, Not Six Overs

Ask ten club players what is a powerplay in cricket and nine will say "the first six overs." That is the correct answer for exactly one format, and the wrong answer for most of the cricket people actually play, including the short-format matches you get in a browser.

The short answer

A powerplay is a block of overs at the start of a limited-overs innings during which the fielding side must keep all but two of its fielders inside the 30-yard circle. In men's T20 cricket it is the first six overs. In a 50-over one-day international it is the first ten overs, after which four fielders may go out until over 40, and five from over 41 to the end. The restriction exists to force gaps in the outfield early, when the batters are least set and the ball is hardest.

The rule, exactly

T20

Overs 1 to 6: a maximum of two fielders outside the 30-yard circle.
Over 7 onwards: a maximum of five fielders outside the circle.

That is the whole thing. There is one powerplay, it is mandatory, and neither captain chooses when it happens.

One-day internationals

Overs 1 to 10: maximum two fielders outside the circle.
Overs 11 to 40: maximum four outside.
Overs 41 to 50: maximum five outside.

ODIs used to carry a second, movable "batting powerplay" that the batting side could call when it liked, plus a requirement for two close catching fielders during the first ten overs. Both were scrapped in 2015. The current structure is fixed and the captain has no lever to pull.

One restriction that never switches off

Separately from the powerplay, no more than two fielders may be behind square on the leg side at the instant the bowler delivers. That applies in every over of every format, powerplay or not. It is the reason a gap exists square of the wicket on the leg side even when the field looks spread, and it is why bowling at the pads costs more than the length suggests.

The part most explanations skip: a powerplay is a percentage

Here is the thing nobody tells you. Six overs is not a magic number handed down from the game's founders. It is thirty per cent of a twenty over innings. The powerplay is a proportion of the innings that happens to be expressed in overs, and as soon as the innings is shorter, the number changes.

The ICC made this explicit for shortened men's T20 matches in a scaling table that took effect on 2 July 2025. Work it in balls and the pattern is obvious:

5 over innings: 1.3 overs of powerplay (9 balls)
6 over innings: 1.5 overs (11 balls)
8 over innings: 2.2 overs (14 balls)
10 over innings: 3 overs (18 balls)
16 over innings: 4.5 overs (29 balls)
20 over innings: 6 overs (36 balls)

Every one of those is thirty per cent of the innings rounded to the nearest ball. The two-fielder limit does not change at any length. Only the size of the window does.

Once you answer the question what is a powerplay in cricket with "about a third of the innings" instead of "six overs," rain-reduced games stop being confusing and short formats start making sense.

How to read "1.3 overs"

This trips up more people than the rule itself. Cricket's decimal point is not a decimal point. It counts balls, and there are six of them to an over.

1.3 overs means one over and three balls, so nine deliveries. It does not mean one and a third overs. The same applies everywhere you see the notation: a bowler with figures of 3.4 overs has bowled 22 balls, and a 4.5 over powerplay is 29 balls, not four and a half overs. Read the digit after the point as a ball count and the tables above become trivial.

What the restriction actually does to the two of you

The numbers are the easy part. What matters is how the field shape changes the price of each shot and each delivery.

If you are batting

With only two fielders out, the boundary rope is defended in two places and undefended in seven. That does not mean swing at everything. It means the risk-to-reward on a well-timed shot is temporarily distorted in your favour, and the distortion expires.

Aerial shots are cheap right now in a way they will not be later. A lofted drive that clears mid-off is a boundary in over three and a catch in over twelve.
Hitting along the ground into the ring still gets you two, because the sweepers are not there yet to cut it off.
The bowler is trying to take a wicket, not save runs. Expect fuller and straighter than you will see in the middle overs.

If you are bowling

The powerplay is the phase where you are least able to buy safety with fielders, so you have to buy it with length.

Full and straight invites the drive but keeps the stumps in play. Short and wide is the single most expensive ball in the phase.
A yorker works in the powerplay for the same reason it works at the death. It removes the batter's ability to swing through the line.
Wickets in this phase are worth more than dots. A new batter facing a restricted field is still a new batter.

What is a powerplay in cricket when the match is five overs long

This is where the percentage view earns its keep. In a five over innings the powerplay is nine balls. Nine.

That compresses everything. You do not get a settling-in period, because by the time you have faced six balls the field is already allowed to spread. The batter who waits for the third over to start scoring has waited through more than half the free window. The bowler who uses the opening overs to find a rhythm has given away the only overs where the batter was under genuine pressure to take risks.

Short formats are not just fast versions of long ones. They change which mistakes are survivable.

Taking the idea into a live match

You can play cricket online at Howzat Live in a 3D browser match against a real person, five, ten or twenty overs, one of you batting and one of you bowling. It is free, there is nothing to download, and it runs in the tab you are already in.

To be straight about it: the game does not hand you a powerplay toggle. What it gives you is the shape of the thing, an innings with a beginning, a middle and an end, where the first third decides most of what follows. That is the part worth practising, and it is the part a single-player timing game cannot teach you, because a real opponent adjusts and a scripted one does not.

A few ways to use it:

Play a five over match and treat the first nine balls as the window. Bat for boundaries, then reassess.
Swap roles. Bowl a five over innings and count how many of your first nine balls you would be happy to bowl again.
Use the bots first if you want reps without pressure. There are three difficulties, Gully, Club and Academy. Those results are rated at half weight, capped at a few a day, and cannot take you past Scale 3, so they are practice, not a ladder.
Move to real opponents through a quick match or a private link to a friend, with chat in the match if you want to talk about it afterwards.

Your Scale badge runs from 0 to 10 and appears after five rated matches. Beating stronger opponents moves you up faster, and playing the same person over and over is damped, so the rating reflects range rather than repetition. You can create a free account to start one, check the leaderboard to see where the good players sit, or read more on the blog.

Quick answers

Is the powerplay the same in the IPL and other T20 leagues? The first six overs with two fielders outside the circle is the standard T20 structure.

Can the batting side choose when to take it? No. In the current game the powerplay is mandatory and its position is fixed at the start of the innings.

How many fielders are allowed outside the circle during a powerplay? Two.

Does the powerplay change in a rain-affected game? Yes. It scales with the length of the innings, at roughly thirty per cent, rounded to the nearest ball.

If something here does not match what you are seeing in a match, contact us and we will take a look.