Cricket

Guide

Biggest Cricket Stadium in the World: History, Capacity, & More

As one of the world’s most popular sports, the biggest cricket games attract huge numbers of spectators, desperate to be as close to their heroes and the action in general, as possible.

James Pacheco

Sports Betting Editor

Last Updated: 2024-12-26

Fact checked by:

Chad Nagel

Content Manager

11 minutes read

Fireworks explode over the Narendra Modi Stadium//Getty Images

Table of Contents

Events like IPL finals, big Ashes matches, and World Cup finals have in the past resulted in stadiums being sold out to the extent that passionate cricket fans have been turned away with no more seats available for them.

However, that was something that seldom happened over the years at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) in Australia, with a capacity of over 100,000 spectators. And since 2020, one cricket stadium in the world has gone even further in terms of the number of fans that it can host.

The Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, now the biggest cricket stadium in the world, can hold 132,000 people. The fact that it was built with such a huge seating capacity in mind is testament to the national obsession that is cricket in India and the desire for cricket fans to flock to the grounds in their numbers to watch their favourite IPL sides in action, or the Indian national cricket team when they’re playing at home.

But as we’ll soon see, there’s far more to these stadiums than just hosting big cricket matches. And what better way to kick things off than actually checking out our list of the biggest cricket stadiums in the world. Here they are.

Top 10 Biggest Cricket Stadiums

Ground	Capacity	City	Country
Narendra Modi Stadium	132,000	Ahmedabad	India
Melbourne Cricket Ground	100,024	Melbourne	Australia
Eden Gardens	68,000	Kolkata	India
Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh International Cricket Stadium	65,000	Raipur	India
Perth Stadium	61,266	Perth	Australia
Adelaide Oval	53,500	Adelaide	Australia
Greenfield International Stadium	50,000	Thiruvananthapuram	India
Bharat Ratna Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Cricket Stadium	50,000	Lucknow	India
JSCA International Cricket Stadium	50,000	Ranchi	India
Brabourne Stadium	50,000	Mumbai	India
Shrimant Madhavrao Scindia Cricket Stadium	50,000	Gwalior	India

The Largest Cricket Stadium in the World

The Narendra Modi Stadium isn’t just the world’s biggest cricket stadium, it’s the biggest sports stadium in the world, full stop.

It holds almost 20,000 people more than the next biggest – the Rungrado 1st May Stadium in North Korea – and at least 25,0000 more people than the ones after that: a number of American Football Stadiums in the US that play host to college football, including venues in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Ohio.

In the process, it’s also beaten the MCG’s record by over 30,000 people just in terms of cricket venues. It’s certainly hard to see how it will be rivalled as the biggest cricket stadium in the world anytime soon.

Aside from providing seats to cricket fans, here are some of the other sporting and non-sporting modern facilities that you can find at the stadium:

Four dressing rooms with associated facilities.
Six indoor practice pitches.
Three outdoor practice fields and 11 centre pitches on the main ground.
An indoor cricket academy.
Olympic size swimming pool.
Badminton, tennis and squash courts.
Dormitory with room for 40 athletes to sleep.
76 corporate boxes with a seating capacity of 25 in each one.
55-room clubhouse.
67 fully automated underground pop-up sprinklers that (automatically) water the grass when it’s needed.
Parking lot that can accommodate 3000 cars and 10,000 two-wheelers.
But back to the cricket. Here are some of the biggest matches that have been hosted at this venue, the world’s biggest stadium for cricket, in its short history.

IPL

Being in Gujarat, it’s no surprise that it was chosen as the home venue for the new IPL team, the Gujarat Titans, who were only formed in 2022. Over three seasons, almost all of the Titans’ IPL games have been played at this venue.

But it made sense for the Narendra Stadium to also be the venue for IPL finals and that’s exactly what happened in both 2022 and 2023, before the 2024 final was moved to Chennai.

Remarkably, the Gujarat Titans won the IPL at the first time of asking in 2022, beating the Rajasthan Royals in the final at their home ground here in Gujarat. It was a low-scoring affair where the Titans chased 131 with minimum of fuss after their skipper Hardik Pandya, later voted Man-of-the-Match, took three wickets and then returned to hit 34 off 30 with the bat in the successful chase.

The Titans made the final the following year (2023), which was also played here, but weren’t so fortunate this time round, against the Chennai Super Kings after the Titans set an imposing total of 214/4.

But in a rain-affected match that was mostly played on the reserve day, CSK got over the line in chasing 171 off 15 overs thanks to a boundary from CSK all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja from the very last ball of the match. It was CSK’s fifth IPL title.

2023 World Cup

The stadium was also the chosen venue for six matches of the 2023 ODI World Cup.

That included the opening match of the tournament – New Zealand v England – plus the biggest rivalry of all in international cricket, India v Pakistan, a match India won easily by seven wickets. Other games were Australia v England and Afghanistan v South Africa.

Most important of all, it was the selected venue for the final, between hot favourites India and Australia on November 19, 2023. But it was a game that didn’t end well for India. A poor batting display saw them all out for just 240, a total Australia chased pretty easily thanks to a brilliant 137 from man-of-the-match Travis Head.

Day-night Test match

Earlier, in 2021, it was used for a day-night Test match between India and England, with India emerging victorious by 10 wickets.

It wasn’t the first pink ball Test match in India though, as one had been played between India and Bangladesh at Eden Gardens in Kolkata back in 2019. So far, that game against England was the only day-night Test played here though other regular Tests have been staged at this ground.

The Biggest Cricket Stadiums in India

There are 29 stadiums in India actively used for international cricket and by that we mean that at least one international match was hosted there in the last five years. Here are three of the most important Indian stadiums, whether in terms of history, heritage or capacity.

Eden Gardens (Kolkata)

Eden Gardens hosted its first international match back in 1934 against England and is known as ‘The Mecca of Indian cricket’ as the first stadium in the country built specifically to host cricket matches.

It’s hosted games from four separate ODI World Cups and also from the 2016 T20 World Cup, including the famous nail-biting final between the West Indies and England, which the Windies won thanks to Carlos Brathwaite’s infamous four sixes in a row in the final over of the match.

It’s the home ground of the Kolkata Knight Riders in the IPL and these days has a capacity of 68,000, making it the ground in India with the second-biggest capacity. But back in 1996, 110,000 were here at Eden Gardens to watch the semi-final of the World Cup between India and Sri Lanka, which Sri Lanka won.

Wankhede Stadium (Mumbai)

Built on the initiative of S. K. Wankhede, a politician and the secretary of the Mumbai Cricket Association, it was then named after him and hosted its first international match between India and the West Indies in 1985, the final Test of that Series.

Like Eden Gardens, it has been used for four ODI World Cups and most significantly, it was here that India beat Sri Lanka in the final of the 2011 World Cup to hand India their second World Cup crown. It also hosted four matches from the 2016 T20 World Cup.

It was also at this venue that Sachin Tendulkar played his last-ever international match. As of 2024, its capacity is 33,100.

Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh International Cricket Stadium (Chhattisgarh)

This one is a very different case in that it’s only been an international venue for two years, having only been built in 2008 and for years only given the responsibility of playing host to domestic matches.

Based in the city of Nava Raipur, Chhattisgarh, it’s been a host venue at domestic level for both the Chhattisgarh first-class team and also as a second venue for the Delhi Daredevils in the IPL.

In January 2023 it was where India played New Zealand in the only ODI ever played there and in December of that year it hosted its only T20I match to date: India v Australia.

But what it lacks in history, it has in spades in terms of modern facilities and infrastructures. Former Indian star batsman Sunil Gavaskar said it was ‘one of the best stadiums in the country’ and proposed to use it for all types of matches, while West Indies great Viv Richards said: “We cannot imagine that Chhattisgarh has such a big Cricket Stadium. This is one of the world’s best”.

Its capacity in 2024 is 65,000.

Global Comparisons: Cricket Stadiums Around the World

Here are some of the other cricket stadiums in the world with particularly large capacities.

Melbourne Cricket Ground (Melbourne, Australia)

It is the largest stadium in the Southern Hemisphere, the 11th largest globally, and the second-largest cricket arena by capacity after, of course, the Narendra Modi Stadium.

In terms of other sports, it’s been used for the 1956 Summer Olympics and the 2006 Commonwealth Games, as well as regularly hosting matches including big finals in both Australian Rules Football and Rugby League.

Cricket-wise it holds the honour of being the first-ever venue for a Test match (Australia v England 1877) and ODI match (Australia v England again, 1971). It’s also hosted not one but two ODI World Cup finals, first back in 1992 and then in 2015. It was also where the Centenary Test Match was held between Australia and England to mark the 100th anniversary of the first Test match.

In terms of just cricket matches, the highest attendance ever seen at the MCG was 93,013 as Australia beat neighbours New Zealand in the final of the 2015 World Cup, though more than 100,000 spectators have been there for rugby league and Aussie Rules matches in the past.

Perth Stadium (Perth, Australia)

Known as the Optus Stadium for sponsorship reasons, it opened in January 2018 and boasts a total capacity of 61, 266 including standing room, making it the third-largest stadium in Australia after the MCG and Stadium Australia and the fifth-biggest cricket ground in the world.

It’s well-known for its technological innovations that include providing Wi-Fi to everyone in the stadium, dual giant LED displays, digital ticketing and sensor-equipped turnstiles. Its roof is famous in its own right.

Known as the ‘Falcon’s Nest’, it’s engineered by the German company Schlaich Bergermann Partner and features kinetic architecture with eight massive sliding panels that can be adjusted for weather control.

Though the greatest number of spectators ever here at Perth Stadium was 61, 241, that was for a Rugby Union match between Australia and New Zealand in 2019.

In fact, none of the 10 most-attended sports events here ever were for cricket but rather, rugby union, rugby league, Aussie Rules and soccer. It also attracted more than 50,000 fans of wrestling when a WWE event, the 2024 Elimination Chamber, took place there.

However, that number of 61,000 rugby fans was dwarfed by music concerts held here with Coldplay (124,00, 2023) and Ed Sheeran (114,000, 2018) setting those records for the most people ever here at the venue.

The stadium is also the home venue of the Perth Scorchers in the Big Bash, Australia’s T20 version of the IPL.

Importance of Large Stadiums in Modern Cricket

We’ve already seen how the two biggest Australian cricket stadiums also host a number of other sports events and music concerts.

But in a way, these stadiums are far more than just event venues anyway. For cities like Melbourne, Perth, Mumbai and Kolkata, they’re both at the heartbeat of local culture but also popular tourist destinations.

Whether it’s for people from out-of-town who want to watch actual games or concerts, or just for midweek visits when nothing is happening, it’s a great opportunity for tourists to be able to say they’ve been there, while taking a few photos for the holiday album. After all, it’s not very day you can see that while you were in Ahmedabad, you happened to visit the world’s biggest cricket stadium.

In that regard they’re also important for the local economy. Visitors from other cities within the same country or tourists from another country, specifically come to the city to watch events played at these stadiums, spending money within the city on accommodation, tickets, food and souvenirs. These huge grounds also provide plenty of local jobs for people working on such things as maintenance, security, catering and the cleaning of the venues.

Equally, as important as all these things are, there’s a lot more to these huge cricket venues than just boosts to the economy.

Watching domestic and international games is an opportunity for local fans to spend time with friends and family, support their local (or national) team and engage with other fans and occasionally, the players themselves. In this regard, these venues help to create bonds within the local community as well as just sources of entertainment.

FAQs

Which is the world’s biggest cricket stadium?

The Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, India, is the biggest cricket stadium in the world, a record previously held by the MCG in Australia.

Where is the biggest cricket stadium in India?

India. More precisely Ahmedabad. It’s called the Narendra Modi Stadium and opened in 2020.

What is the capacity of the largest cricket stadium?

Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad can officially host 132,000 people though the maximum crowd so far was the 101, 566 that watched the 2022 IPL final.