A decade ago, a female cricketer earning more in a single auction than most club professionals see in five years would have sounded like a stretch. Today it is Tuesday-night trivia. When Smriti Mandhana walked away from a single Women’s Premier League auction with a contract worth roughly $400,000, it confirmed something fans had suspected for years: the list of the highest earning female cricketers is no longer a footnote to men’s cricket, it is its own economy.
This post breaks down the ten players currently sitting at the top of that economy, how they got there, and why the gap between men’s and women’s cricket pay, while still wide, is shrinking faster than most people realize.
Why the Highest Earning Female Cricketers Suddenly Matter
Three things changed the math for women’s cricket money. First, the BCCI equalized match fees between men and women in October 2022, so a woman playing a Test now earns the same ₹15 lakh match fee a man does. Second, the Women’s Premier League launched in 2023 with a broadcast rights deal worth ₹951 crore, instantly creating a bidding war for talent. Third, brands stopped treating women’s cricket sponsorships as a corporate social responsibility line item and started treating them as marketing spend that actually moves product.
Put those together and you get a genuinely new class of athlete: professional, well paid, and finally comparable, if not yet equal, to their male counterparts. The following ranking of the highest earning female cricketers reflects a mix of franchise salaries, national contracts, and endorsement income, since very few players disclose a single combined figure.
A quick note on the numbers: net worth estimates for athletes are rarely official. Where a player’s total wealth is cited below, it comes from publicly reported estimates that can vary by source, and I have flagged the range rather than presenting a single hard figure. Franchise auction prices, by contrast, are matters of public record and are reported as announced.
The Top 10 Highest Earning Female Cricketers, Ranked
1. Ellyse Perry (Australia)
Perry remains the benchmark. Estimates of her net worth range from roughly $9 million to $14 million, built from a Cricket Australia central contract, a long WBBL career with the Sydney Sixers, a WPL deal with Royal Challengers Bengaluru, and a brand portfolio that treats her the way a lifestyle magazine treats a cover star. She is also the only cricketer, male or female, to have represented Australia at both a Cricket World Cup and a Football World Cup, which is the kind of resume that makes sponsors write bigger checks without being asked twice.
2. Smriti Mandhana (India)
Mandhana has been the face of Women’s Premier League salaries since the league’s first auction in 2023, when Royal Challengers Bengaluru signed her for ₹3.4 crore (close to $400,000). She has stayed near the top of every WPL salary list since. Her income does not stop at the auction table either. As India’s vice-captain and one of the most recognizable faces in Indian sport, her endorsement roster reads like a shopping mall directory, and that off-field income likely rivals what she earns on it.
3. Meg Lanning (Australia)
Lanning retired from international cricket in 2024 but has not exactly slowed down her earning. Estimates put her net worth between $8.5 million and $9 million, a legacy of captaining Australia to seven ICC titles and a WPL stint with Delhi Capitals worth ₹1.1 crore. Post-retirement, she has moved into coaching and broadcast work, which keeps her name, and her paycheck, firmly in the game.
4. Deepti Sharma (India)
Deepti Sharma topped the WPL 2026 auction as the league’s most expensive signing, going for ₹3.2 crore. That number reflects exactly what franchises now pay for a genuine all-rounder who can both open the bowling and anchor an innings. Her value spiked further after India’s ICC Women’s World Cup 2025 win, a reminder that international form translates directly into auction-room dollars.
5. Natalie Sciver-Brunt (England)
Sciver-Brunt earned ₹32 lakh (around $377,000) in the WPL with Mumbai Indians, on top of a full England central contract and Hundred earnings. She is the kind of all-format all-rounder franchises build a team around, and it shows in a salary that consistently sits near the top of every WPL bracket.
6. Ashleigh Gardner (Australia)
Gardner matched Sciver-Brunt’s ₹32 lakh WPL figure playing for Gujarat Giants. Add her WBBL contract with Sydney Sixers and a growing sponsorship footprint back home, and she has quietly built one of the more diversified income streams among current players.
7. Harmanpreet Kaur (India)
As India’s all-format captain, Harmanpreet holds a BCCI Grade A central contract worth ₹50 lakh a year, the ceiling of India’s domestic pay scale. She was also the first Indian cricketer, male or female, to sign with an overseas T20 league when she joined Sydney Thunder in the WBBL. Estimates place her overall net worth close to $2.9 million once WPL earnings and endorsements are folded in.
8. Jemimah Rodrigues (India)
Rodrigues signed with Delhi Capitals for ₹22 lakh (about $260,000) at the WPL auction table. Her aggressive middle-order batting and a fan base skewing young have made her one of the more marketable names in Indian cricket outside the very top tier.
9. Beth Mooney (Australia)
Mooney’s ₹20 lakh WPL contract with Gujarat Giants sits alongside a Cricket Australia central contract and WBBL earnings with Perth Scorchers. As a wicketkeeper-batter with a reputation for calm under pressure, she has become a steady, dependable earner rather than a headline-grabbing one, and that consistency has its own value to franchises.
10. Mithali Raj (India, retired)
Raj retired in 2022 but still ranks among the richest women in the sport, with an estimated net worth around ₹43 crore. That fortune was built across two decades of international cricket, and it has kept growing through commentary work, brand ambassadorships, and her enduring status as the player who made Indian women’s cricket commercially visible in the first place. She is proof that being one of the highest earning female cricketers does not require an active playing career, just a legacy sponsors still want to be associated with.
What Is Actually Driving These Numbers
Franchise Leagues Changed the Ceiling
Before the WPL and WBBL existed, a top female cricketer’s income was largely capped by her national board’s central contract. Franchise cricket blew that ceiling off. A single strong WPL auction can now double a player’s annual income overnight, the same way a breakout IPL season can turn a domestic bowler into a household name almost overnight.
Women’s Cricket Endorsements Finally Caught Up
Here is a quick snapshot of where the endorsement money is actually coming from for today’s top earners:
- Sportswear and equipment brands chasing the growing amateur women’s cricket market
- Financial services and fintech companies targeting younger, digitally engaged audiences
- Beverage and energy drink brands looking for athletes with crossover appeal beyond hardcore fans
- Broadcast and commentary deals, especially for recently retired players like Mithali Raj
Women’s cricket endorsements used to be an afterthought line in a marketing budget. Now they are a deliberate strategy, and the highest earning female cricketers are the ones benefiting most directly.
WPL vs IPL: The Gap Is Real, But the Comparison Is Unfair
It is tempting to line up WPL salaries next to IPL salaries and call it a day. The IPL’s current media rights deal runs to roughly ₹48,390 crore, against the WPL’s ₹951 crore. That is a real gap, and pretending otherwise does nobody any favors.
But the fairer comparison is not WPL 2026 against IPL 2026, it is WPL’s fourth season against the IPL’s fourth season. Back in 2011, the IPL’s top auction price sat around ₹14 to 15 crore, a fraction of what the league commands today. Women’s cricket salaries are following a similar early trajectory, just compressed into a much shorter timeline. Think of it less like two leagues competing for the same money, and more like watching a younger sibling grow up faster than the older one ever did, because the roadmap already exists.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is currently the highest earning female cricketer in the world?
By most publicly available estimates, Ellyse Perry holds the top spot once national contracts, franchise deals, and endorsements are combined, with Smriti Mandhana close behind as the WPL’s most consistent top earner.
How much do WPL players get paid?
WPL salaries range from a base price of ₹10 lakh for uncapped Indian players up to multi-crore contracts for marquee names, with the 2026 auction’s top bid, Deepti Sharma, going for ₹3.2 crore.
Do male and female cricketers earn the same match fees now?
In India, yes, for international matches. Since October 2022, BCCI has paid identical match fees to men and women, and extended that parity to domestic cricket in December 2025. Annual central contract amounts and franchise league pay still differ significantly, however.
Which league pays female cricketers the most?
The Women’s Premier League currently offers the highest franchise salaries in women’s cricket globally, ahead of the WBBL and The Hundred, though all three contribute meaningfully to a top player’s total income.
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