Dismissal Methods Interpreter

The ten ways a batter can be out, with the Law that governs each, whether the bowler is credited and whether the dismissal survives a no ball or a wide. Timed out and retired out are different things, and neither is the bowler’s.

The ten methods of dismissal

Timed out and retired out are not the same thing

Ten methods, nine Laws, and the two that get mixed up

There are ten ways a batter can be out, and the list is shorter than most people’s and longer than some. Nine of them have a Law of their own, and in the 2017 Code those Laws run 32 to 40 in alphabetical order: Bowled, Caught, Hit the ball twice, Hit wicket, Leg before wicket, Obstructing the field, Run out, Stumped, Timed out. The tenth is retired out, which has no dismissal Law at all — it sits at Law 25.4, inside the Law about a batter’s innings, because it is the one method the fielding side does not bring about. The numbers here come from the contents list of the MCC’s 2017 Code 4th Edition (2026) itself, read on 12 October 2026, and the ten are corroborated by the Table of Dismissals in an official scorers’ manual, which enumerates the same set.

Timed out and retired out are different things and the confusion between them is the commonest error about this list. Timed out is Law 40: after a wicket falls or a batter retires, the incoming batter — or the other batter — must be ready to receive the ball within three minutes, and if they are not, the incoming batter is out Timed out on appeal. Law 40.1.2 sends the umpires to the match-awarding procedure of Law 16.3 if the delay drags on with nobody coming out, timed from the expiry of those three minutes, and Law 40.2 says the bowler gets no credit. Retired out is Law 25.4 and nobody appeals for it: a batter who retires because of illness, injury or another unavoidable cause may resume their innings, while a batter who retires for any other reason and does not resume goes into the book as Retired out. One is a sanction for being late; the other is a record of a choice.

Being honest about the sourcing, because it is uneven. The text of Laws 32 to 39 was not read for this page, and nor was Law 25.4’s. The PDF of the 4th Edition yields text that stops inside Law 21, so Laws 22 to 42 are not in it, and the individual Law page for Law 25 at lords.org returned an error. Those ten Laws therefore appear here by number and title from the 4th Edition’s own contents list, with the bowler credit from the scorers’ manual’s Table of Dismissals and the delivery restrictions from Laws 21.18 and 22.9 — both of which WERE read in full, which is why the two restricted sets can be stated clause by clause. Law 40 was read in full from its own page, which is why the three-minute figure is quoted. What this page nowhere does is tell you what Law 32 or Law 33 says, because nobody here has read them.

Half the list is the bowler’s and half is not, and the split is not the one people guess. Bowled, caught, hit wicket, LBW and stumped are credited to the bowler — stumped included, which surprises people, because the wicket-keeper did the work. Hit the ball twice, obstructing the field, run out, timed out and retired out are credited to nobody. That is why a side can lose all ten wickets with fewer than ten appearing in the bowling figures, and it is one of the reasons a bowling analysis never reconciles with a batting card: the bowling figures and maiden overs calculator works through the other reason, which is extras.

The delivery matters too, and it cuts the list down to two different shorter lists. Law 21.18 allows only three dismissals off a no ball — hit the ball twice, obstructing the field and run out — so a bowler who oversteps and hits the stumps has taken nothing. Law 22.9 allows four off a wide, and they are not the same four: hit wicket, obstructing the field, run out and stumped. So a batter can be stumped off a wide and not off a no ball, and can be out hit the ball twice off a no ball and not off a wide. Only obstructing the field and run out survive both. The no ball, free hit and wide interpreter works through what each call costs in runs and overs.

A note on what changed. The 2026 edition of the Laws makes 73 changes and several touch this list: Law 37.1.3 is new and makes a batter who drops or throws the bat to hit the ball or avoid dismissal liable to be given out; Law 37.5.2 lets the fielding captain decide who faces the next ball; Law 34.3 makes a fielder’s intervention during a second strike a Dead ball without a re-bowl; and Laws 32.1.2, 33.2.2 and 35.2 were altered or clarified. Separately, playing conditions modify the Laws here more than anywhere else on this site: the ICC cut the incoming batter’s three minutes to two in Tests and ODIs with effect from 1 October 2022 and leaves it at 90 seconds in Twenty20 internationals, and from 17 June 2025 it changed the boundary-catch rule and made the Decision Review System’s wicket zone the actual outline of the stumps and bails. Check your own competition’s conditions.

The Laws of Cricket got a new edition eleven days before this page was written, and that matters for every Law quoted on it. The MCC’s 2017 Code 4th Edition (2026) came into force on 1 October 2026 with 73 changes to the 3rd Edition (2022); its PDF carries “© Marylebone Cricket Club 2026” and a preface signed 1 October 2026. The individual Law pages published at lords.org still carry a 2017 copyright line and in at least one place still print the superseded text. So every Law on this page is printed with the document it was actually read from on 12 October 2026 — the 4th Edition’s own PDF, the MCC’s published list of the 73 changes, or an individual Law page at lords.org — and where those disagree, or where a Law’s text could not be read at all, the page says which. A competition’s playing conditions may modify any Law, and several do.

What this page deliberately does not do is rank the ten or tell you how often each occurs. Nobody with authority over cricket publishes that, and a table of frequencies assembled from somewhere else would be a different claim wearing this page’s clothes. For the arithmetic that follows a dismissal, the batting strike rate and average calculator explains why a batting average divides by dismissals rather than innings — so a not-out innings adds runs and no denominator — and the partnership and run contribution calculator handles the stand the dismissal ended.

Frequently asked questions

Related calculators

References

1. Marylebone Cricket Club. The Laws of Cricket (2017 Code 4th Edition – 2026), official PDF — Law 14.1.1 (a lead of 200 runs in a two-innings match of 5 days or more), 14.1.2 (150 runs for 3 or 4 days, 100 for 2 days, 75 for 1 day), 14.2 (notification, after which the decision cannot be changed), 14.3 (first day’s play lost); Laws 15.1–15.2 (declaration and forfeiture); and the contents list of Laws 1 to 42, from which the nine dismissal Laws 32 to 40 and retired out at Law 25.4 are taken. Title page “© Marylebone Cricket Club 2026”, preface signed 1 October 2026. lords.org (read 12 Oct 2026). The extracted text stops inside Law 21.11, so Laws 22 to 42 were read from the individual Law pages instead.
2. Marylebone Cricket Club. Law 40 – Timed out, individual Law page — 40.1.1 (the incoming batter, or the other batter, must be ready to receive the ball within 3 minutes of the dismissal or retirement, and is otherwise out Timed out), 40.1.2 (an extended delay sends the umpires to the Law 16.3 procedure, timed from the expiry of the 3 minutes), 40.2 (the bowler does not get credit). lords.org (read 12 Oct 2026). Carries the 2017 copyright line.
3. New South Wales Cricket Umpires’ and Scorers’ Association. Cricket Scoring: The Basics and Beyond, September 2022 revision — “Maiden over – when a bowler bowls an over that does not have any runs scored off it”, and immediately after it “It can have byes and leg byes and still be a maiden as these are not scored against the bowler”. The Byes and Leg byes sections both say “These runs do not count as runs against the bowler”; penalty runs are not debited either. The Table of Dismissals lists ten methods, with the bowler credited for bowled, caught, hit wicket, LBW and stumped and not for hit the ball twice, obstructing the field, run out, timed out or a batter retiring. nswcusa.cricketnsw.com.au (read 12 Oct 2026). Every scoresheet and symbol table in it is an IMAGE and was not read, and its Table of Dismissals numbers Timed Out as Law 31, which is Appeals in the 2017 Code.
4. Marylebone Cricket Club. Changes to the Laws of Cricket for the 2026 edition — 73 changes to the 4th Edition of the 2017 Code, effective 1 October 2026. Law 22.1.3 makes a delivery bouncing over the striker’s head height a Wide rather than a No ball; Law 37.1.3 is new; Laws 21.6, 21.7, 21.9, 21.12, 23.3, 32.1.2, 33.2.2, 34.3, 34.4, 35.2 and 17.5.2 are altered. Law 14 is not among the 73. lords.org (read 12 Oct 2026). The extracted text is garbled in places and names a fuller companion document that was not fetched.
5. Marylebone Cricket Club. Law 21 – No ball, individual Law page — headings 21.1 to 21.18, including 21.10 “Ball bouncing over head height of striker” as a No ball; 21.15 (one run awarded instantly), 21.16 (the penalty is a No ball extra debited against the bowler), 21.17 (“A No ball shall not count as one of the over”), 21.18 (out off a No ball only under Laws 34, 37 and 38). The Law does not mention a free hit. lords.org (read 12 Oct 2026). This page prints 3rd-Edition (2022) text: the 4th Edition moves the head-height delivery to Law 22.1.3 as a Wide.
6. Marylebone Cricket Club. Law 22 – Wide ball, individual Law page — 22.1.1–22.1.2 (judging a Wide), 22.3.1–22.3.2 (revoking), 22.4.1–22.4.2 (not a Wide), 22.6 (one run awarded instantly), 22.7 “Apart from any 5 Penalty runs, all runs from a Wide are debited against the bowler”, 22.8 (“A Wide shall not count as one of the over”), 22.9 (out off a Wide only under Laws 35, 37, 38 and 39). lords.org (read 12 Oct 2026). This page does not mention head height anywhere, which is how the staleness of the individual Law pages was established rather than assumed.
7. International Cricket Council. ICC makes changes to Playing Conditions, 19 September 2022 — the conditions effective 1 October 2022. Records that the in-match over-rate penalty in Twenty20 internationals was introduced in January 2022, “an additional fielder having to be brought inside the fielding circle” for the rest of the innings, and that it would be adopted in ODIs after the 2023 Cricket World Cup Super League. Also cuts the incoming batter’s time from three minutes to two in Tests and ODIs, leaving 90 seconds in Twenty20 internationals. icc-cricket.com (read 12 Oct 2026).
8. International Cricket Council. Several changes made to ICC Playing Conditions, 27 June 2025 — the Test stop clock: the fielding side must be ready to bowl the first ball of the next over within 60 seconds, two warnings an innings and five penalty runs for each failure after that, the warnings resetting after 80 overs. Also the boundary-catch rule and the DRS wicket zone as the outline of the stumps and bails. In force from 17 June 2025 in Tests, 2 July 2025 in ODIs and 10 July 2025 in T20Is. icc-cricket.com (read 12 Oct 2026).