Nineteen seasons, nineteen finals, and only eight different franchises have ever lifted the trophy. This is the complete IPL winners list from 2008 to 2026 — every champion, every runner-up and every winning captain — along with what the list actually tells you once you read it properly.
The headline as things stand: Chennai Super Kings and Mumbai Indians lead on five titles each, Kolkata Knight Riders have three, and Royal Challengers Bengaluru have just become the third franchise to win back-to-back titles.
IPL winners list: 2008 to 2026
| Year | Champion | Winning captain | Runner-up |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2008 | Rajasthan Royals | Shane Warne | Chennai Super Kings |
| 2009 | Deccan Chargers | Adam Gilchrist | Royal Challengers Bangalore |
| 2010 | Chennai Super Kings | MS Dhoni | Mumbai Indians |
| 2011 | Chennai Super Kings | MS Dhoni | Royal Challengers Bangalore |
| 2012 | Kolkata Knight Riders | Gautam Gambhir | Chennai Super Kings |
| 2013 | Mumbai Indians | Rohit Sharma | Chennai Super Kings |
| 2014 | Kolkata Knight Riders | Gautam Gambhir | Kings XI Punjab |
| 2015 | Mumbai Indians | Rohit Sharma | Chennai Super Kings |
| 2016 | Sunrisers Hyderabad | David Warner | Royal Challengers Bangalore |
| 2017 | Mumbai Indians | Rohit Sharma | Rising Pune Supergiant |
| 2018 | Chennai Super Kings | MS Dhoni | Sunrisers Hyderabad |
| 2019 | Mumbai Indians | Rohit Sharma | Chennai Super Kings |
| 2020 | Mumbai Indians | Rohit Sharma | Delhi Capitals |
| 2021 | Chennai Super Kings | MS Dhoni | Kolkata Knight Riders |
| 2022 | Gujarat Titans | Hardik Pandya | Rajasthan Royals |
| 2023 | Chennai Super Kings | MS Dhoni | Gujarat Titans |
| 2024 | Kolkata Knight Riders | Shreyas Iyer | Sunrisers Hyderabad |
| 2025 | Royal Challengers Bengaluru | Rajat Patidar | Punjab Kings |
| 2026 | Royal Challengers Bengaluru | Rajat Patidar | Gujarat Titans |
Titles by franchise
| Franchise | Titles | Years |
|---|---|---|
| Chennai Super Kings | 5 | 2010, 2011, 2018, 2021, 2023 |
| Mumbai Indians | 5 | 2013, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2020 |
| Kolkata Knight Riders | 3 | 2012, 2014, 2024 |
| Royal Challengers Bengaluru | 2 | 2025, 2026 |
| Rajasthan Royals | 1 | 2008 |
| Deccan Chargers | 1 | 2009 |
| Sunrisers Hyderabad | 1 | 2016 |
| Gujarat Titans | 1 | 2022 |
Eight franchises, nineteen titles. Chennai and Mumbai have won ten of the nineteen between them — more than half the competition’s history in two dressing rooms.
The 2026 final
Royal Challengers Bengaluru beat Gujarat Titans by 5 wickets at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on 31 May 2026.
| Detail | |
|---|---|
| Gujarat Titans | 155/8 in 20 overs |
| Royal Challengers Bengaluru | 161/5 in 18 overs |
| Key innings | Virat Kohli 75 not out from 42 balls |
| Result | RCB won by 5 wickets with 12 balls remaining |
| Most Valuable Player | Vaibhav Sooryavanshi (Rajasthan Royals) |
| Orange Cap | Vaibhav Sooryavanshi — 776 runs |
| Purple Cap | Kagiso Rabada (Gujarat Titans) — 29 wickets |
A chase completed with two overs to spare is comfortable by final standards, and 155 was below par at that venue. The result made RCB only the third franchise to successfully defend the title.
The three teams to win back-to-back
| Franchise | Consecutive titles |
|---|---|
| Chennai Super Kings | 2010 and 2011 |
| Mumbai Indians | 2019 and 2020 |
| Royal Challengers Bengaluru | 2025 and 2026 |
Three in nineteen seasons is a small number, and it says something about how hard the competition is to dominate. Squads are rebuilt at auction, overseas availability shifts season to season, and a salary cap prevents any franchise from simply buying continuity. Retaining a title means surviving all of that twice.
RCB’s is the most striking of the three because of what preceded it. The franchise reached three finals in the competition’s first nine years — 2009, 2011 and 2016 — and lost all three, before waiting until 2025 to win at all. Two titles in two years after that record is a considerable turnaround.
MS Dhoni and the ten finals
The most remarkable individual number in the winners list belongs to one captain.
MS Dhoni has captained a side in ten IPL finals — winning five and losing five. He led Chennai Super Kings to the title in 2010, 2011, 2018, 2021 and 2023, and to runner-up finishes in 2008, 2012, 2013, 2015 and 2019.
Ten finals across sixteen seasons of participation, in a competition that has never had a dominant dynasty, is an outlier. It is also worth noting the shape of it: Chennai’s titles are spread from 2010 to 2023, either side of a two-year suspension, rather than clustered in one strong period.
Captains who have won the IPL
| Captain | Titles | Franchise |
|---|---|---|
| MS Dhoni | 5 | Chennai Super Kings |
| Rohit Sharma | 5 | Mumbai Indians |
| Gautam Gambhir | 2 | Kolkata Knight Riders |
| Rajat Patidar | 2 | Royal Challengers Bengaluru |
| Shane Warne | 1 | Rajasthan Royals |
| Adam Gilchrist | 1 | Deccan Chargers |
| David Warner | 1 | Sunrisers Hyderabad |
| Hardik Pandya | 1 | Gujarat Titans |
| Shreyas Iyer | 1 | Kolkata Knight Riders |
Dhoni and Rohit Sharma are level on five apiece, which mirrors their franchises’ totals exactly — neither Chennai nor Mumbai has won a title under anyone else.
Shreyas Iyer’s unusual record
One captain appears in the list in a way nobody else does. Shreyas Iyer has led three different franchises to an IPL final: Delhi Capitals as runners-up in 2020, Kolkata Knight Riders as champions in 2024, and Punjab Kings as runners-up in 2025.
Three finals with three different teams in six seasons is a genuinely rare line in any franchise competition, and it is the kind of detail a plain winners list buries.
Franchises that have never won
- Punjab Kings — runners-up in 2014 as Kings XI Punjab and again in 2025.
- Delhi Capitals — runners-up in 2020; among the original franchises and still without a title.
- Lucknow Super Giants — a newer franchise, yet to reach a final.
- Rising Pune Supergiant — runners-up in 2017, but the franchise no longer exists.
- Kochi Tuskers Kerala, Pune Warriors India and Gujarat Lions — all defunct, none reached a final.
Delhi is the notable one. Present since the first season, in a major market, and still without a trophy after nineteen attempts — the longest wait in the competition.
Two traps in reading this list
Anyone working through IPL history runs into the same two problems, and both produce incorrect claims.
Rebrands are not new teams. Royal Challengers Bangalore and Royal Challengers Bengaluru are the same franchise — the name changed with the city’s official spelling. Kings XI Punjab became Punjab Kings, and Delhi Daredevils became Delhi Capitals. All of that history carries forward.
New franchises are not continuations. Deccan Chargers and Sunrisers Hyderabad are different franchises that happen to share a city — Deccan’s 2009 title does not belong to Sunrisers. The same applies to Gujarat Lions and Gujarat Titans. Our IPL records guide covers this in more detail, because it is the most common source of wrong title counts online.
How the competition has changed
| Era | Teams | What stood out |
|---|---|---|
| 2008–2010 | 8 | New competition; Rajasthan’s underdog win in year one |
| 2011–2013 | 9–10 | Expansion, including franchises that no longer exist |
| 2014–2015 | 8 | Consolidation |
| 2016–2017 | 8 | Two temporary franchises replaced suspended sides |
| 2018–2021 | 8 | Chennai and Rajasthan return; Mumbai’s peak |
| 2022–2026 | 10 | Expansion to ten; Gujarat win as a new franchise |
Gujarat Titans winning in 2022 as a first-season franchise is one of the competition’s more remarkable results, and it demonstrated that the auction model genuinely does let a new team compete immediately — which is not true of most franchise leagues elsewhere.
What the list does and does not tell you
A winners list is a record of outcomes, not a measure of strength, and it is worth being clear about the difference.
- Nineteen data points is a small sample. A single tournament win depends heavily on two or three knockout matches.
- T20 is the most variance-heavy format, so the best league-stage side frequently does not win.
- Finishing top two matters — the playoff structure gives those sides a second chance.
- Squads change wholesale at mega auctions, so a franchise’s history says little about its current team.
- Runner-up finishes are not failures. Chennai have lost five finals and are still joint-most successful.
That last point is the one worth sitting with. The same franchise leads the title count and the runner-up count, which is a good reminder that reaching finals repeatedly is the achievement, and winning them is substantially a matter of what happens on one evening.
Season records and full scorecards for every edition listed above are published on the official IPL site, which remains the reference for anything contested – final margins, player-of-the-match awards and the season statistics that get misquoted most often.
The short version
Nineteen IPL seasons from 2008 to 2026 have produced eight different champions. Chennai Super Kings and Mumbai Indians lead with five titles each, Kolkata Knight Riders have three, and Royal Challengers Bengaluru have two after winning in 2025 and 2026.
RCB’s 2026 win — beating Gujarat Titans by 5 wickets at Ahmedabad, with Virat Kohli unbeaten on 75 — made them the third franchise to defend the title, after Chennai in 2010-11 and Mumbai in 2019-20. MS Dhoni has captained ten finals, winning five. Delhi Capitals remain the longest-serving franchise never to win. For more see our IPL teams and venues guide, the IPL records guide, the IPL tickets guide and our IPL page.
The runner-up list
Losing finalists tell you as much about a franchise as winning ones, and the pattern here is striking.
| Franchise | Runner-up finishes | Years |
|---|---|---|
| Chennai Super Kings | 5 | 2008, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2019 |
| Royal Challengers Bengaluru | 3 | 2009, 2011, 2016 |
| Sunrisers Hyderabad | 2 | 2018, 2024 |
| Gujarat Titans | 2 | 2023, 2026 |
| Punjab Kings | 2 | 2014, 2025 |
| Mumbai Indians | 1 | 2010 |
| Rising Pune Supergiant | 1 | 2017 |
| Delhi Capitals | 1 | 2020 |
| Kolkata Knight Riders | 1 | 2021 |
| Rajasthan Royals | 1 | 2022 |
Add the two tables together and Chennai Super Kings have played in ten of the nineteen finals — five won, five lost. No other franchise is close. Mumbai have reached six, Royal Challengers five, and every other side four or fewer.
That is the real measure of Chennai’s record. Winning five titles is impressive; being in the final more than half the time across nineteen seasons, through a mega-auction cycle and a two-year suspension, is the harder thing to do.
Indian and overseas winning captains
Nineteen titles have been won by nine different captains, and the split has shifted decisively over time.
| Captains | Titles | When | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Overseas | Shane Warne, Adam Gilchrist, David Warner | 3 | 2008, 2009, 2016 |
| Indian | Dhoni, Rohit, Gambhir, Hardik, Shreyas Iyer, Patidar | 16 | 2010 onwards |
Overseas captains won two of the first two seasons and only one since. That is not a rule about who leads better — it reflects how the competition changed. Early IPL squads leaned on marquee international names for leadership; the modern competition is built around a core of Indian players who must make up the bulk of every XI, and captaincy has followed.
How a team actually wins the IPL
The route to a title is not simply finishing top, and the playoff structure is worth understanding because it shapes every result in the list above.
- League stage — each team plays 14 matches, and the top four advance.
- Qualifier 1 — first plays second. The winner goes straight to the final.
- Eliminator — third plays fourth. The loser is out.
- Qualifier 2 — the Qualifier 1 loser plays the Eliminator winner.
- Final — the two survivors meet.
The advantage this hands the top two is substantial: they get a second chance after losing a knockout match, and third and fourth do not. A side finishing second can lose Qualifier 1 and still win the trophy. A side finishing fourth must win three consecutive knockouts.
This is why net run rate matters so much across a season, and why the closing weeks of the league stage are frequently more consequential than the opening weeks of the playoffs.
Why the same names keep appearing
Eight champions in nineteen seasons, with two franchises accounting for ten of them, invites an obvious question: what makes Chennai and Mumbai different in a competition explicitly designed to prevent dynasties?
- Retention discipline — both have consistently kept a settled core through auction cycles rather than rebuilding wholesale.
- Captaincy continuity — neither has won a title under anyone other than Dhoni or Rohit respectively.
- Domestic recruitment — with overseas players capped in the XI, depth in Indian players is the real constraint, and both have drafted well.
- Low churn in support staff, which is harder to measure but frequently cited.
- Tolerance for a bad season — both have finished near the bottom and rebuilt without dismantling the core.
None of that guarantees anything, and both franchises have had poor seasons. But across nineteen years the pattern is consistent enough to be more than coincidence.
Two related records worth reading alongside this: the most expensive player in IPL history — including the salary-cap rule that means the headline figure is not what the player receives — and the T20 World Cup winners list for India’s three titles in that format.
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