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Cricket Overs to Balls Calculator: six-ball notation converter

Sports24hour reference desk · reviewed 22 October 2026. Independent explanatory tools; no account required.

Convert six-ball cricket overs to legal balls, or legal balls back to scoreboard notation. The dot separates completed overs from balls within the next over; it is not a decimal point.

19.4 overs means 19 complete overs and 4 legal balls.

Quick reference

Cricket overs Legal balls Decimal overs for arithmetic
0.5 5 0.833333…
1.0 6 1
10.3 63 10.5
19.4 118 19.666667…
20.0 120 20
50.0 300 50

How to add innings correctly

Convert each innings to balls first. For example, 12.4 plus 7.5 is 76 + 47 = 123 balls, or 20.3 overs. Adding these as decimals produces 20.9, which is not valid cricket notation. Likewise 19.6 is invalid: the sixth legal ball completes the twentieth over, written 20.0.

From balls to overs

Divide legal balls by six. The quotient gives completed overs and the remainder gives the digit after the dot. For 119 balls: 19 complete overs with 5 balls remaining in the next over, written 19.5.

Do wides and no-balls count toward the six balls?

They are not legal deliveries for completing an over. Use the scoreboard’s valid-ball count rather than counting every delivery bowled. Law 17 also covers other cases where a delivery does not count.

Can I enter 19.40 or 19.6?

No. Use one ball digit from 0 to 5 after the dot, or whole overs such as 20. The strict format helps catch decimal arithmetic mistakes.

Does it support The Hundred or historic eight-ball overs?

No. This page is explicitly for six-ball overs. Use the competition’s own format for other systems.

Rule reference: MCC Laws of Cricket 2026, Law 17 (PDF). Apply the conversion in the NRR calculator or chase calculator.