IPL 2026 retention: Full list of players retained and released

Know which teams retained and released which players ahead of the IPL 2026 mini auction.

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The IPL 2026 retention list, revealing the retained and released players by every Indian Premier League team ahead of the upcoming auction, was officially announced on Saturday. Among the 10 IPL cricket teams, Punjab Kings retained the most number of players with 21 while Kolkata Knight Riders kept hold of the least number of players with 12. KKR released Andre Russell, who has been part of the team since 2014, as well as Venkatesh Iyer, who was the franchise’s most expensive buy in IPL history last season. Chennai Super Kings are also expected to be active in the upcoming auction, having lost 13 players from last season, including the now-retired Ravichandran Ashwin. MS Dhoni was retained. Glenn Maxwell, Quinton de Kock, Faf du Plessis and Ravi Bishnoi were among the other big names released by their respective teams. In contrast to the virtual reset that comes with retentions before mega auctions - where only a handful of core players can be held on to - franchises are allowed to retain the bulk of their squads prior to mini auctions, provided they stayed within the INR 120 crore purse and the 18-25 player roster limit. Reigning champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru have retained 17 players of the champion side from last season, including Virat Kohli. Several player trades have been confirmed ahead of the IPL 2026 season, leading to notable changes across multiple franchises. CSK traded Ravindra Jadeja and Sam Curran to RR for Sanju Samson. Donovan Ferreira also returned to RR from DC in a trade with Nitish Rana. Shardul Thakur moved to MI from LSG for Arjun Tendulkar. LSG also bolstered their pace battery by bringing in Mohammed Shami via an all-cash trade from SRH. Similarly, West Indies all-rounder Sherfane Rutherford was acquired by MI from GT. Mayank Markande also returned to MI from KKR. The trade window is still open.

IPL 2026 retention list: Players retained and released

Chennai Super Kings IPL 2026 retention

CSK retained players

  1. Ruturaj Gaikwad
  2. MS Dhoni
  3. Dewald Brevis* (SA)
  4. Ayush Mhatre
  5. Urvil Patel
  6. Anshul Kamboj
  7. Jamie Overton* (ENG)
  8. Ramakrishna Ghosh
  9. Shivam Dube
  10. Khaleel Ahmed
  11. Noor Ahmad* (AFG)
  12. Mukesh Choudhary
  13. Nathan Ellis* (AUS)
  14. Shreyas Gopal
  15. Gurjapneet Singh
  16. Sanju Samson - trade in from RR

CSK released players

  1. Ravindra Jadeja - trade out to RR
  2. Sam Curran* (ENG) - trade out to RR
  3. Rahul Tripathi
  4. Vansh Bedi
  5. Andre Siddarth
  6. Rachin Ravindra* (NZ)
  7. Deepak Hooda
  8. Vijay Shankar
  9. Shaik Rasheed
  10. Kamlesh Nagarkoti
  11. Matheesha Pathirana* (SL)
  12. Devon Conway* (NZ)
  13. Ravichandran Ashwin (retired)

Delhi Capitals IPL 2026 retention

DC retained players

  1. KL Rahul
  2. Karun Nair
  3. Abishek Porel
  4. Tristan Stubbs* (SA)
  5. Axar Patel
  6. Sameer Rizvi
  7. Ashutosh Sharma
  8. Vipraj Nigam
  9. Ajay Mandal
  10. Tripurana Vijay
  11. Madhav Tiwari
  12. Mitchell Starc* (AUS)
  13. T. Natarajan
  14. Mukesh Kumar
  15. Dushmantha Chameera* (SL)
  16. Kuldeep Yadav
  17. Nitish Rana - trade in from RR

DC released players

  1. Donovan Ferreira* (SA) - trade out to RR
  2. Faf du Plessis* (SA)
  3. Jake Fraser-McGruk* (AUS)
  4. Sediqullah Atal* (AFG)
  5. Manvanth Kumar
  6. Mohit Sharma
  7. Darshan Nalkande

Gujarat Titans IPL 2026 retention

GT retained players

  1. Shubman Gill
  2. Sai Sudharsan
  3. Kumar Kushagra
  4. Anuj Rawat
  5. Jos Buttler* (ENG)
  6. Nishant Sindhu
  7. Glenn Phillips* (NZ)
  8. Washington Sundar
  9. Arshad Khan
  10. Shahrukh Khan
  11. Rahul Tewatia
  12. Kagiso Rabada* (SA)
  13. Mohammed Siraj
  14. Prasidh Krishna
  15. Ishant Sharma
  16. Gurnoor Singh Brar
  17. Rashid Khan* (AFG)
  18. Manav Suthar
  19. Sai Kishore
  20. Jayant Yadav

GT released players

  1. Sherfane Rutherford* (WI) - trade out to MI
  2. Mahipal Lomror
  3. Karim Janat* (AFG)
  4. Dasun Shanaka* (SL)
  5. Gerald Coetzee* (SA)
  6. Kulwant Khejroliya

Kolkata Knight Riders IPL 2026 retention

KKR retained players

  1. Ajinkya Rahane
  2. Rinku Singh
  3. Angkrish Raghuvanshi
  4. Manish Pandey
  5. Rovman Powell* (WI)
  6. Anukul Roy
  7. Ramandeep Singh
  8. Vaibhav Arora
  9. Sunil Narine* (WI)
  10. Varun Chakaravarthy
  11. Harshit Rana
  12. Umran Malik

KKR released players

  1. Mayank Markande - trade out to MI
  2. Andre Russell* (WI)
  3. Venkatesh Iyer
  4. Quinton de Kock* (SA)
  5. Anrich Nortje* (SA)
  6. Luvnith Sisodia
  7. Rahmanullah Gurbaz* (AFG)
  8. Moeen Ali* (ENG)
  9. Chetan Sakariya
  10. Spencer Johnson* (AUS)

Lucknow Super Giants IPL 2026 retention

LSG retained players

  1. Rishabh Pant
  2. Ayush Badoni
  3. Abdul Samad
  4. Aiden Markram* (SA)
  5. Himmat Singh
  6. Matthew Breetzke* (SA)
  7. Nicholas Pooran* (WI)
  8. Mitchell Marsh* (AUS)
  9. Shahbaz Ahamad
  10. Arshin Kulkarni
  11. Mayank Yadav
  12. Avesh Khan
  13. Mohsin Khan
  14. M. Siddharth
  15. Digvesh Rathi
  16. Prince Yadav
  17. Akash Singh
  18. Arjun Tendulkar - trade in from MI
  19. Mohammed Shami - trade in from SRH

LSG released players

  1. Shardul Thakur - trade out to MI
  2. David Miller* (SA)
  3. Aryan Juyal
  4. Yuvraj Chaudhary
  5. Rajvardhan Hangargekar
  6. Akash Deep
  7. Ravi Bishnoi

Mumbai Indians IPL 2026 retention

MI retained players

  1. Rohit Sharma
  2. Surya Kumar Yadav
  3. Robin Minz
  4. Ryan Rickelton* (SA)
  5. Tilak Varma
  6. Hardik Pandya
  7. Naman Dhir
  8. Mitchell Santner* (NZ)
  9. Will Jacks* (AUS)
  10. Corbin Bosch* (SA)
  11. Raj Bawa
  12. Trent Boult* (NZ)
  13. Jasprit Bumrah
  14. Deepak Chahar
  15. Ashwani Kumar
  16. Raghu Sharma
  17. Allah Ghazanfar* (AFG)
  18. Mayank Markande - trade in from KKR
  19. Shardul Thakur - trade in from LSG
  20. Sherfane Rutherford* (WI) - trade in from GT

MI released players

  1. Arjun Tendulkar - trade out to LSG
  2. Satyanarayana Raju
  3. Reece Topley* (ENG)
  4. KL Shrijith
  5. Karn Sharma
  6. Bevon Jacobs* (SA)
  7. Mujeeb-ur-Rahman* (AFG)
  8. Lizaad Williams* (SA)
  9. Vignesh Puthur

Punjab Kings IPL 2026 retention

PBKS retained players

  1. Shreyas Iyer
  2. Nehal Wadhera
  3. Vishnu Vinod
  4. Harnoor Pannu
  5. Pyla Avinash
  6. Prabhsimran Singh
  7. Shashank Singh
  8. Marcus Stoinis* (AUS)
  9. Harpreet Brar
  10. Marco Jansen* (SA)
  11. Azmatullah Omarzai* (AFG)
  12. Priyansh Arya
  13. Musheer Khan
  14. Suryansh Shedge
  15. Mitch Owen* (AUS)
  16. Arshdeep Singh
  17. Yuzvendra Chahal
  18. Vyshak Vijaykumar
  19. Yash Thakur
  20. Xavier Bartlett* (AUS)
  21. Lockie Ferguson* (NZ)

PBKS released players

  1. Josh Inglis* (AUS)
  2. Aaron Hardie* (AUS)
  3. Glenn Maxwell* (AUS)
  4. Kuldeep Sen
  5. Praveen Dubey

Royal Challengers Bangalore IPL 2026 retentions

RCB retained players

  1. Rajat Patidar
  2. Virat Kohli
  3. Tim David* (AUS)
  4. Devdutt Padikkal
  5. Phil Salt* (ENG)
  6. Jitesh Sharma
  7. Krunal Pandya
  8. Jacob Bethell* (ENG)
  9. Romario Shepherd* (WI)
  10. Swapnil SinghSwapnil Singh
  11. Josh Hazlewood* (AUS)
  12. Bhuvneshwar Kumar
  13. Rasikh Salam
  14. Yash Dayal
  15. Suyash Sharma
  16. Nuwan Thushara* (SL)
  17. Abhinandan Singh

RCB released players

  1. Mayank Agarwal
  2. Swastik Chhikara
  3. Tim Seifert* (NZ)
  4. Liam Livingstone* (ENG)
  5. Manoj Bhandage
  6. Lungi Ngidi* (SA)
  7. Mohit Rathee

Rajasthan Royals IPL 2026 retention

RR retained players

  1. Shubham Dubey
  2. Vaibhav Suryavanshi
  3. Lhuan-dre Pretorius* (SA)
  4. Shimron Hetmyer* (WI)
  5. Yashasvi Jaiswal
  6. Dhruv Jurel
  7. Riyan Parag
  8. Yudhvir Singh Charak
  9. Jofra Archer* (ENG)
  10. Tushar Deshpande
  11. Fazalhaq Farooqi* (AFG)
  12. Kwena Maphaka* (SA)
  13. Nandre Burger* (SA)
  14. Ravindra Jadeja - trade in from CSK
  15. Sam Curran* (ENG) - trade in from CSK
  16. Donovan Ferreira* (SA) - trade in from DC

RR released players

  1. Sanju Samson - trade out to CSK
  2. Nitish Rana - trade out to DC
  3. Kunal Singh Rathore
  4. Maheesh Theekshana* (SL)
  5. Wanindu Hasaranga* (SL)
  6. Fazalhaq Farooqi* (AFG)
  7. Akash Madhwal
  8. Kumar Kartikeya
  9. Ashok Sharma

Sunrisers Hyderabad IPL 2026 retention

SRH retained players

  1. Travis Head* (AUS)
  2. Abhishek Sharma
  3. Aniket Verma
  4. R Smaran
  5. Ishan Kishan
  6. Heinrich Klaasen* (SA)
  7. Nitish Kumar Reddy
  8. Harsh Dubey
  9. Kamindu Mendis* (SL)
  10. Harshal Patel
  11. Brydon Carse* (ENG)
  12. Pat Cummins* (AUS)
  13. Jaydev Unadkat
  14. Eshan Malinga* (SL)
  15. Zeeshan Ansari

SRH released players

  1. Mohammad Shami - trade out to LSG
  2. Abhinav Manohar
  3. Atharva Taide
  4. Sachin Baby
  5. Wiaan Mulder* (SA)
  6. Simarjeet Singh
  7. Rahul Chahar
  8. Adam Zampa* (AUS)