IPL 2025 Mega Auction: The IPL mega auction, which has made cricketers from all over the world crorepatis, will be held on 24 and 25 November in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. 577 players will be bid for Rs 641.50 crore. 10 teams have to buy a total of 204 players.
Know everything about the mega auction in 10 Keypoints –
Table of Contents
1: Mega auction rebuilds teams; watch live on Star/JioCinema
When is the mega auction? IPL’s mega auction will be held in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. The auction will start on November 24 at 3 pm. Bidding will go on till 8 pm, the rest of the players will start selling from 3 pm the next day.
BCCI has been trying to host the mega auction abroad for the last few years to make it a global event. The last auction was also held in Dubai. Before that all the auctions were held in India.
what is the difference between mega auction and normal auction? Mega auction takes place once in 3 years, the last auction was held before 2022 IPL. Teams can retain very few players in the mega auction. This time the limit was to retain 6 players.
There are mini auctions between the mega auctions, in which teams can retain more players. Mini auctions were held for the 2023 and 2024 IPLs.
Where can we watch it? The auction can be watched on TV on ‘Star Sports Channel’ and online on ‘Jio Cinema’.
2: Who all are participating in the auction, how many players will be up for bid?
All 10 IPL franchises will participate in the auction along with their management team. 1574 players had registered to participate in the mega auction. Out of which 577 players were shortlisted, whom the teams showed interest in buying. These include 367 Indian and 210 foreign players. Among these, 4 players are from associate countries. 331 players are uncapped, of which 319 are from India and 12 from abroad.
3: Which team has how much money to bid, is the amount different for each team?
The IPL committee has given the teams a purse limit of Rs 120 crore. That means the teams can spend this much money to buy 18 to 25 players. The team also had to retain its top players with this much money. After the retention ended, Punjab Kings has the maximum amount of Rs 110.50 crore left. The teams that retained more players have less money left in their purse.
Punjab has the most number of 23 vacant slots. After them, Bengaluru has 22 and Delhi has 21 vacant slots. Rajasthan has the least amount of Rs 41 crore left and only 19 players have vacant slots in the team.
| IPL 2025/ Squad Size/Salary Cap/Available Slots | ||||||||
| Franchise | No of Players | No of Overseas Players | No of Uncapped Players | RTM | Total money spent (Rs.) | Salary cap available (Rs.) | Available Slots | Overseas Slots |
| CSK | 5 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 65 | 55 | 20 | 7 |
| DC | 4 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 47 | 73 | 21 | 7 |
| GT | 5 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 51 | 69 | 20 | 7 |
| KKR | 6 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 69 | 51 | 19 | 6 |
| LSG | 5 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 51 | 69 | 20 | 7 |
| MI | 5 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 75 | 45 | 20 | 8 |
| PBKS | 2 | 0 | 2 | 4 | 9.5 | 110.5 | 23 | 8 |
| RCB | 3 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 37 | 83 | 22 | 8 |
| RR | 6 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 79 | 41 | 19 | 7 |
| SRH | 5 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 75 | 45 | 20 | 5 |
| Total | 46 | 10 | 12 | 14 | 558.5 | 641.5 | 204 | 70 |
4: What is this Right to Match i.e. RTM card, what are its rules, who has how many cards?
Teams that have retained less than 6 players will get the Right to Match (RTM) card in the auction. With the RTM card, teams will be able to retain the previous players included in the squad.
Let’s understand RTM with an example, suppose Glenn Maxwell, who was part of RCB last season, was bought by MI in the auction by bidding Rs 7 crore. Now if RCB wants, it can keep Maxwell with them by using the RTM card.
However, this time MI will also have the option to increase the bid for Maxwell. After using RTM, MI can also bid Rs 10 crore on Maxwell if they want. Now if RCB wants to keep Maxwell with them, they will have to pay Rs 10 crore. With this, one of their RTM cards will be used. If RCB refuses, then Maxwell will become MI’s for Rs 10 crore.
Punjab Kings retained only 2 players, due to which the team can now buy 4 players of the squad through RTM card in the auction. Bangalore will have 3 and Delhi will have 2 RTM cards in the auction. Hyderabad and Rajasthan do not have a single RTM card, while the remaining 5 teams have 1 RTM card each.
5: Will international and domestic players be bid on together? What does 79 sets in the auction mean?
The names of players who have played international cricket will come first. 45 capped players will come in 7 sets, followed by uncapped players. 577 players have been divided into 79 different sets. There are 5 to 8 players in one set. There are 45 international players in the first 7 sets. Players will be selected in the sequence of marquee player, batsman, bowler, wicketkeeper, fast bowler and spinner.
There will be a total of 38 uncapped players in sets 8 to 12. Their sequence will also be that of batsman, bowler, wicketkeeper, pacer and spinner. From the 13th set onwards, the names of the next players will appear in the same sequence, the sets will be repeated until the players of that category are finished. In the first set, bids will be placed on marquee i.e. top players and in the last set, bids will be placed on uncapped all-rounders.
6: Which players will be bid on first in the auction? When will the speed of the auction increase?
Set-1 has the names of Jos Buttler, Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant, Kagiso Rabada, Arshdeep Singh and Mitchell Starc. The name of one of these players will come first.
There are 116 top players in 17 sets. This means that teams will get more time to think about purchasing players. The speed of the auction will be increased as soon as the name of player number 117 is announced. This means that teams will have to bid quickly from the 117th player onwards. The auctioneer will not spend much time on players from 117 to 577.
Which Player in Which Set?
Set-1:
- Jos Buttler
- Shreyas Iyer
- Rishabh Pant
- Kagiso Rabada
- Arshdeep Singh
- Mitchell Starc
Set-2:
- Yuzvendra Chahal
- Liam Livingstone
- David Miller
- KL Rahul
- Mohammed Shami
- Mohammed Siraj
Set-3:
- Harry Brook
- Devon Conway
- Jack Fraser-McGurk
- Aiden Markram
- Devdutt Padikkal
- Rahul Tripathi
- David Warner
Set-4:
- Ravichandran Ashwin
- Venkatesh Iyer
- Mitchell Marsh
- Glenn Maxwell
- Harshal Patel
- Ravindra Jadeja
Set-5:
- Jonny Bairstow
- Quinton de Kock
- Rahmanullah Gurbaz
- Ishan Kishan
- Phil Salt
- Jitesh Sharma
7: What is the base price of players, how many players are there in which base price?
Base price is a fixed price, the bidding for a player in the auction starts from his base price. 30 lakhs is the lowest base price, while 2 crores is the highest base price. There are 82 players in the base price of 2 crores. There are 27 players in 1.50 crores, 18 players in 1.25 crores and 23 players in the base price of 1 crore. Apart from these, there are 427 players in the base prices of 75 lakhs, 50 lakhs, 40 lakhs and 30 lakhs.
Base Price and Number of Players
- ₹2 Crore: 82 players
- ₹1.50 Crore: 27 players
- ₹1.25 Crore: 18 players
- ₹1 Crore: 23 players
- ₹75 Lakh: 92 players
- ₹50 Lakh: 8 players
- ₹40 Lakh: 5 players
- ₹30 Lakh: 322 players
8: Who will conduct the auction, who will strike the auction hammer?
BCCI and IPL committee will conduct this auction together. The host of the auction is Mallika Sagar, who will strike the hammer. She had also hosted the previous auction. Before her, Hugh Edmeads used to conduct the auction.
When teams bid on the player, the auctioneer keeps announcing the price of the player as it increases. Finally, when the highest bid is made, the auctioneer bangs the hammer on the desk and says sold and sells the player to the team. In this way, the auction process is completed.
9: Is there any limit on buying Indian and foreign players? Which foreign player can buy the most?
Yes, absolutely. A team can buy a maximum of 8 foreign players, because a maximum of 4 foreigners can play in the playing-11 of the match. There are 18 to 25 players in the squad, to fill which the teams have to buy 8 foreigners along with the rest of the Indian players.
Mumbai, Punjab and Bangalore did not retain even a single foreign player, so the teams can buy 8 foreign players each. Hyderabad retained the maximum of 3 foreign players, so the team can buy only 5 foreign players. A total of 70 foreign players will be bought in the auction.
10: What will happen after the auction? When and where will the next season of IPL be held?
The auction will end after 204 players are sold, all the franchises will prepare their teams with new players. Preparations will begin from January next year with those players who will not be on national duty.
A total of 74 matches will be played between 10 teams in the 2025 IPL. The 18th edition of the tournament will start from March 14 and run till May 25. The 2024 IPL was played from March 22 to May 26. Under the captaincy of Shreyas Iyer, Kolkata Knight Riders won the title by defeating Sunrisers Hyderabad in the final.
Also read:
IPL 2025 Mega Auction: Which Team Leads the Budget Race? CSK’s Purse Revealed!
