Virat Kohli becomes world's most popular cricketer, says new study

Virat Kohli is the most popular cricketer in the world after new research revealed the extend of the India captain's popularity during the recently concluded IPL.

Cricket Bet India's research reveals that the 31-year-old has been searched for online an average of 797,000 times a month over the past year, making him by far the most popular cricket in the world.

Using data from ahrefs and analysing all 160 players to play in the IPL in 2020, Kohli, Rohit Sharma and Hardik Pandya are the most popular cricketers, ahead of stars such as Steve Smith, David Warner and Ben Stokes, who all feature in the top 10 list.

Sharma and Pandya were star performers in this year's IPL held out in the UAE which saw Mumbai Indians claim a second successive title, but Orange Cap winner KL Rahul was also a success story of the tournament and is the sixth most-searched for cricketer in the world.

Sanju Samson and Rishabh Pant attracted more global searches for their names online than RCB favourite AB de Villiers, while Shikhar Dhawan, Shreyas Iyer, Prithvi Shaw and Mayank Agarwal were also very popular.

Cricket Bet India has analysed search results for all the IPL cricketers around the world as well as in India, the UK and Australia so you can see which are the most popular players in each 'Big Three' nation.