The LBW Rule Explained: How Leg Before Wicket Is Decided

Edited by Nayan Makvana · Last reviewed 24 October 2026

Leg before wicket, written LBW, causes more arguments than any other dismissal, yet it is one of the most tightly defined. Law 36 of the MCC Laws of Cricket lists five conditions, and a batter is out only if every one of them is met. This guide takes them in the order an umpire does, then explains how the Decision Review System tests the same conditions with ball-tracking. It follows the 2026 edition of the Laws and the ICC playing conditions current at the date of review.

The five conditions

The delivery is legal. Nobody can be out LBW off a no-ball, however straight the ball was going.
The ball did not first land outside leg stump. It must first land in line between wicket and wicket, or on the off side. A ball that lands outside the line of leg stump cannot produce an LBW, wherever it goes next. A full toss that hits the batter before landing meets this condition automatically.
It hit the batter before the bat. The ball must strike some part of the batter's person, such as the pad, body or helmet, without having touched the bat first.
The impact was in line, unless no shot was offered. The point where the ball first hits the batter must be between wicket and wicket, even if it is above the height of the bails. If the batter made no genuine attempt to play the ball with the bat, an impact outside the line of off stump also counts. An impact outside the line of leg stump is never out.
The ball would have hit the wicket. The umpire assumes that, but for the batter, the ball would have carried on along the path it was already on, whether or not it would have bounced before reaching the stumps.

LBW appeals are answered by the bowler's end umpire, and as with every dismissal a batter can only be given out if the fielding side appeals. If an umpire is still in doubt after consulting their colleague, the Laws say the decision is not out.

Bat first, pad first

If the ball touches the bat before it hits the pad, the batter cannot be out LBW, though they can still be caught off the deflection. If the ball hits bat and pad at the same instant, Law 36 treats it as having hit the bat first. Only the first contact with the batter counts, so a ball that hits the pad, then the bat, is judged on where it struck the pad.

Gloves are a frequent source of confusion. A glove on a hand that is holding the bat counts as part of the bat, so a ball that hits it first cannot be LBW. A hand that has come off the handle is part of the batter's person, so a ball that hits that hand first can be.

The no-shot exception

Most close LBW decisions turn on whether the batter played a shot. A batter who makes a genuine attempt to play the ball with the bat can only be out if the impact was in line with the stumps. A batter who does not, by padding the ball away or leaving it, can be out even when struck outside the line of off stump, provided the ball would have gone on to hit the wicket. Whether an attempt was genuine is the umpire's judgement.

The clause exists to stop pad-play: batters kicking away balls outside off stump instead of playing them, knowing they could not be given out. LBW itself has been in the Laws since 1774. Balls landing outside off stump were brought within it by an experiment in 1935 that became Law in 1937, and the no-shot wording was trialled from the 1969-70 season and written into the Laws in 1980.

Which side is the off side?

Off and leg are fixed by the batter's position at the moment the ball comes into play, which is when the bowler starts their run-up. A right-hander who switches to a left-handed grip during the run-up, or plays a reverse sweep, is still judged as a right-hander, so their original leg stump still marks the line for outside leg.

What the umpire has to judge

Without technology, the bowler's end umpire has a second or two to settle all five conditions. The hardest is the last: a projection that must allow for bounce, swing, spin and the distance from the point of impact to the stumps. The further from the stumps the batter is hit, the less certain any projection becomes, and the review rules below build that uncertainty in.

How DRS tests an LBW

When an LBW decision is reviewed, the TV umpire first checks that the delivery was legal, then whether the ball touched the bat before the pad, using replays and edge detection. If the batter is still eligible to be out, ball-tracking (Hawk-Eye is the best-known system) reports three things: where the ball landed, where it first hit the batter, and whether it would have hit the wicket.

Landing: Judged by the centre of the ball against a zone the width of the stumps running between the two sets. The reading is in line, outside off or outside leg. Outside leg is not out; the other two can be. There is no umpire's call on where the ball landed.
Impact: In line if the centre of the ball was inside the line of the stumps when it hit the batter; umpire's call if part of the ball was in line but its centre was not; outside if no part of it was in line. When the umpire has judged that no shot was offered, an impact outside off stump still counts.
Wicket: Hitting if the ball would have hit the wicket with its centre inside the outline of the stumps and bails; umpire's call if it would have clipped the wicket with its centre outside that outline; missing otherwise.

Umpire's call

Umpire's call exists because ball-tracking is a projection with a margin of error, so marginal readings defer to the decision made on the field: out stays out and not out stays not out. That is why two deliveries that look identical on screen can end differently. To turn not out into out, the ball must not have landed outside leg, the impact must be in line (or outside off with no shot offered) and the ball must be shown hitting. To turn out into not out, the ball must have landed outside leg, hit the batter wholly outside the line of the stumps (wholly outside leg, where no shot was offered) or be shown missing.

A review that fails only because of umpire's call does not count against the reviewing side's allowance of unsuccessful reviews, which is three per innings in Tests and two in ODIs and T20Is. If a review shows the delivery was a no-ball, the batter is not out.

Less obvious review rules

Long distances. If tracking shows the ball hitting but the batter was struck 300 cm (about ten feet) or more from the stumps, a not-out decision stands. The same applies between 250 and 300 cm if the ball travelled less than 40 cm between landing and hitting the batter.
Full tosses. If the ball hits the batter on the full but would have bounced before the stumps, ball-tracking shows only its projected line. How high it would have bounced remains the on-field umpire's judgement.
Caught or LBW. If a batter is given out caught and the review shows the ball hit the pad rather than the bat, the TV umpire can check LBW instead, and that check starts from the original decision of out, so an umpire's-call reading keeps the batter out.
The no-shot question. Before deciding whether to review, players may ask the umpire whether the decision was based on no shot being offered. Unless the umpire says so, the TV umpire assumes a genuine shot was played.

If a batter is hit and given not out, leg byes may be run only if they attempted a shot or tried to avoid the ball. For the other ways of being dismissed, see the ten ways of getting out; for review allowances and the technology, see the DRS guide.