Most runs scored by a player in a Cricket World Cup tournament (female)

In nine innings at the 2025 ICC Women’s World Cup, hosted by India and Sri Lanka, South Africa captain and opener Laura Woolvaardt plundered 571 runs – at an average of 71.37 runs per innings – to move clear of the 509 runs scored by Australia’s Alyssa Healy at the previous edition of the Women’s World Cup in 2022. The 26-year-old’s prolific month on the subcontinent, playing for a team that were twice bowled out for less than 100, included 90 against Pakistan in a group match in Colombo on 21 October, and back-to-back knock-out hundreds, in the semi-final against England in Guwahati on 29 October (169) and the final against India in Navi Mumbai on 2 November (101), although her heroics were in vain as India won the tournament for the first time.

Woolvaardt’s scores of 5, 14, 70, 31, 60 not out, 90, 31, 169 and 101 included seven sixes and a single-tournament record 73 fours. Woolvaardt’s tally of 571 runs was 137 more than the next-most-prolific run-scorer at the 2025 Women’s Cricket World Cup: Smriti Mandhana’s 434 runs in nine innings for champions India. At the conclusion of the 2025 Women’s Cricket World Cup, Woolvaardt’s 1,328 runs in 24 innings (2017-25) stood second only to Debbie Hockley’s 1,501 runs in 43 innings (1982-2000) for New Zealand in tournament history. By comparison, Marizanne Kapp’s 659 runs in 28 innings (2009-25) was the next-highest-scoring South African at the Women’s Cricket World Cup.