Kagiso Rabada reached 350 Test wickets on the final day of the series-deciding third Test against Australia at Newlands, taking the milestone in 13,808 balls — the fewest of any bowler in Test history to reach the mark, moving past Dale Steyn's previous record of 14,719 balls.
Rabada reached the landmark by dismissing Travis Head for 14, his third wicket of Australia's second-innings chase of 288, with the breakthrough coming as South Africa pushed for early wickets on the final morning. Marco Jansen's celebration from the non-striker's end was widely shared as the milestone was confirmed.
While Steyn remains the quickest South African to 350 wickets by Tests played, reaching the mark in 69 matches against Rabada's 75, Rabada's record is specifically for pace of strike rate — fewest deliveries bowled to get there. That tally of 75 Tests is still the joint fourth-fewest among fast bowlers to reach 350 wickets, level with Malcolm Marshall, underlining how little time Rabada has needed on the field relative to the volume of wickets.
The wicket arrived with the series locked at 1-1 and Australia chasing 288 to win it outright at Newlands, meaning Rabada's personal landmark came inside a passage of play that remained live and undecided at the time. Rabada had missed South Africa's series-opening defeat in Durban through injury, making his return to form across the remainder of the series — now crowned by this record — a significant thread in South Africa's push for the decider.
Reaching 350 wickets puts Rabada among a small group of fast bowlers to have done so, and the balls-faced record specifically marks him as the most strike-rate-efficient wicket-taker to get there, ahead of Steyn's long-standing South African benchmark. It is the latest in a run of career milestones for a bowler who has been central to South Africa's pace attack across formats for a decade.
Kagiso Rabada's record-breaking spell and early wicket in the chase make him the standout bowling pick from either attack for what remains of the match, with his career tally adding further weight to his standing as one of the format's premier wicket-taking options.
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Rabada's wicket count and the record figures in this article are verified against same-day and freshly re-checked reporting as of October 31, 2026; the match itself had not yet concluded at the time of writing.
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