Audited 28 Jul 2026·Last updated 28 Oct 2026·6 citations·Tier 1·0 uses

WHIP Calculator — Walks and Hits per Inning Pitched

Calculate WHIP, walks plus hits per inning, from a pitcher's line, reading .1 and .2 innings as outs, with hits, walks and baserunners per nine innings.

WHIP Calculator

Hits allowed (H)Hits charged to the pitcher. A batter who reaches on an error or a fielder's choice is not a hit and does not count against WHIP.

Walks allowed (BB)Bases on balls including intentional walks. Hit batsmen are NOT included — MLB's glossary states explicitly that they do not count against a pitcher's WHIP.

Innings pitched (IP)Baseball notation: .1 means one out and .2 means two outs. Enter 74 and one third as 74.1, never 74.33. A fractional part of .3 to .9 is impossible and is rejected.

WHIP

0.6592

Walks plus hits per inning pitched, published to two decimals; 1.00 means one such baserunner an inning on average.

Baserunners allowed (BB + H)

Innings pitched (true decimal)

74.3333

Outs recorded

223

Hits per nine innings (H/9)

4.722

Walks per nine innings (BB/9)

1.2108

Baserunners per nine innings

5.9327

Background.

Over 74⅓ innings in 2024, Cleveland closer Emmanuel Clase allowed 39 hits and 10 walks — 49 runners reaching base by those two routes, about one every inning and a half. Divide 49 by 74⅓ and you have his WHIP, 0.66, as MLB's own data reports it. Rescaled to a full game, that is fewer than six such baserunners per nine innings.

WHIP, walks plus hits per inning pitched, measures how much traffic a pitcher allows, regardless of whether any of it scores. MLB's glossary defines it as the sum of a pitcher's walks and hits divided by his innings pitched, and two details in that definition trip people up. Hit batsmen are not included — the glossary says so explicitly, along with errors and fielder's choices — so there is no hit-by-pitch field here. And innings are written in baseball's own notation, where 74.1 means 74 innings and one out, not 74 and a tenth. Divide by the printed figure and the result is slightly off over a season and badly off over a single outing.

From hits, walks and innings you get WHIP itself, the baserunner total, the out count the innings notation encodes, innings as a true decimal, and three per-nine-innings rates: hits, walks and total baserunners. The split between hits and walks is often the more useful reading, because the two have different causes.

WHIP is not in the Official Baseball Rules. Daniel Okrent, the writer who invented rotisserie fantasy baseball, coined it in 1979 under the name innings pitched ratio, and fantasy players and broadcasters carried it into everyday use until MLB adopted it in its glossary.

What is whip calculator?

WHIP is the number of batters who reach base by a walk or a hit, per inning pitched: (BB + H) ÷ IP. Walks include intentional walks. Hit batsmen, batters who reach on an error and batters who reach on a fielder's choice are left out by definition, so WHIP counts two specific ways a pitcher puts runners on rather than every runner. Because it is per inning, the scale is small: 1.00 means one such runner an inning, or nine a game, and a pitcher moving from 1.30 to 1.00 allows nearly three fewer baserunners every nine innings. Its strength is that it ignores sequencing — whether the runners later scored, and whether a reliever stranded them, makes no difference — so it is steadier than ERA over short spells. Its weakness is that every runner counts the same: a home run and a four-pitch walk each add one, although one has already scored and the other is standing on first.

How to use this calculator.

Enter hits allowed as charged to the pitcher in the box score or stats line. A batter who reached on an error was not credited with a hit and does not belong here.
Enter walks allowed, intentional walks included. Leave hit batsmen out; adding them would put your figure out of line with every published WHIP.
Enter innings exactly as printed: 6.2 for six innings and two outs, 74.1 for 74 and one out. Only .0, .1 and .2 are possible endings, so a figure such as 74.33 is rejected — convert it to 74.1 first.
Check the outs output against your expectation, three per whole inning plus the digit after the point, to confirm the notation was read the way you meant.
Read WHIP to two decimals as it is usually published, then compare hits per nine with walks per nine to see which half drives the number.

The formula.

WHIP = (BB + H) ⁄ IP, IP = outs ⁄ 3

BB · walks allowed, intentional walks includedH · hits allowedIP · true innings pitched, outs ÷ 3 — not the printed notationouts · 3 × whole innings + the digit after the point (.1 = one out, .2 = two outs)not counted · hit batsmen, errors, fielder's choicesbaserunners per 9 · 9 × WHIP

The numerator is plain addition: walks plus hits, every one counting once. A bases-clearing double and an unintentional walk on four pitches contribute equally, and nothing is added for hit batsmen, errors or fielder's choices.

The denominator needs one conversion. Rule 9.02(c)(1) of the Official Baseball Rules tells the scorer to count each putout as one third of an inning, which is why the digit after the point is an out count. So outs = 3 × whole innings + that digit, and true innings = outs ÷ 3. For 74.1 that is 3 × 74 + 1 = 223 outs and 223 ÷ 3 = 74.3333 innings. WHIP = (BB + H) ÷ (outs ÷ 3).

The per-nine figures put the same counts on the scale ERA uses: hits × 9 ÷ innings, walks × 9 ÷ innings, and baserunners × 9 ÷ innings, which is exactly nine times WHIP.

Misreading the notation does little damage over a long season and a great deal over a short one. Over 200.2 innings, dividing by 200.2 instead of 200.6667 shifts WHIP by about 0.23 %. Over a single relief outing of 0.2 innings, dividing by 0.2 instead of 0.6667 inflates WHIP by a factor of 3.33.

WHIP is published to two decimals, and that rounding hides real differences: 1.195 and 1.204 both print as 1.20, yet over 200 innings they are almost two baserunners apart. To combine pitchers — a bullpen, a team or a fantasy roster — add all the walks, all the hits and all the outs, and divide once. Averaging individual WHIPs gives a reliever with 60 innings the same weight as a starter with 200, which skews the result toward whichever pitchers threw least.

A worked example.

Example

Emmanuel Clase's 2024 line from MLB's data feed: 74.1 innings, 39 hits and 10 walks. The feed also records 223 outs, which is what the notation encodes: 3 × 74 + 1 = 223. True innings are 223 ÷ 3 = 74.3333. Baserunners by walk or hit: 39 + 10 = 49. WHIP = 49 ÷ 74.3333 = 0.6592, published as 0.66. The per-nine rates follow from the same innings: hits 39 × 9 ÷ 74.3333 = 4.7220, walks 10 × 9 ÷ 74.3333 = 1.2108, and baserunners 49 × 9 ÷ 74.3333 = 5.9327, which is 9 × 0.6592. Across a full nine innings, then, Clase allowed fewer than five hits and barely more than one walk. The walk rate stands out most: at about 1.2 per nine he issued one walk every seven and a half innings or so. The notation matters even here, though only in the last digits. Dividing 49 by the printed 74.1 gives 0.6613, which still rounds to 0.66 over a season this long. The same misreading on a one-out appearance with one baserunner turns a true WHIP of 3.00 into 10.00.

hits Allowed39

innings Pitched74.1

walks Allowed10

Frequently asked questions.

Does a hit by pitch count against a pitcher's WHIP?

No. MLB's glossary states that hit batsmen, errors and hitters who reach via fielder's choice do not count against a pitcher's WHIP. It is an odd exclusion, since a hit batsman takes first base just as a walk does, but it is the published definition, and adding hit batsmen would make your figure disagree with every WHIP printed elsewhere. On-base percentage against, by contrast, does include them.

Why does 6.1 innings mean six and one third, not six and a tenth?

Because an inning has three outs and the scorer credits each out as a third of an inning, under Rule 9.02(c)(1) of the Official Baseball Rules. Box scores write the thirds as a single digit after the point: .1 for one out, .2 for two. A .3 never appears, since the third out completes the inning. A double play adds .2 in one go, and a batter reaching on an error adds nothing to the innings total.

What counts as a good WHIP?

A widely used rule of thumb puts about 1.30 at average for a starting pitcher, 1.20 as above average, 1.10 as very good and 1.00 or lower as excellent. The two 2024 Cy Young Award winners illustrate the top end: Tarik Skubal finished at 0.92 over 192 innings and Chris Sale at 1.01 over 177⅔. Relievers, with far fewer innings, often post lower figures, so compare like with like.

How is WHIP different from ERA?

ERA counts earned runs allowed per nine innings; WHIP counts runners allowed per inning. ERA therefore depends on sequencing, on the scorer's earned-or-unearned rulings and on whether relievers strand inherited runners, and WHIP depends on none of these. A pitcher whose ERA is much better than his WHIP suggests has been stranding runners at a high rate, which tends not to last. Reading the two together tells you more than either alone.

Why does a home run count the same as a walk in WHIP?

Because WHIP was built to be simple enough to compute from a newspaper box score, and simplicity means one runner, one count. The cost is that it misses damage: a solo home run has already scored, while a walk is a runner on first who may never move. Fielding independent pitching, FIP, weights the outcomes instead — 13 for a home run, 3 for a walk or hit batsman and −2 for a strikeout — so look there when power allowed matters.

Do errors make a pitcher's WHIP worse?

Not directly. A batter who reaches on an error is not a hit and is not added to the numerator. But an error that should have been an out also means no out was recorded, so the inning is extended and the pitcher may face more batters, any of whom can then single or walk. Those later hits and walks do count. ERA's earned-run rules reconstruct the inning as if the error had not happened; WHIP makes no such adjustment for the extra batters.

How do I work out WHIP for a whole staff or a fantasy roster?

Pool the counts rather than averaging the ratios. Add every walk and hit, convert every innings figure to outs and add those, then divide baserunners by total outs ÷ 3. Clase's 0.6592 and Skubal's 0.9219 average to 0.7905, but pooling their 226 baserunners over 266⅓ innings gives 0.8486, because Skubal's 192 innings rightly carry more weight. Rotisserie leagues, where WHIP is a standard pitching category, score team WHIP this way.

Can a reliever's WHIP be compared with a starter's?

Only loosely. A reliever's season is often 60 to 80 innings, a starter's can be 180 or more, so a short run of luck moves a reliever's figure far more. Relievers also usually pitch an inning at a time, often at full effort, and may face the same hitters only once. Clase's 0.66 over 74⅓ innings and Skubal's 0.92 over 192 are both outstanding, but they are not the same kind of achievement.

Does the defence behind a pitcher change his WHIP?

Yes, through the hits half. A drive into the gap that a fast centre fielder runs down is an out; the same ball with a slower fielder is a hit and raises WHIP. Walks, by contrast, are almost entirely the pitcher's own doing. Research on balls in play has long found that pitchers control hits allowed less than walks and strikeouts, which is why the hits-per-nine and walks-per-nine split is worth reading.

Why does a pitcher's WHIP swing so much early in the season?

Because the denominator is small. After 10 innings, one extra hit changes WHIP by 0.10; after 150 innings, the same hit moves it by less than 0.01. A reliever who allows two hits and a walk in his first third of an inning sits at a WHIP of 9.00 until he gets more outs. Early figures say little until a few dozen innings have accumulated, and hits settle more slowly than walks.

References& sources.

How this page was produced

Published by: Quanta Calculator
Overseen by: Daniel, Quanta Calculator Researcher
Primary sources: 6 cited below
Method: WHIP = (BB + H) ⁄ IP, IP = outs ⁄ 3
Published: 28 July 2026
Last verified: 28 July 2026

Built with AI assistance and verified by automated tests against the cited sources — every worked example on this page is computed by the same code that runs the calculator. How we build and check calculators.

Related calculators

ERA Calculatorbas FIP Calculatorbas On-Base Percentage Calculatorbas Ratio Calculatorpro Batting Average Calculatorbas

In this category

Embed

Quanta Pro

Paid features are coming later.

All 1560 calculators remain free
No billing is enabled

Coming soon