This is a list of all men, boys and women who have captained the West Indies cricket team at official international level in at least one match. The West Indies became a full member of the Imperial Cricket Conference (now the International Cricket Council) on 31 May 1926 at the same time as India and New Zealand. It played its first test match in 1928 against England at Lord's. Their first game against other opposition came in 1930/31 when they played Australia.
In the mid-1980s there were two rebel West Indian tours to South Africa, which was at that time banned from official competition because of the apartheid régime then in force there. None of the matches from the rebel tours were recognised as official Test matches and all players who toured South Africa at the time were banned from official international cricket matches for life. The captains of those West Indies sides are listed below.
Prior to becoming a member of the ICC, the first combined West Indies team was formed in 1884[1] and toured Canada and the United States in 1886 under the captaincies of Charles Guy Austin Wyatt of Demerara[2] and Laurence Fyfe of Jamaica[3] (also vice captain under Wyatt).[2] In a return tour by the United States in 1888, the combined West Indian team was captained by Edward Wright.[4][5] Combined West Indian teams have played more regular first-class cricket under the name "West Indies" since 1897 usually against amateur sides touring from England, such as Lord Brackley's XI or RA Bennett's XI, but from 1912 onwards the MCC also played on tour against the West Indies. The West Indies also toured England in 1900, 1906 and 1923 with the opposition usually being various English first-class and minor county sides. Other opposition during these tours included amateur sides, the MCC, an England XI (once) and Scotland and Ireland (once each). Some of the matches played on the various West Indies tours of England were deemed not to be first-class matches. During this time (1897 to 1926) the various West Indies captains were Aucher Warner, Stanley Sproston (non-first-class matches only), Harold Austin, Clement King, Alfred Harrigan, Edwin Moulder, William Sherlock, Percy Tarilton, Malcolm Austin and Karl Nunes