The record depends on whether you mean all of professional baseball or just Major League Baseball (MLB) :

  • In professional baseball history, the most home runs in a single game by one player is 8 , by Jay Clarke for Corsicana of the Texas League on June 15, 1902 (a minor league game, and the total is still somewhat disputed in historical reports).
  • In Major League Baseball, the record is 4 home runs in one game by a single player , and more than 20 players have accomplished this, from Bobby Lowe in 1894 onward.

So:

  • Overall pro ball record: 8 HR in one game (Jay Clarke, 1902 Texas League).
  • MLB record: 4 HR in one game (multiple players share it).

Quick Scoop: Key Facts

  • Most HR by one player in a professional game: 8 (Jay Clarke, Corsicana, 1902, Texas League).
  • Most HR by one player in an MLB game: 4 (record shared by many players, starting with Bobby Lowe in 1894).
  • No MLB player has ever hit 5 in a single official game.

MLB Four-Homer Games (Mini Overview)

A number of stars (and a few unlikely names) share the four-homer-game record. Examples include:

  • Bobby Lowe (Boston Beaneaters, 1894 – first to do it).
  • Lou Gehrig, Chuck Klein, Willie Mays, Mike Schmidt.
  • More recent names like Carlos Delgado, Josh Hamilton, and Scooter Gennett.

Each of these players had a night where almost every swing changed the scoreboard, often pairing the homers with huge RBI totals and memorable storylines.

Minor League Outlier: Jay Clarke’s 8

Jay Clarke’s reported 8-homer game for Corsicana stands out as a kind of baseball legend.

  • It happened in a high-scoring, early‑1900s Texas League game.
  • Some contemporary newspaper accounts only credited him with 3 homers, and no full box score survives, which is why historians still debate it.

Even with the dispute, it’s widely cited as the official single-game record for any professional league.

MLB vs. “All of Baseball”

If you’re talking records in a typical MLB context (what most fans mean), the safe answer is:

The record for most home runs in a game by one MLB player is four , shared by multiple players.

If you’re talking all levels of pro baseball , you can add:

The all-levels professional record is generally credited as eight , by Jay Clarke in a 1902 Texas League game.

TL;DR:

  • MLB record: 4 HR in one game (many players tied).
  • Pro ball record (minor leagues included): 8 HR in one game (Jay Clarke, 1902), though historical details are fuzzy.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.