Domestic players, meanwhile, will move to seven-month retainer contracts.
West Indies have been among the teams most affected by players choosing franchise cricket over central contracts.
"We appreciate the spirit of cooperation of the West Indies Players Association and the players who have demonstrated their total understanding of the circumstances we all face.
The board has also suspended this year's men's Super50 and women's T20 Blaze, citing the operational costs involved in staging domestic competitions.
The West Indies Championship, however, will continue in its 2025-26 format.
Cricket West Indies (CWI) has announced a series of sweeping measures aimed at addressing what it describes as a financial, developmental and competitive crisis, including a 25% cut in international players' retainer fees and the suspension of this year's men's Super50 and women's T20 Blaze tournaments.
International players will continue to be offered 12-month contracts, but their retainer fees will be reduced by a quarter. Domestic players, meanwhile, will move to seven-month retainer contracts. West Indies have been among the teams most affected by players choosing franchise cricket over central contracts. CWI's latest move could further encourage that shift.
"International retainer contracts will remain at 12 months but there will be a 25% reduction on the retainer fees," CWI chief executive Chris Dehring said in a statement addressing stakeholders. "We appreciate the spirit of cooperation of the West Indies Players Association and the players who have demonstrated their total understanding of the circumstances we all face. While not ideal, it is a necessary step towards financial stability."
The board has also suspended this year's men's Super50 and women's T20 Blaze, citing the operational costs involved in staging domestic competitions. The decision removes a key component of the pathway to the West Indies men's ODI side, particularly with the team required to play a World Cup qualifier in February-March 2027 after missing out on the 2023 ODI World Cup.
"Our domestic tournaments as structured historically, where Cricket West Indies bears the entire cost of every national team and tournament, whether it is age-group, development or senior for both men and women, including salaries, match fees, airfares, hotels and event staging costs, are simply unsustainable.
"The high cost of domestic travel and accommodation absorbs too much of our scarce resources every year instead of being deployed for the direct benefit of our cricket.
"Indeed, over eighty million US dollars has been spent by Cricket West Indies with domestic airlines over the past 15 years, without a reciprocating a dollar of sponsorship from those beneficiaries. We must also deal with the immediate cash crunch brought about by years of bearing this burden and the crippling financial losses that emanate as a result," said Dehring.
CWI says it will instead focus on preparing the men's ODI squad for the 2027 World Cup qualifier. A series of white-ball matches against a visiting England A side in November will be followed by an ODI team camp.
The restructuring also comes as the unique nature of West Indies cricket, comprising multiple independent nations competing as a single team at international level, faces a new challenge ahead of the 2027 Pan American Games in Lima and the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.
The top four finishers in the 2025-26 Super50 have already been designated as the qualifiers for the men's cricket event at the Pan American Games, which will be played in the T20 format. The top four finishers in the 2025-26 T20 Blaze will similarly take part in the women's event.
With the Super50 and T20 Blaze suspended, CWI has announced replacement qualification tournaments for the 2028 Olympics. The cost of staging and participating in these competitions will be borne by the individual cricket boards of the countries under the CWI umbrella.
"These replacement tournaments will be by invitation to the 10 countries under the aegis of Cricket West Indies that qualify for Olympic participation. We are excited by these new invitational tournaments, the dates for which are being finalized, as given the higher stakes and prestige, it's an opportunity for individual countries to galvanize national resources to chase Olympic glory, with the responsibility and cost of participation falling on their respective national cricket and Olympic associations, private sectors, governments and people, hopefully fulfilling a desire to make a meaningful contribution to their national team's hunt for Olympic glory," Dehring said.
"The winners of those tournaments will qualify for the ICC Olympic Qualifying tournaments for a spot in Los Angeles in 2028," he added.
The women's domestic structure will also undergo further changes. Next year's Women's Super50 will be replaced by a Best vs Best development tournament.
The West Indies Championship, however, will continue in its 2025-26 format. The four-day competition will retain its bilateral-series structure, with each team playing one three-match series against an opponent, for a total of 12 games. The top three sides on the composite table will then qualify for the playoffs.
"All our projects involve taking innovative daring decisions and calculated risks that must be mitigated as best as possible, but we have reached in West Indies cricket what we reference internally and inspirationally as our Carlos Brathwaite moment, where we have the opportunity to win but to do so takes courage and bold risk-taking strokes but with total confidence in our ability to execute," said Dehring, invoking a reference to Brathwaite's four successive sixes in the final over of the 2016 T20 World Cup final.
