While the Brazilian football god Pele holds the Guinness World Record for most goals scored in his career, many of his goals came in friendlies that do not count in official rankings.
Below, FootballTransfers goes through the most prolific goalscorers of all time.
The 10 best goal scorers of all time!
Cristiano Ronaldo is the all-time record goalscorer in football history with 916 goals for club and country (excluding friendlies).
The Portugal legend has won five Ballon d’Ors during his illustrious career, while no player in history has scored more goals for Real Madrid (450). In addition, he scored five times for Sporting CP, 145 times for Manchester United and 101 times for Juventus.
Furthermore, Ronaldo currently has 80 Al-Nassr goals (which really shouldn’t count as the league is at a very low level) and 135 goals for the nation of Portugal.
In second place is Lionel Messi. He has scored 850 goals for club and country, and the vast majority of his goals have come for Barcelona.
The Argentina icon netted 672 times during his time at Camp Nou, while finding the back of the net on 32 occasions over a two-year spell with Paris Saint-Germain. He currently has 34 goals for Inter Miami and 112 goals for Argentina.
The third best goalscorer in football history is Brazilian legend Pele. The iconic player scored 762 official goals during his career, and most of them came for Santos.
Romario is in fourth place with a total of 756 career goals. He played for 10 different clubs during his career, including PSV Eindhoven and Barcelona, while netting 55 times in just 70 caps for Brazil.
Real Madrid and Hungary icon Ferenc Puskas has scored the fifth-highest number of goals in football history, scoring 725 times throughout a 23-year professional career.
Current Barcelona striker Robert Lewandowski is in seventh place, with 692 goals to date, while Jimmy Jones is seventh with 639 goals in his career.
Gerd Muller (634 goals) and Joe Bambrick (626) round out the top 10, according to the IFFHS (International Federation of Football History & Statistics).
| Player | Nationality | Target |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Cristiano Ronaldo | Portugal | 916 |
| 2. Lionel Messi | Argentina | 850 |
| 3. Pele | Brasil | 762 |
| 4. Romario | Brasil | 756 |
| 5. Ferenc Puskas | Hungary | 725 |
| 6. Josef Bican | Austria/Czechoslovakia | 722 |
| 7. Robert Lewandowski | Poland | 692 |
| 8. Jimmy Jones | Northern Ireland | 639 |
| 9. Gerd Müller | Germany | 634 |
| 10. Joe Bambrick | Northern Ireland | 626 |
