Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi headline the Top 10 greatest goal machines of all time

In football history, many players have excelled in the art of scoring goals, sealing their names amongst the best of the best in the sport.

Football is unarguably the most popular sport in the world today.

 The basic goal of the sport is to score goals and win games and usually, the players responsible for the goals are one of the most prominent in the sport.

Throughout history, there have been some special players who have been deemed prolific in front of goal in times past.

Some of these players have since made their mark in history with the likes of first-generation Brazilian legends Pele and Romario boasting a staggering amount of career goals.

However, the new generation in football have also followed suit producing some of the best of the best in terms of scoring goals and breaking goal-scoring records, with the iconic duo of Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi leading the 21st century class of goal machines.

Ronaldo and Messi are among the very best to have ever played the beautiful  game and the endless debate over which superstar is superior still continues even after over a decade.

Both of the legendary stars have helped reshape football into what it is today, sealing their legacy as one of the greatest goal scorers in football history but who else joins them on this incredible list of net busters.

In this article, we will review the Top 10 highest goal scorers in football history.

Who is the highest goal scorer in football history?  

As of April 2023, Cristiano Ronaldo is the highest goal scorer in football history.

The 38-year-old Portuguese who currently plays for the Saudi league Al Hilal has netted 834 times in 1,159 appearances for club and country.

The five-time Ballon d’Or winner is the all-time leading scorer in men’s international football and is widely regarded as the most prolific striker of his generation.

But who else joins him on the list. 

Let’s take a quick look at the Top 10 highest goal scorers in football history with only one Argentine and one Portuguese making the list.

Top 10 highest-goal scorers in football history

Uwe Seeler - 530+ goals (654 matches from 1953-1978)

Uwe Seeler was a German footballer and football official, who is widely regarded as one of the most prolific German players of all time.

 As a striker, Seelar was a lethal scorer for Hamburger SV and also made 72 appearances for the West Germany national team. 

Seeler was a gifted, powerful, and prolific striker who, among other things, was most of all renowned for his leadership, consistency, overhead kicks, and aerial ability.

He was captain of both his club team and the national team for many years.

He was top scorer of the first Bundesliga season in 1963–64 and German Footballer of the Year in 1960, 1964, and 1970.

Seeler ended his active playing career in 1972.

Widely regarded as one of the greatest players in German football history, Seeler was named one of FIFA's 100 greatest living players by Pelé in 2004.

 He was also the first football player to be awarded the Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.

As of today, his 406 goals in league games overall makes him the second-best German goalscorer behind Gerd Müller.

Seeler participated in four FIFA World Cups: 1958, 1962, 1966, and 1970. 

Although Seeler never won a World Cup, he had a prolific career in the tournament.

He was the first player ever to appear in 20 World Cup matches (retired with 21 matches played, tied for third all-time), the first ever to score in four World Cups (beating Pelé by only a few minutes), and the first player to score at least two goals in each of four World Cups (matched in 2014 by his compatriot Miroslav Klose). 

He also ranks third in all-time minutes played in World Cups, with 1,980, behind Paolo Maldini and Lothar Matthäus.

After retiring from active football, Seelar had a two-and-a-half-year tenure as president of Hamburger SV, which began in 1995, and ended with his resignation in 1998 due to a financial scandal, for which he took responsibility.

However, he was not himself implicated in the irregularities.

Seeler died on 21 July 2022, aged 85, in his home in Norderstedt.

 He was honoured later in the day with a moment of silence before the UEFA Women's Euro 2022 quarter-final between Germany and Austria.

He was also given a tribute at the following second matchday of the 2. Bundesliga, where Hamburg played a home match against Hansa Rostock, as well as the first round of the DFB-Pokal this season.

Throughout his career, Seeler scored over 530 goals for club and country making him one of the highest goal scorers in football history.

Tulio Maravilha - 575 goals (Total matches unknown from 1988-2019)

Túlio Humberto Pereira Costa, sometimes simply referred as Túlio or Túlio Maravilha ("Wonder Túlio"), is a 53-year-old former Brazilian international footballer who played as a forward.

During his career, Tulio featured for many Brazilian club teams, such as Goiás, Botafogo, Corinthians, Vitória, Fluminense, Cruzeiro and Vila Nova and several lower-division teams in Brazil. 

However he had a brief career in Europe, having played for Switzerland club Sion and Hungarian side Újpest.

His best years were while he was at Botafogo, where he was three times the Brazilian top scorer (1989, 1994 and 1995) and won the 1995 Campeonato Brasileiro.

Tulio is one of the highest goal scorers in football history and has also claimed he reached the mark of 1000 goals in 2014, at 44 years old. 

This number was only reached, however, by counting goals in friendlies, commemorative games and amateur football.

Tulio played 15 games with the Brazil national team and scoring 13 goals in his career.

 The team never lost a match when Tulio played.

With Brazil, Túlio was famous for scoring a controversial equalizer against Argentina in the quarter-finals of the 1995 Copa América in Uruguay in which he committed a deliberate handball.

Since then, he never played again for the Brazil national team, but is one of the most prolific Brazilian footballers of all time.

Gerd Müller - 734 goals (793 matches from 1962-1981)

Gerhard "Gerd" Müller was a German professional footballer widely regarded as one of the best players in football history.

 Muller was a striker renowned for his clinical finishing, especially in and around the six-yard box, and is widely regarded as one of the greatest goalscorers in the history of the sport.

With success at club and international level, he is one of nine players to have won the FIFA World Cup, the UEFA Champions League and the Ballon d'Or.

At international level with West Germany, he scored 68 goals in 62 appearances, and at club level, in 15 years with Bayern Munich in which he scored 365 goals in 427 Bundesliga matches.

Muller remains the record goalscorer in the Bundesliga.

 In 74 European club games he scored 65 goals.

Nicknamed "Bomber der Nation" ("the nation's Bomber") or simply "Der Bomber", Müller was named European Footballer of the Year in 1970. 

After a successful season at Bayern Munich, he scored 10 goals at the 1970 FIFA World Cup for West Germany where he received the Golden Boot as top goalscorer, before winning the 1970 Ballon d'Or. 

In 1972, he won the UEFA European Championship and was the top goalscorer, scoring two goals in the final. 

Two years later, he scored four goals in the 1974 World Cup, including the winning goal in the final.

Müller held the all-time goal-scoring record in the World Cup with 14 goals for 32 years.

 In 1999, Müller was ranked ninth in the European player of the Century election held by the International Federation of Football History & Statistics (IFFHS), and he was voted 13th in the IFFHS' World Player of the Century election.

 In 2004, he was named by the great Pelé in the FIFA 100 list of the world's greatest living players.

After Müller ended his active football career in 1982, he fell into a slump and became an alcoholic.

However, his former companions at Bayern Munich convinced him to go through alcohol rehabilitation. 

When he emerged, he was given a job as a coach at Bayern Munich II. 

He held the position from 1992 until he retired in 2014 due to health problems. 

German sportswear brand Adidas also released a colection under the Gerd Müller name, as part of the Adidas originals series.

 In July 2008, the Rieser Sportpark, in Nördlingen, where Müller had begun his career, was renamed the Gerd-Müller-Stadion in his honour.

On 6 October 2015, it was announced that Müller was suffering from Alzheimer's disease.

He passed away on 15 August 2021 in a nursing home in Wolfratshausen, aged 75.

Gerd Muller scored over 730 goals in his career, making him one of the highest goal scorers in football history.

Ferenc Deak - 790+ goals (Total matches unknown from 1940-1957)

Ferenc Deák was a Hungarian footballer who played as a striker for clubs such as Szentlőrinci AC, Ferencváros and Budapesti Dózsa, and who played internationally for Hungary, scoring 29 goals in just 20 caps.

 His nickname was ‘Bamba’, which he got from the fans.

With over 795 goals in official matches scored during his career, most of which came during WWII, Hungarian football legend Deak is one of the most prolific finishers of his generation.

Incredibly, Deak averaged over three goals per game during his career at Szentlorinci AC.

Ferenc Deák is remembered for the goblet, which is handed over to the top scorer of the top championship every year, and a wandering cup has also been named after him. 

His legacy has been preserved by the Puskás Academy since 2015. 

Deak topped the European top-scoring list three times, in the 1945-46(66), 1946-47(48) and 1948-49(59) seasons.

 His best season was the 1945/46 league season, when he scored 66 goals in 34 matches, and because of it, he was voted the Hungarian Player of the Year. 

Deak still holds the record for the most goals scored in a single European league season with 66 (endorsed by the IFFHS) - only American Archibald Stark did better with 67 goals in the 1924/25 season, but he needed 44 matches to reach that figure.

Due to his impressive numbers, he was eventually signed by Ferencváros in 1947, and he played for them as a centre-forward for three years, from 1947 to 1950, winning the Hungarian championship at the end of the 1948/49 season. 

In this league season, the attackers of the team celebrated the half-century anniversary of the club's formation (Ferencváros was founded in 1899) with 140 goals in just 30 matches, of which Deák himself contributed with 59 hits.

He scored 155 goals in 111 matches (121 in 83 matches in the league only) over three years in green and white.

His life novel was published in 1992 as The Bamba, with the subtitle The Greatest Goal King of All Time.

Ferenc Deak’s incredible prolificacy makes him one of the highest goal scorers in football history.

Ferenc Puskas - 746+ goals (754+ matches from 1943-1966) 

Ferenc Puskás born ‘Ferenc Purczeld’ was a Hungarian football player and manager, widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time and the sport's first international superstar.

As a forward, Puskas was exceptionally prolific scoring 84 goals in 85 international matches for Hungary and played four international matches for Spain.

 He became an Olympic champion in 1952 and led his nation to the final of the 1954 World Cup. 

He won three European Cups (1959, 1960, 1966), ten national championships (five Hungarian and five Spanish Primera División) and eight top-individual scoring honors. 

Known as the "Galloping Major", in 1995, Puskas was recognized as the greatest top-division scorer of the 20th century by the IFFHS.

 He was the top scorer in the Hungarian League on four occasions and in 1948 he was the top goal scorer in Europe.

In 1958, two years after the Hungarian Revolution, he emigrated to Spain where he played for LaLiga giants Real Madrid. 

While playing with Real Madrid, Puskás won four Pichichis and scored seven goals in two European Champions Cup finals. 

He scored 619 goals in 618 matches in the Hungarian and Spanish leagues and National Cups.

After retiring as a player, he became a coach. 

The highlight of his coaching career came in 1971 when he guided Greek side Panathinaikos to the European Cup final, where they lost 2–0 to Eredivisie giants AFC Ajax.

 In 1993, he returned to Hungary and took temporary charge of the Hungarian national team.

In 1998, he became one of the first-ever FIFA/SOS Charity ambassadors.

 In 2002, the Népstadion in Budapest renamed the Puskás Ferenc Stadion in his honour.

Puskas was also declared the best Hungarian player of the last 50 years by the Hungarian Football Federation in the UEFA Jubilee Awards in November 2003.

In October 2009, FIFA announced the introduction of the FIFA Puskás Award, awarded to the player who has scored the "most beautiful goal" over the past year. 

He was also listed in Pelé's FIFA 100.

Ferenc Puskas had excellent ball control, mostly with his left foot, and had a great first touch of the ball giving very quick and precise passing and crossing.

 He also was able to maneuver and change positions quickly on the pitch by moving from inside left to centre forward. 

Puskas was also excellent at the set pieces, often scoring powerful direct free-kicks. 

He also scored directly from a corner kick. Puskas had one of the most powerful left shots in history and often scored from 30 to 35 metres from goal.

Puskas is one of the highest goal scorers in football history.

Pelé - 757 goals (831 matches from 1957-1977)

Edson Arantes do Nascimento better known by his nickname Pelé , was a Brazilian professional footballer who played as a forward. 

Widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, he was among the most successful and popular sports figures of the 20th century.

 In 1999, he was named Athlete of the Century by the International Olympic Committee and was included in the Time list of the 100 most important people of the 20th century.

 In 2000, Pelé was voted World Player of the Century by the International Federation of Football History & Statistics (IFFHS) and was one of the two joint winners of the FIFA Player of the Century.

 His 1,279 goals in 1,363 games, which includes friendlies, is recognised as a Guinness World Record.

During his international career, he won three FIFA World Cups: 1958, 1962 and 1970, the only player to do so and the youngest player to win a World Cup (17). 

He was nicknamed O Rei (The King) following the 1958 tournament. Pelé is the joint-top goalscorer for Brazil with 77 goals in 92 games. 

At the club level, he was Santos's all-time top goalscorer with 643 goals in 659 games

Pele is credited with connecting the phrase "The Beautiful Game" with football, and his "electrifying play and penchant for spectacular goals" made him a star around the world, and his teams toured internationally to take full advantage of his popularity.

 Throughout his career and in his retirement, Pelé received numerous individual and team awards for his performance on the field, his record-breaking achievements, and his legacy in the sport.

Pelé died on 29 December 2022, at 3:27 pm, at the age of 82, due to multiple organ failure, a complication of colon cancer and is widely regarded as the greatest goal scorer in the history of football.

 Romario - 772 goals (994 matches from 1985-2007) 

Romário de Souza Faria known simply as Romári is a 57-year-old Brazilian politician and a former professional footballer. 

A prolific striker renowned for his clinical finishing, he scored over 700 goals and is one of the few players to score at least 100 goals for three different clubs, making him one of the highest goal scorers in football history.

He is also considered one of the greatest players of all time.

Romário starred for Brazil in their 1994 FIFA World Cup triumph, receiving the Golden Ball as player of the tournament. 

He was named FIFA World Player of the Year the same year.

 He came fifth in the FIFA Player of the Century internet poll in 1999, was elected to the FIFA World Cup Dream Team in 2002, and was named in the FIFA 100 list of the world's greatest living players in 2004.

During his five seasons at PSV, he won the Eredivisie title three times, scoring a total of 165 goals in 167 games.

 In 1993, he moved to FC Barcelona and became part of Johan Cruyff's "Dream Team", forming an exceptional strike partnership with Hristo Stoichkov.

 He won La Liga in his first season and finished as the top goalscorer with 30 goals in 33 matches. 

During the second half of his career Romário played for clubs within the city of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil.

 He won the Brazilian league title with Vasco da Gama in 2000 and was top scorer three times in the league. 

At the end of his career, he also played briefly in Qatar, the United States and Australia.

Romario was considered a master of the confined space of the penalty area, his rapid speed over short distances (aided by his low centre of gravity) took him away from defenders, and he was renowned for his trademark toe poke finish.

With 55 goals in 70 appearances, Romário is the fourth-highest goalscorer for the Brazil national team, behind Pelé, Neymar and Ronaldo.

 He is third on the all-time list of Brazilian league's top scorers with 155 goals.

As of April 2023, Romario is currently a senator in Rio de Janeiro.

 Lionel Messi  - 804 goals (1020 matches from 2003-present)

Lionel Messi is undoubtedly one of the greatest footballers in the history of mankind, perhaps the best footballer to ever step foot on the soccer field. 

The Paris Saint Germain forward holds a number of incredible individual records courtesy of his extraordinary brilliance on the pitch.

Messi has been often described as the ‘ultimate playmaker of the 21st century’, and one of the most prolific Argentine footballers of all time.

Messi, who is one of the richest footballers in the world is a record 7-time Ballon d’Or winner and a 6-time European Golden Shoe winner. 

 A prolific goalscorer and creative playmaker, Messi holds the records for most goals in La Liga (474), most hat-tricks in La Liga (36) and the UEFA Champions League (eight), and most assists in La Liga (192) and the Copa América (17). He also has the most international goals by a South American male (102). Messi has scored over 800 senior career goals for club and country, and has the most goals by a player for a single club (672).

He has scored over 800 goals for club and country and also holds the record for most goals scored for a single club by an individual. 

The 35-year-old diminutive maestro won his first Ballon d’Or at the age of 22, and has gone ahead to win six more of those afterwards.

Messi has won every single trophy at club level and every major trophy and international level with Argentina including the Copa America and the World Cup.

The Albiceleste captain has scored over 800 career goals, making him one of the highest goal scorers in football history.

Josef Bican - 805+ goals (530+ matches from 1931-1956)

Josef "Pepi" Bican was an Austrian-Czech professional footballer who played as a striker and is widely regarded as one of the highest goal scorers in football history.

Bican's exact tally is questionable, given that his most prolific spell came during the Second World War, but there is no doubting his fantastic ability to find the back of the net.

Bican scored a total of 1137 unofficial goals in more than 514 games for Slavia Praha, with a ratio of 2.21 goals per game across his almost 15-year career at the club in total.

Bican began his professional career at Rapid Vienna in 1931.

 After four years at Rapid, he moved to local rivals Admira Vienna. 

Bican won four league titles during his time in Austria, moved to Slavia Praha in 1937, where he stayed until 1948, and became the club's all-time top goalscorer.

He later played for FC Vitkovice, FC Hradec Králové, and Dynamo Praha, retiring in 1955 as the all-time top goalscorer in the Czechoslovak First League with 447 goals.

According to UEFA, the governing body for European football, he is the leading all-time goalscorer in European top-flight leagues with 518 goals (447 in Czechoslovakia and 71 in Austria), narrowly ahead of Hungarian Ferenc Puskás.

Cristiano Ronaldo - 834 goals (1159 matches from 2001-present)

Cristiano Ronaldo dos Santos Aveiro is a 38-year-old  Portuguese professional footballer who plays as a forward for and captains both Saudi Professional League club Al Nassr and the Portugal national team. 

Widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, Ronaldo has won five Ballon d'Or awards and four European Golden Shoes, the most by a European player. 

He has won 32 trophies in his career, including seven league titles, five UEFA Champions Leagues, the UEFA European Championship and the UEFA Nations League. 

Ronaldo holds the records for most appearances (183), goals (140), and assists (42) in the Champions League, goals in the European Championship (14), men's international goals (122), and men's international appearances (198).

 He is one of the few players to have made over 1,100 professional career appearances, and has scored over 800 official senior career goals for club and country.

 In 2015, Ronaldo was named the best Portuguese player of all time by the Portuguese Football Federation. 

The following year, he led Portugal to their first major tournament title at Euro 2016, and received the Silver Boot as the second-highest goalscorer of the tournament. This achievement would see him receive his fourth Ballon d'Or. 

Ronaldo is widely regarded as one of the two best players of his generation, alongside Lionel Messi.

Winning his first Ballon d'Or in 2008 by a record-high vote count at age 23, over the next decade Ronaldo has often featured in debates concerning who is the greatest player in history.

Acclaimed for his prolific and consistent goal-scoring, he is considered a decisive player who is also a game changer, especially in important and high-pressured situations.

For this man, calling him prolific might even be an understatement.

As of April 2023, Cristiano Ronaldo is the highest goal scorer in the history of football.

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