Europe’s elite raises record
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FC Bayern has moved into the top three clubs in the world with the highest turnover. In 2024/25, the German record champions increased their revenue from just under 765 million in the previous season to 860.6 million euros. This was the result of the 29th edition of the “Football Money League” report, which the auditing and consulting company Deloitte in London publishes annually. Transfer income is not taken into account in the surveys. Only Real Madrid and Spanish champions FC Barcelona earned more money than Bayern.
Real broke the billion mark for the second time in a row and improved to 1.161 billion euros. The Catalans under coach Hansi Flick increased by 27 percent to 974.8 million euros and are among the three clubs with the highest turnover for the first time since 2019/20.
VfB Stuttgart is back in the illustrious sales circle after 15 years
Borussia Dortmund and VfB Stuttgart also appear in the top 20 of the ranking. BVB slipped from eleventh to twelfth place with revenue of 531.3 million euros (plus three percent). Although the Westphalians were able to generate ten percent more media revenue, they had to accept a three percent decline in commercial revenue (including merchandising).
The German Cup winner from Stuttgart is in 18th place and is back in the top 20 for the first time in 15 years with a turnover of 296.3 million euros. The increase was 130.8 million euros, which corresponds to 79 percent compared to the previous year. Eintracht Frankfurt narrowly missed out on the top 20 with 269.9 million euros (31st place). However, the ranking is dominated by the Premier League clubs, which occupy half of the top 30 places.
Another sales record in football
With a total of 12.4 billion euros, the 20 clubs exceeded the previous season’s sales mark by eleven percent. In addition to commercial revenue (5.3 billion euros), media revenue was the most lucrative source of income at around 4.7 billion euros. They rose by ten percent. The reasons for this were the expanded Club World Cup in the USA last summer and the expanded three European Cups. The fastest-growing revenue segment is match day revenue, with an increase of 16 percent to 2.4 billion euros.
Women’s football is also on a growth path and experienced another record year. The 15 clubs with the highest sales achieved a total of 158 million euros, 35 percent more than in the 2023/24 season. Here too, FC Bayern is the ninth best Bundesliga club. At 7.2 million euros, the Munich team doubled their sales compared to the previous season. Eintracht Frankfurt, however, took in 22 percent less and generated 4.7 million euros. The reason for this was the missed Champions League, which led to lower media and match day revenue. Nevertheless, the Frankfurt women remained eleventh on the list. The ranking is led by Arsenal FC (25.6 million euros), Chelsea FC (25.4 million euros) and FC Barcelona (22 million euros).
