🔗 Share this article

The competition for the prestigious Golden Shoe is reaching a fever pitch as the 2025-26 season approaches its mid-season juncture.

With a different winner in every one of the past three campaigns, the award remains up for grabs. Premier League star Erling Haaland was the most recent Premier League-based striker to win the trophy back in 2022-23.

The prodigious Norwegian striker is once again in the running this campaign, but encounters tough competition from Bayern Munich marksman Harry Kane and Spanish La Liga phenomenon Kylian Mbappe. With plenty of fixtures left to play, other players still have time to throw their hat into the contest.

What is the European Golden Shoe Award?

The Golden Boot award was introduced in the 1967-68 by the France-based publication L'Equipe to honor the top scorer in domestic league matches from a European top division league.

Since the 1997-98 season, the prize has been administered by European Sports Media, which introduced a weighted points system. Under this format, a player's tallies are weighted with a designated multiplier based on the UEFA coefficient of their domestic competition.

Goals scored in Europe's top five leagues—the English Premier League, Spanish La Liga, Bundesliga, Italian Serie A, and Ligue 1—are valued at two points each.

For competitions ranked sixth to 22nd in UEFA rankings, such as the Portuguese league, goals are worth 1.5 points. Goals in lower-ranked European leagues carry one point.

While the award has been jointly won on multiple occasions in the past, a regulation update from the 2019-20 dictates that in the case of a tie, the trophy goes to the player with the least minutes played.

If the tie remains, the next tiebreaker is the number of assists, followed by the fewest goals from the penalty spot. Only if these criteria are used would the award be split.

Who are the Main Contenders?

Currently, a three-horse tussle exists for the current season's Golden Shoe, with the three most recent winners split by just a single goal.

• Harry Kane (England captain) leads with 19 goals (38 points) from 15 Bundesliga games.
• Erling Haaland also has 19 goals (38 points) from 17 Premier League appearances.
• Kylian Mbappe sits just behind on 18 goals (36 points) in 18 La Liga matches.

In fourth is Darko Lemajic of Latvian side RFS, who has netted 28 goals (28 points) across their 36 league games in 2025.

Dutch side Feyenoord forward Ayase Ueda is joint-fifth with 18 goals (27 points) from 17 Eredivisie matches this term.

The remainder of the current top ten is comprised of players from leagues that function on a calendar year schedule.

Reviewing Past Winners

Throughout its nearly six-decade history, the Golden Shoe has been won by some of football's most iconic stars.

Portuguese legend Eusébio claimed the first-ever trophy in 1968, scoring forty-two goals for SL Benfica. He later secured the award for a second time in the 1972-73 season.

Argentine legend Lionel Messi has won the most Golden Shoes, collecting the honor on six separate times during his 17-year tenure at Barcelona.

Messi established the record for most goals in a campaign with 50 in 2011-12 (100 points). He also became the first and only player to ever to win it in three successive seasons from 2016 to 2019.

Portuguese superstar Cristiano Ronaldo claimed his first award in the 2007-08 season with Man Utd before proceeding to win it three more times with Real Madrid.

The first player to win the award while at an club in England was Ian Rush in 1983-84, when he scored thirty-two goals for Liverpool FC.

The prize has seen a new winner in every one of the past three seasons.

Erling Haaland won the prize for the first time in 2022-23, scoring a Premier League record-equaling 36 goals (72 points). Harry Kane earned his maiden Golden Shoe with the identical total for Bayern Munich the following year.

Kylian Mbappe is the reigning winner of the award after scoring 31 goals (62 points) for Real Madrid in 2024-25.

Now, the same trio are competing at the top of the standings once more this campaign, with Kane presently leading the pack.