For a brief moment this summer, Cristiano Ronaldo seemed to be on the verge of ending his illustrious soccer career. The 40-year-old superstar forward’s contract was expiring at Al Nassr, the Saudi Pro League club he had joined in 2023, and he had just led Portugal to victory in the UEFA Nations League tournament, offering him an opportunity to hang up his boots on a high note. But Ronaldo quickly dispelled the retirement speculation and re-upped with Al Nassr on a two-year deal.

“I think I’m still producing good things; I’m helping my club and the national team,” he told Portuguese television network Canal 11 in October. “Why not keep going?”

The money doesn’t hurt, either. Forbes estimates Ronaldo will earn $230 million from Al Nassr during the 2025-26 season, a sum that is believed to incorporate financial incentives from commercial agreements facilitated by his club, in addition to his playing wages. Factor in the $50 million he will collect off the field from partners including Nike, Binance and Herbalife, and Portugal’s favorite son is slated to pull in $280 million in total earnings over the coming year before taxes and agents’ fees.

That astonishing figure, which is roughly in line with Forbes’ projection for Ronaldo for the 2024-25 season, gives him the top spot among the world’s highest-paid soccer players for the sixth time in the last decade. In fact, among all the athletes Forbes has tracked since 1990, only one has surpassed that number in a single year while active in his sport: boxer Floyd Mayweather, who hauled in an estimated $300 million over the 12 months ending in June 2015 and $285 million three years later.

Ronaldo’s sky-high total also puts a fair amount of distance between him and his longtime rival Lionel Messi of Inter Miami, who ranks No. 2 among the sport’s top earners at $130 million in projected total income.

Combined, the world’s ten highest-paid soccer players are set to earn an estimated $945 million during the 2025-26 campaign, with the cutoff for inclusion on the list rising to the $43 million total of Barcelona’s teenage sensation Lamine Yamal, up from Kevin De Bruyne’s $39 million at Manchester City last season.

However, the top ten is collectively down nearly 4% from 2024-25—in large part because Neymar, No. 3 on last year’s list and one of soccer’s best-paid players ever, has fallen out of the ranking entirely.

Last season, the Brazilian star was in line to collect $110 million, including $80 million from his contract with Saudi Pro League club Al Hilal. However, Neymar and the team agreed to terminate his deal in January, and he returned to Santos, his boyhood club in Brazil, in a move that required him to take a significant pay cut. Even after he signed a new contract in June that reportedly gives him the option to stay put through the 2026 World Cup, Forbes estimates Neymar will collect only $38 million in total earnings this season—the majority coming off the field.

Despite the top-ten slots opened up by the absence of Neymar and De Bruyne, who also dropped off the ranking after his move to Napoli, and despite a hot transfer market this summer that featured

© Forbes