Top 10 Best Soccer Players Of All Time

New soccer stars burst onto the scene all the time, but only a handful go on to shine for decades and win a permanent place in our hearts. These wizards of the ball stand out dramatically from everyone else on the pitch. Along with raw skill, they carry a kind of soccer charisma that helps them not just win matches, but embody everything people love about the “king of sports.”

Modern soccer history spans roughly 150 years, dating back to the first official international match, played between England and Scotland. The world was never quite the same after that. Millions of boys in every corner of the globe started kicking leather balls around their neighborhoods, dreaming of becoming the best of the best and playing in front of a roaring crowd. AdmiGram.com pays tribute to the sport with its own ranking of the most outstanding soccer players of all time.

Top 10 Best Soccer Players of All Time

How We Selected the Best Soccer Players

To objectively rank the best soccer players, we scored each one on five factors, using a 10-point scale for each:

Individual skill — what stands out on the field: the trait that lets a player single-handedly change the outcome of a match.
Success and trophies — individual awards alongside team trophies, cups, and medals won in international competitions.
Longevity — not every talented player manages to stay dominant across an entire career, let alone finish it at an elite level.
Team play — what separates good soccer from truly great soccer. Putting the team first is one of the most important traits a real soccer star can have.
Competitive spirit — the ability to dominate on the field and unsettle opponents. Not everyone can fight until the final whistle and simply overpower the other side.

Combining these five factors, we built our list of the ten greatest players of all time.

10. Xavi Hernandez

Born: January 25, 1980, Terrassa, Spain
Points: 36

Xavi joined Barcelona’s youth ranks and made his first-team debut at 18. At the time, the club couldn’t easily buy new talent, so its coaches kept a close eye on the academy instead. Xavi started out as a defender before being pushed forward into midfield, where his vision and ball control soon won him a permanent spot in the first team. Alongside Andrés Iniesta and Lionel Messi, he formed Barcelona’s famous “golden trio.”

9. Michel Platini

Born: June 21, 1955, Joeuf, France
Points: 38

One of the greatest French players ever, Michel Platini spent most of his 15-year career as an attacking midfielder for Nancy, Saint-Étienne, and Juventus, scoring well over 200 goals across his club career. He won the European Cup with Juventus in 1985, where he was a driving force, and remains the only player to win three consecutive Ballon d’Or awards — in 1983, 1984, and 1985. As captain of the French national team, he led Les Bleus to victory at Euro 1984, France’s first major international trophy.

8. Johan Cruyff

Born: April 25, 1947, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Points: 39

Nicknamed the “Flying Dutchman,” Johan Cruyff was one of the most gifted attacking players of his generation. Raised in Ajax’s academy, he helped redefine how the game was played. With Ajax, he won seven Dutch league titles and three European Cups, scoring 190 goals in 240 matches. Cruyff could operate in almost any position on the field and still dominate. For the Netherlands, he scored 33 goals in 48 international appearances.

7. Alfredo Di Stefano

Born: July 4, 1926, Barracas, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Points: 42

Di Stéfano is widely regarded as one of the greatest players in the sport’s history. With Real Madrid in the 1950s, he won the Spanish league title eight times, the European Cup five times, and the Spanish Cup twice, and many consider him the greatest player in the history of Spanish soccer. Over the course of his career, he claimed 27 trophies in total.

6. Franz Beckenbauer

Born: September 11, 1945, Munich, Germany
Points: 43

Franz Beckenbauer changed the way defenders were used in soccer, inventing the sweeper — or libero — role and turning it into an attacking weapon. Playing for Bayern Munich through the 1970s, he helped the club win four Bundesliga titles, four German Cups, and three consecutive European Cups (1974–76). Over his career, Beckenbauer made 747 appearances and scored 97 goals.

5. Zinedine Zidane

Born: June 23, 1972, Marseille, France
Points: 44

Zinédine Zidane sparked a golden era for French soccer, and his impact on the sport — and on France in particular — was enormous in the early 2000s. Fans and experts alike recognized his talent: Zidane was named the world’s best player three times, and UEFA later named him the best European player of the period 1950–2000. With the French national team, he helped win both the European Championship and the World Cup. Across his career, Zidane scored 128 goals in 681 matches.

4. Cristiano Ronaldo

Born: February 5, 1985, Funchal, Portugal
Points: 45

Cristiano Ronaldo belongs at the very top of world soccer. He’s widely considered the most complete and versatile player of his era, with dribbling skills that let him glide past several opponents at once and a free-kick strike that’s nearly impossible for goalkeepers to read. Across his career, he has won 34 trophies and scored well over 970 goals in more than 1,300 games — numbers no other player in the modern game has come close to matching.

3. Diego Maradona

Born: October 30, 1960, Lanus, Argentina
Points: 46

Diego Maradona produced some of the most breathtaking dribbling the sport has ever seen — on the ball, he was a whirlwind that defenders simply couldn’t contain. He amassed close to a hundred trophies and individual honors over his career. With the Argentine national team, he won the 1986 World Cup and was a runner-up in 1990. In total, Maradona scored 345 goals in his career, including 34 for the national team.

2. Lionel Messi

Born: June 24, 1987, Rosario, Argentina
Points: 47

Lionel Messi is widely regarded as one of the greatest soccer players in history, with a list of records too long to cover in full here. Among the highlights: 49 trophies, 57 hat tricks, and more than 1,200 matches played, with 933 goals to his name. For well over a decade, Messi has embodied the kind of explosive, instinctive soccer that fans dream of watching — and his style has done as much as anyone’s to grow the sport’s popularity worldwide.

1. Edson Arantes do Nascimento (Pele)

Born: October 23, 1940, Tres Coracoes, Minas Gerais, Brazil
Points: 49

Pelé isn’t just the most famous soccer player in the world — he played the game ahead of his time. He remains the only player to win three World Cups (1958, 1962, and 1970), and he won virtually everything there was to win with his club, Santos, and with Brazil. In the biggest moments, he had a knack for taking the game onto his own shoulders and turning a match around. In 2000, FIFA named Pelé joint Player of the Century alongside Diego Maradona. Over his career, this legendary athlete played 1,120 matches and scored 1,087 goals — a mark that remains out of reach even for today’s players.

image on top: Liam McKay / Unsplash