Who is the best player in world football? It was a question that divided fans for the best part of two decades as Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo dominated the debate.
That’s not the case anymore as Messi and Ronaldo are playing out the twilight years of their careers away from the glare of the planet’s top leagues in the US and Saudi Arabia respectively. They will get one last dance on the global stage at this summer’s World Cup, however.
While Messi and Ronaldo will looking to sign off their international careers by bagging the biggest prize in the game, the tournament could see someone definitively lay claim to the title of the world’s best player. It’s a role that is yet to be unanimously filled, despite a number of rising stars and mega talents being in the conversation.
Erling Haaland and Kylian Mbappe were seen by many as the pretenders to the crown prior to the emergence of Jude Bellingham and ongoing growth of several established names. The 2026 World Cup might be the time for one of the game’s new greats to prove their worth as the successor to Messi and Ronaldo.
We’ve had a stab at ranking the best on the block and this list is based on more than just current form. We have taken into account domestic and international achievements as well as various stats and figures from this season and recent, prior campaigns to build a picture of the current best players in world football.
RadioTimes.com brings you our definitive list of the best football players in the world in 2026.
Check our more football features:
- Best players of all time
- Best players in the world 2026
- Best strikers in the world 2026
- Best wingers in the world 2026
- Best midfielders in the world 2026
- Best defenders in the world 2026
- Best goalkeepers in the world 2026
- Best young players in the world 2026
- Best teams in the world 2026
10. Lionel Messi (Inter Miami)
In line with other players sliding down the rankings due to the standard of their current league, Lionel Messi was under threat. However, he still makes our cut for the top 10. We can’t bring ourselves to ditching him in a World Cup year when he will inevitably run the show. Again.
There’s no denying Messi has evolved. He has lost some of his blistering pace, but his intelligence and manipulation of the football means his control over the result of games remains as strong as ever. He is not an all-action terrier, he won’t pitch in with the dirty work, but to count that against him is to miss the point entirely.
Messi continues to dominate games – both subtly and explicitly – for club and country. His performances directly inspired Argentina to Copa America and World Cup trophies in recent years, and he transformed rock-bottom MLS team, Inter Miami, into cup finalists in the space of a month.
Messi’s time at the top of our list is over due to the fact his presence in the growing, exuberant yet ultimately lower quality MLS will mask his decline. However, his displays for Argentina, against a high standard of opposition, remain top notch. Let’s face it: he would still play and succeed in any club team in world football in his current guise.
9. Jude Bellingham (Real Madrid)
Bellingham has already shown enough to convince the world of his obscene talent at Dortmund, Real Madrid and on the international stage.
His all-action, dynamic presence saw him transform from teenage wildcard to instant starter for England at the World Cup 2022 and he has never looked back. His displays for Dortmund put them firmly in title contention against the Bayern Munich juggernaut, spurned only by goal difference, before making the move to Real Madrid where he has added an abundance of goals to his arsenal.
He is the complete package in midfield already. Physically imposing, an immense ball carrier, with precision passing skills, Bellingham will continue to soar at his current trajectory, buoyed with enough confidence to claim Zinedine Zidane’s No.5 shirt at the Bernabeu. Bellingham is a generational talent and is arguably *the* player to watch over the next few years.
The Englishman’s rise up the rankings has stalled for the time being after a frustrating 2025/26 campaign for Real Madrid, but the 2026 World Cup might be his time to shine. Can he inspire the Three Lions to glory?
8. Rodri (Man City)
Rodri is the heartbeat of Manchester City, a crucial cog in a majestic machine. He is all things to all men, a maestro conducting the orchestra from midfield.
A tall, strong, physical presence, Rodri has all the muscle City require in a combative midfielder, combined with the grace, skill and drive of an attacking midfielder capable of drifting high up the pitch.
He boasts the knack of scoring critical goals in crucial moments – see the Champions League final – and in mid-January 2024, he struck a milestone of 50 games undefeated for City. It became a case of when Rodri plays, the Sky Blues don’t lose.
Rodri was the 2024 Ballon d’Or winner for his influence on club and country. A serious ACL injury robbed club and country of his talents for the majority of the 2024/25 campaign. He’s taken a while to get back to his best, but he remains the go-to guy for midfield protection.
Spain are looking to win the World Cup for the first time in 16 years. A fit-and-firing Rodri could be the key.
7. Vinicius Jr. (Real Madrid)
It’s an ominous sign for the rest of the football world that while Real Madrid has shed some of its ageing skin in recent transfer windows, an equally venomous threat has slithered into the open: Vinicius Jr.
The 25-year-old has already racked up more than 400 professional appearances since he debut for Flamengo in 2017, and he is one of the few contenders who could, without a hint of delusion, claim to be sitting top of this list in several years time. His near miss in the 2024 Ballon d’Or rankings will surely spur him on.
Vincius’s pace is scorching, with dynamite acceleration able to propel him from standing starts to beyond petrified defenders at will. Most impressively, he harnesses that speed with quickness of feet and ball control to match any player in the world.
And yet, for all his demonstrable talent, he is often overlooked in discussions of the greatest players in the world. He has drifted in and out of the teams at times, but remains a lethal threat whenever he is given a chance to prove it.
6. Ousmane Dembele
It feels like Dembele has taken the long way around to reach the pinnacle of his ability, but now that he is the main man at a club, for the first time in his career, he is shining.
Dembele struggled to emerge from the shadow of Lionel Messi at Barcelona and was reportedly subjected to more fines than any other player at the Nou Camp due to his training punctuality. He effectively replaced the departed Messi at PSG and again found himself veiled by Kylian Mbappe.
However, since Mbappe’s exit to Real Madrid, Dembele has shifted into a more central position and he’s thrived. PSG shed their megastars for lesser-known talents and they have become a real force through the change in culture. Dembele’s talent is finally being coaxed out of him on the biggest stages.
He netted 29 goals and recorded 12 assists in just 33 starts and 11 substitute appearances across Ligue 1 and the Champions League as PSG won Ligue 1 and the Champions League in 2025. He was in prolific mood once again in the most recent campaign, with 31 goal contributions in 40 appearance, as his team retained the two titles.
Want to see this content?
This page contains content provided by Google reCAPTCHA. We ask for your permission before anything is loaded, as Google reCAPTCHA may use cookies and other technologies. To view this content, choose ‘Accept and continue’ to allow Google reCAPTCHA and its required purposes.
5. Lamine Yamal
Who can argue against Lamine Yamal already being considered among the world’s elite? Let’s be clear, he was the best player at Euro 2024, denied winning Player of the Tournament essentially because he was a nice fit for the Young Player of the Tournament prize instead.
At the age of 18, Yamal has already racked up over 100 first-team appearances for Barcelona and more than 20 caps for Spain. Once again, he is 18. And he doesn’t turn 19 until the final week of the World Cup.
Yamal is a devastating right winger capable of cutting inside and driving at defenders with extreme speed. He has technique to match his rapid feet and loves to bend shots around defenders en route to goal, but his creative flair sets him apart. Yamal is tracking close to two goal contributions every three games and could sit top of this list by the end of the World Cup if he dazzles for Spain on the greatest stage of them all.
4. Erling Haaland (Man City)
Haaland has normalised the abnormal. He set the bar insurmountably high from the very start, yet has maintained a scoring ratio that has completely distorted what success looks like for a Premier League striker. With the domestic leagues effectively conquered, the Norwegian will be looking to dominate on the international stage at this summer’s World Cup.
The 25-year-old has continued to score approximately a goal per game in the best league in world football, and recently hoisted the Golden Boot for the third time in four seasons with City.
His physicality is unrivalled, his finishing ability – including improvised, instinctive finishing by any means necessary – is staggering and he boasts a turn of pace that few in the Premier League could match. The best bit? We’re mostly likely yet to see Haaland at his absolute peak. The next few years should continue to be explosive and, if he proves his consistency over several years, he will sit No.1 in this list without rival.
3. Declan Rice (Arsenal)
Part of the reason it is so difficult to judge the world’s best players is the diversity of positions and roles to compare. How is it even possible to compare a goalkeeper to a midfielder, or a defender to a striker?
We thought long and hard about this, but in terms of importance and impact to a team operating at the very highest level, Declan Rice simply has to be up there near the very, very top. He has taken his game to another level since joining Arsenal and will be England’s most important player when the next man on our list calls it quits.
The midfielder, who guided West Ham to UEFA Europa Conference League success before his move to North London, is as accomplished sitting deep as a holding midfielder as he is roaming from box to box, or even sitting higher up the field as a full No. 8.
By adding goals, assists, and serious set-piece threat to his game, Rice has established himself as arguably the best midfielder in world football. He finally got his hands on one of the game’s biggest prizes as Arsenal ended their Premier League title drought in 2026. It could be a golden summer for England if Rice starts cooking in North America.
2. Harry Kane (Bayern Munich)
Despite Haaland’s heroic, Harry Kane is, arguably, the world’s best target man.
The relative mystique of foreign leagues can often inflate a player’s reputation as we are fed their many highlights and rarely see their 4/10s, the days they’d rather not remember, their misses, their failures. The Premier League, in all its hyper-exposed, tribal glory, is often not a place where rival fans can appreciate world class talent when they see it. When Kane moved to Germany and made such a mockery of the Bundesliga, everyone finally saw the plain truth.
Kane’s season-end tallies remain consistently high, with a bundle of assists and uncountable contributions setting him above almost every other striker in the world. In 2025/26, he netted a ridiculous 61 goals in 51 games for his club.
Of course, when it comes to sheer numbers, Haaland is ripping up every record he can lay his hands on, but dare we suggest Haaland’s all-around game is, by Kane’s standards, almost… limited? The City star is a ruthless finisher and constant menace against the backline, but Kane offers similarly lethal goalscoring ability with the technical talents of a fully fledged playmaker to boot.
The England captain’s finishing is exemplary, his positioning to accommodate for a lack of raw pace is second-to-none, though his unique selling point is his uncanny creative ability, to pick a pass from deep, to swing a cross in, to play the No.10 and No.9 roles simultaneously and effectively and he achieved all of that in a Tottenham team that, with the greatest respect, was simply not at his level and rarely has been near his standard.
Kane is the greatest natural No.9 in world football right now. He will, undoubtedly, be in the Ballon d’Or conversation if he leads England to the World Cup trophy in North America.
1. Kylian Mbappé (Real Madrid)
Mbappé is a megastar forged by the crucible of the World Cup. It’s an old-school way to achieve greatness given the prominence of the Champions League and Premier League, but Mbappé’s international heroics prove his ability and mentality beyond all reasonable doubt.
Like Neymar, Messi and many before, he made a mockery of Ligue 1, but his form on the global stage for both club and country puts him out in front. Despite being on the losing side, his World Cup 2022 final hat-trick will go down as the stuff of legends – a big time performance from a big time player.
Mbappé was often portrayed as a dramatic soap character in the long-brewed psychodrama between PSG and Real Madrid ahead of his transfer, a large portion of his mind fixed on off-field politics, but the character he showed throughout the World Cup, his mentality and steely determination to drag his team kicking and screaming to the trophy has elevated him to the very top of the ladder.
The 27-year-old is one of the fastest footballers we’ve ever seen grace the field, with shooting technique like no other. He can strike the ball on the run or with immense power from a dead standing start, he can finesse shots low into the corners or drill the ball high and rising into the roof of the net. If you offer him an inch of the goal, he will punish you, mercilessly.
He netted a ferocious haul of 31 goals in 34 La Liga games during his maiden voyage with Real Madrid, plus seven goals in 14 Champions League matches. Despite rumblings of discontent from the famously patient Bernabeu crowd in 2025/26, he averaged nearly a goal per game across all competitions to cement his standing.
Kylian Mbappé remains our best football player in the world 2026.
Harry Kane may be in freakishly-good form and Lamine Yamal the hot prospect heading towards the summit, but Mbappé is untouchable for the time being.
Do you agree with our list? Of course you don’t! And that’s totally fine, even though you are completely wrong.
Check out more of our Sport coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what’s on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
