Methodology
The ranking compares 5,222 clubs from 33 countries with a single index from 0 to 100. It is built from the league tables of every season of the top four national tiers and from every official domestic and international title.
The five components
| Component | Weight | What it measures |
|---|---|---|
| Presence by tier | 20 % | Seasons in each tier out of those played in the country (top flight counts 1; 2nd, 0.5; 3rd, 0.25; 4th, 0.1). |
| Historical points | 25 % | Share of the available points won in each season, weighted by tier. |
| Domestic titles | 20 % | Leagues, cups and super cups, relative to the highest-scoring club. |
| International titles | 25 % | Continental and intercontinental cups, relative to the highest-scoring club. |
| Stadium | 10 % | Current stadium capacity versus the average of the country's top flight (twice or more = 100). |
The weights can be changed in the ranking and in the comparison tool with the "Adjust weights" button.
Value of each title
| Title | Points |
|---|---|
| Domestic league | 10 |
| Domestic cup | 4 |
| League cup | 2 |
| Domestic super cup | 1 |
| 32-team FIFA Club World Cup (2025-) | 40 |
| European Cup / Champions League · Copa Libertadores | 30 |
| Intercontinental Cup · annual Club World Cup | 25 |
| UEFA Cup / Europa League | 15 |
| Copa Sudamericana / Copa CONMEBOL · Cup Winners' Cup | 12 |
| CONCACAF Champions' Cup / Champions League | 10 |
| Conference League · Supercopa Libertadores | 6 |
| UEFA Super Cup · Recopa Sudamericana | 4 |
Short tournaments (Apertura, Clausura and the like) count as half a league. The Inter-Cities Fairs Cup does not count as a title because UEFA does not recognise it, but its matches are used to measure league strength.
League strength
Winning a league or collecting points is not worth the same in every country or era. For each country and year a coefficient is calculated from its clubs' results in international competitions (10-year rolling window, an Elo-style rating within its confederation, and a Europe-South America link through the Intercontinental Cups and Club World Cups). That coefficient multiplies presence, points, domestic titles and stadium. Before a country's first international results, its historical average is used.
Concentration adjustment
A domestic title is worth less where a few clubs win almost everything. For each country and year the effective number of champions is calculated over a ±15-year window and, if it is below 5, leagues, cups and super cups are reduced proportionally. It is not applied to federal leagues (USSR, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia).
Ranking by decade
The same calculation is done with only the seasons and titles of each decade (by the year the season ends). The stadium does not count in decades, because only the current capacity is known, and the other four weights are rescaled.
Similar clubs
For each club we look for the clubs in other countries with the most similar history, from two angles. Same role at home compares the path within their own league, without adjusting for its strength: share of seasons in the top flight, the 2nd tier and the 3rd-4th tiers, share of points, domestic titles relative to the most successful club in their country and international titles relative to the most successful club in their confederation. Same world level compares the five index components, already adjusted for the strength of each league. Titles are compared as square roots, to better tell apart clubs with few titles. Similarity is 100 minus twice the average distance between the traits (on a 0-100 scale): 100 % means an identical history. Explore them in Similar.
General criteria
- A season is identified by the year it ends (1988-89 → 1989).
- Only the national tiers that existed at each time count; groups or zones of the same tier count equally.
- A club under another name is the same club. Mergers and refoundations add up their history only when the continuity is recognised.
- Amateur seasons count 75 %. Suspended or unofficial wartime competitions do not count.
- Clubs from the USSR, Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia are assigned to their current country, with the history of the federal league.
Each country also has its own decisions (from which year it counts, how short tournaments or regional leagues are handled). Data updated on 2026-10-08.