Published on May 26, 2026
Maja Hitij/UEFA/UEFA via Getty Images
Lionel Messi may have more Ballon d’Or victories than Cristiano Ronaldo as world player of the year, but the Portuguese star remains the champion at the bank.
For the fourth consecutive year—and the sixth time out of the last 11—Cristiano Ronaldo has topped Forbes’s annual list of the world’s highest-paid athletes. And his $300 million haul the last 12 months is bigger than ever before. Of course, a huge chunk of those earnings come from playing in the Saudi league for Al-Nassr, which paid the 41-year-old star $235 million last season, while he earned an additional $65 million off the pitch as pitchman for numerous brands including Binance, Nike, and Perplexity. Additionally, he’s an investor in a tech subsidiary of Herbalife, which he plowed $7.5 million into last year. He also has a pretty impressive property portfolio, too.
The athlete who rose to second place in the rankings was also Saudi-aligned. Boxer Canelo Alvarez inked a deal to fight in Saudi Arabia in Riyadh and then fought again in Las Vegas later in the year, drawing the largest crowd to a match in Sin City history. His earnings from inside the squared-circle totaled $160 million, while his business ventures and endorsement deals grossed the 35-year-old fighter $10 million outside of the ring.
