The 2026 summer transfer window is not yet officially the biggest in Premier League history – at the time of writing, that is still the summer of 2025 – but it is probably the strangest.The league’s financial dominance has never been more pronounced. Of the top 20 most expensive transfers in the world during this summer window, 14 involved a buying club in the Premier League. There were five non-Premier League buyers: Real Madrid (Yan Diomande from Leipzig), Barcelona (Anthony Gordon from Newcastle and Rodri from Manchester City), Milan (Gonçalo Ramos from PSG) and two clubs in the Saudi league.The new development is that increasingly the biggest-money transfers are an all-Premier League affair. In 11 of the top 20 transfers in the world, both the buying and the selling club were in the Premier League. And of the top 20 most expensive signings made by Premier League clubs so far in this window, 15 were players who were already in the league last season.This might be why the transfer frenzy is accompanied by a strange sense of stagnation, that all this sound and fury is signifying not very much. For all the money that has been spent – there have been eight Premier League deals for £75 million (€87.6 million) or more, as many as in the last five summers put together – very little fresh top-tier talent has arrived. Bradley Barcola (PSG to Liverpool) is the only established star coming to the league from a top club abroad.Premier League clubs have not stopped buying from elsewhere; of the deals ranked 21 to 40, 16 involve players signed from outside the league. But when it comes to the very biggest fees, they are increasingly reluctant to risk them on players who have no experience of the league.Bradley Barcola has joined Liverpool from Paris Saint-Germain. Photograph: Adam Davy/PA