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The battle for the European Golden Shoe is reaching a fever pitch as the 2025-26 season nears its halfway mark.

With a new winner in every one of the last three campaigns, the honor remains wide open. Premier League star Erling Haaland was the most recent Premier League-based forward to secure the award back in the 2022-23 season.

The prodigious Norwegian goal-scorer is back in the running this campaign, but encounters stiff rivalry from German Bundesliga forward Harry Kane and Spanish La Liga phenomenon Kylian Mbappe. With many matches remaining, other talents still have an opportunity to enter the contest.

What is the European Golden Shoe Award?

The European Golden Shoe was introduced in the 1967-68 season by the France-based newspaper L'Equipe to recognize the leading goalscorer in domestic league matches from a European top-flight league.

Since the 1997-98, the award has been administered by European Sports Media, which implemented a points-based scoring system. Under this format, a player's goals are weighted with a designated coefficient based on the UEFA coefficient of their domestic competition.

Goals scored in the continent's top five leagues—the Premier League, Spanish La Liga, German Bundesliga, Serie A, and French Ligue 1—are valued at two points apiece.

For leagues ranked sixth to 22nd in UEFA rankings, such as the Portuguese league, goals are worth one and a half points. Goals in all other European leagues are worth one point.

While the award has been jointly won on several occasions in the past, a rule change from the 2019-20 dictates that in the event of a points tie, the award goes to the player with the fewest minutes played.

If the deadlock persists, the next deciding factor is the number of assists, followed by the least penalties scored. Only if these tiebreakers are used would the prize be shared.

Who are the Main Challengers?

As it stands, a three-way tussle exists for the current season's Golden Shoe, with the three most recent winners separated by just a solitary goal.

• Harry Kane (England captain) leads with 19 goals (38 points) from 15 Bundesliga fixtures.
• Erling Haaland also has 19 goals (38 points) from 17 Premier League appearances.
• Kylian Mbappe sits one back on 18 goals (36 points) in 18 La Liga games.

In fourth place is RFS striker Darko Lemajic of Latvian club RFS, who has scored 28 goals (28 points) across their 36 league games in 2025.

Dutch side Feyenoord forward Ayase Ueda is joint-fifth with 18 goals (27 points) from 17 Eredivisie fixtures this term.

The rest of the current top ten is made up of players from leagues that function on a January-to-December schedule.

A Look at Past Recipients

Throughout its nearly six-decade existence, the Golden Shoe has been awarded to some of football's biggest stars.

Portuguese icon Eusebio won the inaugural trophy in 1968, scoring 42 goals for SL Benfica. He later secured the award for a second time in the 1972-73 season.

Argentine maestro Lionel Messi has won the record number of Golden Shoes, collecting the award on six separate times during his 17-year tenure at FC Barcelona.

Messi established the benchmark for most goals in a campaign with fifty in 2011-12 (100 points). He also became the only player to ever to win it in three straight seasons from 2016 to 2019.

Portuguese superstar Cristiano Ronaldo first won award in the 2007-08 with Man Utd before proceeding to win it three more times with Real Madrid.

The first player to win the award while at an English club was Ian Rush in 1983-84, when he scored 32 goals for Liverpool FC.

The prize has seen a different winner in each of the past three seasons.

Erling Haaland scooped the award for the first time in 2022-23, scoring a Premier League record thirty-six goals (72 points). Harry Kane earned his first Golden Shoe with the same goal tally for Bayern Munich the next year.

Kylian Mbappe is the current holder of the award after scoring 31 goals (62 points) for Real Madrid in 2024-25.

Now, the very three players are competing at the summit of the standings once more this season, with Kane currently leading the pack.