The Portuguese football star Cristiano Ronaldo took the first place in the rating of the highest paid athletes in the world according to the survey of the popular magazine “Forbes”, which was made for the current year 2024. The ranking can be seen on the magazine’s official website and is based on reported revenue from contracts, both at clubs, image rights and advertising.

The striker of Saudi Al Nasr has earned 260 million dollars in one year, of which 200 million are his net profit in the club, and the remaining 60 million are from advertising contracts.

“Forbes” notes that such an amount is a total record for a football player, and Cristiano Ronaldo himself is at the top of the ranking for the fourth time.

Ronaldo was at the top of this ranking list last year as well with 136 million dollars, and in 2022 Lionel Messi won the most money.

The second place among the highest paid athletes is now occupied by the Spanish golfer John Rahm, whose earnings are in the amount of 218 million dollars.

Lionel Messi is in third place. The footballer of Inter Miami can boast of 135 million dollars in the accounts for the year.

Los Angeles Lakers NBA player LeBron James with $128.2 million, Milwaukee Bucks basketball player Giannis Antetokounmpo with $111, as well as three other football players, one basketball player and one NFL player were in the top 10.

Sixth place went to Kylian Mbappe. The French striker, who is leaving Paris Saint-Germain at the end of the season and is likely to join Real Madrid, takes 110 million of the American currency. He is followed by Neymar with 108 million, Karim Benzema with 106 million, as well as Steph Curry and Lamar Jackson.

Steph Curry – basketball player of Golden State Warriors of the NBA received 102 million, and the top 10 closes the two-time player of the season in the NFL, the quarterback of Baltimore – Jackson with 100.5 million.

Each of the top ten highest-paid athletes in 2024 earned more than $100 million for the first time, according to Forbes, surpassing the previous peak of eight athletes in 2023. Combined, the top ten highest-paid athletes worldwide earned about $1.38 billion before taxes and agent fees in the past 12 months, beating last year’s record of $1.11 billion by 24%.

But that’s not the only factor driving those numbers up. Exploding media rights fees and increasingly lucrative off-field opportunities have had a significant impact on revenues for years.