Who won the Ballon d'Or in 2026: Kane first, Mbappé second, Yamal third, and what the vote looked at

Harry Kane won the 2026 Ballon d'Or in London

Anyone asking who won the Ballon d'Or this year gets a short answer: Harry Kane. The Bayern Munich striker and England captain was named the men's winner on Monday 26 October 2026 at the London Palladium. UEFA.com, in its report of the ceremony, calls him the first Englishman to win the award in 25 years. The Associated Press gives his age as 33 and names the previous English winner, Michael Owen, in 2001.

It was the 70th ceremony and, according to Wikipedia, the first held outside France or Switzerland, with Kate Scott and Thierry Henry as hosts. The Associated Press says London was chosen to mark the first winner, Stanley Matthews of England, in 1956. This year's award covers a season rather than a calendar year, from 3 August 2025 to 19 July 2026. The rest of this story keeps three things apart: what the organisers published, what the statistics say, and what commentators argue.

The top ten and the other trophies of the night

UEFA.com lists the men's top ten in this order: Kane (England, Bayern Munich), Kylian Mbappé (France, Real Madrid), Lamine Yamal (Spain, Barcelona), Rodri (Spain), Lionel Messi (Argentina, Inter Miami), Khvicha Kvaratskhelia (Georgia, Paris Saint-Germain), Ousmane Dembélé (France, Paris Saint-Germain), Erling Haaland (Norway, Manchester City), Michael Olise (France, Bayern Munich) and Fabián Ruiz (Spain, Paris Saint-Germain). Dembélé was the 2025 winner and dropped to seventh.

Wikipedia's table of the thirty nominees continues with Jude Bellingham in 11th place, Pau Cubarsí 12th, Achraf Hakimi 13th, Vitinha 14th and Declan Rice 15th. UEFA.com points to a full ranking on the organiser's site. The pages read give places but no point totals.

The same evening produced a set of side prizes. According to UEFA.com, Yamal took the Young Talent trophy, Unai Simón the goalkeeper award, Luis de la Fuente the coach award and Paris Saint-Germain the club award, while Kane also won the striker award. Alexia Putellas won the women's Ballon d'Or, which the Associated Press calls a record-equalling third. Bukayo Saka received the Sócrates Award.

Harry Kane's 2025–26 season in numbers

The headline figure is 73 goals for club and country in 2025–26, which UEFA.com and the Associated Press both give, the latter adding that it made him Europe's top scorer. NBC Sports, in a piece by Joe Prince-Wright, puts it as the most in a season since Lionel Messi in 2011–12. The tally also earned him his second Gerd Müller Trophy for the top scorer.

At club level, Wikipedia's page for the 2025–26 Bundesliga shows Kane as top scorer with 36 goals, while Bayern finished first with 89 points and Borussia Dortmund second with 73. UEFA.com says it was his third Bundesliga scoring title in a row. The Associated Press adds that Bayern won the league and the German Cup, with a Kane hat-trick against Stuttgart in the cup final.

Europe and the World Cup were less complete. UEFA.com counts 14 Champions League goals and a Bayern exit in the semi-finals. In the quarter-finals Bayern beat Real Madrid 6–4 on aggregate, according to Wikipedia's page on Real Madrid's season. At the World Cup, the Associated Press says he scored six times and passed Gary Lineker as England's top World Cup scorer, but England lost to Argentina in the semi-final and finished third.

Why not Kylian Mbappé: two scoring titles and no trophy

Mbappé's own case was strong on goals. Real Madrid's website, announcing his Mahou Five Star Player award on 27 May 2026, says he finished as LaLiga's top scorer with 25 goals, won the Pichichi Trophy, and was the Champions League's top scorer with 15. The club counted 42 goals in 44 matches at that date, and Wikipedia's page on the club's season also gives 42 across all competitions.

The team record is where his season is thinner. Wikipedia's season page says Real Madrid finished second in La Liga behind Barcelona, lost the Supercopa final 2–3 to Barcelona, went out of the Copa del Rey to Albacete in the round of 16 and lost the Champions League quarter-final to Bayern. It lists no trophy for the season.

The World Cup added a third individual prize. Wikipedia's page on the 2026 tournament credits Mbappé with the Golden Boot on 10 goals, his second in a row, and calls him the tournament's all-time leading scorer. France finished fourth after losing the third-place match to England, the Associated Press notes. The organisers give no reasons for the placing, but the published criteria rank team achievements second, and this is the one column where Kane's year and Mbappé's differ in kind: Kane's Bayern won two domestic prizes and Mbappé's Real Madrid won none.

Why not Lamine Yamal: a world champion at 19, but a shorter season

Yamal's year had a great deal on the ledger. Spain beat Argentina 1–0 after extra time in the World Cup final on 19 July 2026, and Wikipedia's article on Yamal says that at 19 years and six days he became the youngest player to win both the World Cup and the European Championship. He also won the Kopa Trophy for the third time, in 2024, 2025 and 2026, according to the same page.

In club numbers he was a creator as much as a scorer. Wikipedia lists 24 goals and 17 assists in 45 appearances for Barcelona, including 16 goals and 11 assists in 28 La Liga games. Barcelona kept the league title and won the Supercopa, and he was named La Liga Player of the Season. Next to Kane's 73 goals, the volume is lower.

Fitness limited the total. Wikipedia reports that a hamstring tear in late April ended his club season early. At the World Cup he was not fit enough to start Spain's opener against Cape Verde, came on as a substitute, scored his first tournament goal on 21 June against Saudi Arabia and was Man of the Match against Austria and Belgium. The World Cup Golden Ball went to his teammate Rodri, who finished fourth in the Ballon d'Or.

How the 2026 vote works: criteria, jury and a full season

Wikipedia's page on the award states three criteria: individual performances with a decisive and impressive character; team performances and achievements; and class and fair play. Since 2022 an international jury of specialised journalists decides, with one representative per country from the top 100 in the latest FIFA men's ranking. The page gives no exact jury size, so the safe reading is a maximum of 100 voters.

BEIN SPORTS, in an explainer published in August 2026, adds the mechanics. Each juror receives a list of 30 nominees and ranks ten of them, with 15 points for first place, 12 for second, 10 for third, then 8, 7, 5, 4, 3, 2 and 1. The player with most points wins, and ties are settled by first-place votes, then second-place votes.

That structure explains why the World Cup did not settle the result by itself. It is the closing stretch of a season that began on 3 August 2025, and the ballot looks at all of it. Rodri won the tournament's Golden Ball and was fourth, Mbappé won the Golden Boot and was second, and Spain's champion Yamal was third. Kane's England lost a semi-final and his Bayern lost one too, yet he won. The ballots themselves are not available in any page read for this story.

How the result was received in England and beyond

The Associated Press reports that Kane, after thanking his family, told young players that anything is possible with hard work and resilience. He called the win massive for England and said that holding the ceremony in London felt like a good omen. England coach Thomas Tuchel told him that England are lucky to have him as their leader.

Commentators leaned on his route to the top. NBC Sports, writing on 27 October 2026, framed the win around his path from loans at Leyton Orient, Millwall, Norwich City and Leicester City to being the all-time leading scorer for Tottenham and England. Yahoo Sports described the vote as tight and the 73 goals as the deciding factor, in its own words, and added that footage of Mbappé and Yamal at the ceremony was being passed around online. Such footage shows faces, not ballots, and says nothing about what any juror thought.

What the result changes and what to watch next

For Kane the prize arrives in a year without a Champions League or World Cup title, since Bayern and England both went out in the semi-finals. That makes 2026 an unusual case, because the best-known shortcut to the award, a major team trophy, was not available to him.

For Mbappé the open item in the published record is a team prize. His season included three individual honours, but Real Madrid ended it without silverware. For Yamal, three Kopa Trophies and a World Cup medal already sit on his page at 19.

The next edition will again judge a football season, the rule applied since 2022. The pages consulted do not give a date for the next ceremony or its judging window. Readers who want more than names can compare the full ranking from 1 to 30 on the official site of the organisers, France Football, and set the places beside the season facts in this story.