Lionel Messi in the Champions League: Records, stats, who he scored against, how he compares to Erling Haaland, Kylian Mbappé, Cristiano Ronaldo
Thursday, July 23, 2026
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One of the all-time great UEFA Champions League performers, Lionel Messi has scored 129 goals in the competition and won three finals. Dig in to his stats!
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How many Champions League goals did Lionel Messi score?
A once-in-a-generation talent, Messi scored 129 goals in 163 Champions League games before leaving Europe to sign for Inter Miami. He made his competition debut in a 2-0 group stage defeat at Shakhtar Donetsk in December 2004, and scored his first goal in the competition in his fifth appearance: a 5-0 home win against Panathinaikos in November 2005.
Lionel Messi in the Champions League
Overall
Games: 163
Goals: 129
By club
Barcelona: 149 games, 120 goals
Paris: 14 games, 9 goals
The Argentinian appeared in three Champions League final wins for Barcelona (2009, 2011 and 2015) and scored in two of those games, both against Manchester United: in the 2009 decider in Rome and the 2011 showcase in London. He was also a regular when Barcelona won the trophy in 2006 but was not part of their squad for the final.
Messi left Barcelona for Paris in 2021, having scored 120 Champions League goals for the Catalan side. He scored nine more during his stay in France, with the last two of them coming in a 7-2 home success against Maccabi Haifa in October 2022.
How Lionel Messi's Champions League goals came
Left foot: 107 (18 penalties)
Right foot: 18
Headers: 4
Home: 78
Away: 49
Neutral: 2
Despite being just 1.70m tall, Messi managed to score four Champions League goals with his head.
Who did Lionel Messi score against in the Champions League?
The Argentinian forward faced 44 different clubs in the Champions League, failing to score against only four: Atlético de Madrid, Inter, Rubin Kazan and Udinese. The goalkeeper who went the longest without conceding against Messi in Europe was Inter's Júlio César – 270 minutes.
Messi scored more goals against Arsenal than any other team in UEFA competition – nine in 537 minutes comprising six games. On average, that's a goal every 59 minutes and 40 seconds.
| Opponents | Games | Mins | Goals |
| Ajax | 3 | 247 | 6 |
| APOEL | 2 | 180 | 3 |
| Arsenal | 6 | 537 | 9 |
| Atleti | 4 | 360 | - |
| Basel | 2 | 120 | 2 |
| BATE | 1 | 90 | 2 |
| Bayern | 8 | 720 | 4 |
| Benfica | 3 | 203 | 1 |
| Bremen | 2 | 49 | 1 |
| Celtic | 6 | 488 | 8 |
| Chelsea | 10 | 835 | 3 |
| Club Brugge | 2 | 180 | 2 |
| Copenhagen | 2 | 180 | 3 |
| Dortmund | 2 | 121 | 1 |
| Dynamo Kyiv | 3 | 270 | 3 |
| Ferencváros | 1 | 90 | 1 |
| Inter | 4 | 360 | - |
| Juventus | 9 | 748 | 3 |
| Leipzig | 1 | 90 | 2 |
| Leverkusen | 3 | 270 | 7 |
| Liverpool | 4 | 360 | 2 |
| Lyon | 6 | 538 | 5 |
| Maccabi Haifa | 2 | 180 | 3 |
| Man City | 8 | 720 | 7 |
| Man United | 6 | 512 | 4 |
| Milan | 8 | 720 | 8 |
| Mönchengladbach | 1 | 90 | 1 |
| Napoli | 2 | 180 | 1 |
| Olympiacos | 2 | 180 | 1 |
| Panathinaikos | 4 | 293 | 4 |
| Paris | 10 | 794 | 6 |
| Plzeň | 2 | 180 | 3 |
| PSV | 2 | 180 | 4 |
| Rangers | 2 | 180 | 1 |
| Real Madrid | 4 | 360 | 2 |
| Roma | 4 | 360 | 2 |
| Rubin | 4 | 237 | - |
| Shakhtar | 4 | 300 | 3 |
| Slavia Praha | 2 | 180 | 1 |
| Spartak Moskva | 2 | 180 | 4 |
| Sporting CP | 4 | 266 | 1 |
| Stuttgart | 3 | 270 | 3 |
| Tottenham | 2 | 117 | 2 |
| Udinese | 1 | 70 | - |
| TOTAL | 163 | 13,585 | 129 |
When did Lionel Messi score his Champions League goals?
Messi was relatively slow to get started; his least prolific scoring periods were at the start of either half.
By contrast, he seemed to hit something of a critical goalscoring mass in the closing stages: 15 goals between the 86th minute and the final whistle.
| Time | Goals (penalties) |
| 0-10 | 7 (1) |
| 11-20 | 14 (2) |
| 21-30 | 17 (4) |
| 31-40 | 17 (1) |
| 41-half-time | 10 (1) |
| FIRST HALF | 65 (9) |
| 46-55 | 7 (2) |
| 56-65 | 14 (2) |
| 66-75 | 14 (2) |
| 76-85 | 14 (2) |
| 86-full-time | 15 (1) |
| SECOND HALF | 64 (9) |
| TOTAL | 129 (18) |
How many Champions League hat-tricks did Lionel Messi score?
Lionel Messi scored eight trebles in the world's top club competition, and shares the record for the most Champions League hat-tricks with Cristiano Ronaldo. All eight of those trebles were scored for Barcelona, including two in both the 2011/12 and 2016/17 campaigns. Those 2011/12 trebles include five in a 7-1 win against Leverkusen.
Lionel Messi's Champions League goal comparison: Erling Haaland, Kylian Mbappé, Cristiano Ronaldo
By the standards of Erling Haaland, Messi made a relatively leisurely start to his goalscoring career in the Champions League, taking 23 appearances to reach ten goals, and 40 to score his 20th. However, he averaged over a goal a game thereafter and is the fastest player to reach 60, 70, 90 and 100 Champions League goals.
| Player | 10 goals | 20 goals | 30 goals | 40 goals | 50 goals | 60 goals | 70 goals | 80 goals | 90 goals | 100 goals |
| Messi | 23 apps | 40 | 48 | 61 | 66 | 80* | 90* | 102 | 109* | 123* |
| Van Nistelrooy | 15 | 27 | 34 | 45 | 62 | |||||
| Benzema | 14 | 34 | 50 | 67 | 88 | 111 | 126 | 138 | 149 | |
| Mbappé | 15 | 40 | 51 | 59 | 79 | 89 | 98 | |||
| Lewandowski | 16 | 36 | 46 | 61 | 77 | 85 | 93 | 100* | 110 | 125 |
| Neymar | 19 | 38 | 49 | 65 | ||||||
| C Ronaldo | 37 | 56 | 74 | 82 | 91 | 98 | 106 | 116 | 123 | 137 |
| Haaland | 7 | 14* | 25* | 35* | 49* | |||||
| Raúl | 22 | 39 | 57 | 75 | 97 | 115 | 139 | |||
| Kane | 12 | 24 | 45 | 57 | 66 | |||||
| Haller | 6* |
*record
What Champions League records does Lionel Messi hold?
- Most Champions League group stage/league phase goals: 80 (71 for Barcelona)
- Most Champions League round of 16 goals: 29
- Most Champions League round of 16 appearances: 36 – record shared with Cristiano Ronaldo
- Most goals scored in a Champions League knockout phase game: 5 (Barcelona vs Leverkusen, 07/03/12) – record shared with Erling Haaland
- Most goals scored in a Champions League round of 16 tie: 6 (Barcelona vs Leverkusen, 2011/12)
- Most goals scored in a Champions League quarter-final match: 4 (Barcelona vs Arsenal, 06/04/2010)
- Most Champions League goals for one club: 120 (Barcelona)
- Most Champions League goals in their first 80/90 appearances: 62/71
- Most Champions League goals before their 25th/26th/27th/28th/29th/30th birthdays: 51/59/67/77/83/94
- Most successive seasons scoring in Champions League: 18 – record shared with Karim Benzema
