The athlete at the top of the list earned more than £200m in 2024. Cristiano Ronaldo has been named the world's highest-paid athlete for the second year running, earning US$260 million (£207m) in 2024, according to Sportico. The sports news site's rankings of the top 100 highest-earning athletes, however, revealed a stark gender disparity, with no women making the cut. The top 100, dominated by stars from football, the NBA, NFL, golf, and boxing, collectively earned an estimated US$6.2 billion (£4.9b) in 2024.
![[Cristiano Ronaldo earned £207m in 2024]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/02/05/13/51/GettyImages-2172436030.jpg)
The figure comprised $4.8 billion in salary and prize money and an additional $1.4 billion from endorsements. Ronaldo's earnings stemmed from his lucrative contract with Saudi Arabian club Al-Nassr, where he moved in December 2022. The 40-year-old Portuguese forward earned $215 million in wages alone, supplemented by $45 million in endorsements. The highest-earning female athlete, tennis star and former US Open champion Coco Gauff, earned $30.4 million in 2024 – a figure that fell far short of the $37.5m earned by Minnesota Vikings quarterback Daniel Jones, who was 100th on Sportico’s list.
![[Tyson Fury was the third highest-paid athlete on the list]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2024/12/22/14/4e91c9e7ff8282e8604d4304419bc579Y29udGVudHNlYXJjaGFwaSwxNzM0OTYyOTY5-2.78548045.jpg)
Ronaldo was so far ahead of the other athletes in the world that Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry, who is second on the list, earned $153.8 million in comparison – more than $100 million short of the five-times Ballon d'Or winner. British boxer Tyson Fury, who lost to Ukraine's Oleksandr Usyk in a heavyweight clash in December, is third on the list at $147 million. The top five are rounded out by Inter Miami's Argentina captain Lionel Messi ($135 million) and Los Angeles Lakers forward LeBron James ($133.2 million) – the only 40-year-old currently playing in the NBA.
The top 100 is made up of athletes from eight sports and hailing from 27 countries. While American Gauff, who is only 20, could climb up the list in the years to come, there have been other women athletes who would have cracked the list in the past. Business magazine Forbes said Japan's four-times Grand Slam tennis champion Naomi Osaka was the world's highest-paid female athlete in 2022 after she pulled in $57.3 million in prize money and endorsements.
