‘The biggest-ever prize money for a football tournament’ of its kind will be on offer to Chelsea, Manchester City and the other teams in the Club World Cup.
Under an expanded format almost a decade in the making, the winners of the revamped 2025 Club World Cup could earn close to £100m from a total prize pool of £772.81m ($1bn).
The tournament will take place in the United States between June 14 and July 13 and is potentially worth more per game than the Champions League.
“The distribution model of the FIFA Club World Cup reflects the pinnacle of club football and represents the biggest-ever prize money for a football tournament comprising a seven-match group stage and playoff format with a potential payout of $125m foreseen for the winners,” said FIFA President Gianni Infantino in March 2025; it was in November 2016 he first publicly pitched the idea of a 32-team tournament to replace the previous seven-team format which had been used from 2007 to 2023.
How much can teams earn through the 2025 Club World Cup?
The distribution model for the Club World Cup is similar to that used by UEFA across the three European club competitions, splitting the total £772.81m prize pot into two pillars: 1) sporting performance, and 2) a straight participation payment.
The sporting performance pillar is worth £367.1m and will be based on how well teams do within the competition. Clubs will receive £1.54m for each group-stage win and £772,000 for any draw across those three games.
From there, clubs earn extra for progressing further, with each stage worth increasingly more:
Last 16 – £5.79m
Quarter-finals – £10.14m
Semi-finals – £16.22m
Runner-up – £23.18m
Winner – £30.91m
The maximum amount a club can earn through the sporting performance pillar – by winning all three group games and then the tournament itself – is £67.68m.
But then the participation pillar can be factored in and is worth £405.7m to the 32 teams involved, with this payment ‘determined by a ranking based on sporting and commercial criteria’, according to FIFA.
The 12 European teams – Chelsea, Real Madrid, Manchester City, Bayern Munich, Paris Saint-Germain, Inter, Porto, Benfica, Borussia Dortmund, Juventus, Atletico Madrid and Red Bull Salzburg – will be paid between £28.31m and £9.5m based on that ranking. It is likely that Red Bull Salzburg would take home the lowest payment of £9.5m based on that criteria, while the top-ranking club will almost certainly be Real Madrid or Manchester City.
The payments for clubs from other continents are fixed:
South America (Palmeiras, Flamengo, Fluminense, Botafogo, River Plate and Boca Juniors) – £11.75m
North, Central America and Caribbean (Monterrey, Seattle Sounders, Pachuca, Inter Miami and Los Angeles FC) – £7.38m
Asia (Al Hilal, Urawa Red Diamonds, Al Ain and Ulsan HD) – £7.38m
Africa (Al Ahly, Wydad AC, Esperance de Tunis and Mamelodi Sundowns) – £7.38m
Oceania (Auckland City) – £2.76m
Adding the sporting performance and participation pillars together, if the top-ranked European club in terms of sporting and commercial criteria wins all seven of their games, they would be paid £97.19m as champions.
How much prize money will each Club World Cup team be paid?
Based on those numbers and a few estimates, and using UEFA club ranking points to predict how the European clubs are paid their share of the participation pillar, it is possible to roughly calculate how much total prize money each team will be paid for participating in the 2025 Club World Cup.
1) Manchester City – £29.84m
2) Bayern Munich – £27.99m
3) Real Madrid – £27.38m
4) Paris Saint-Germain – £24.73m
5) Chelsea – £23.03m
6) Borussia Dortmund – £22.1m
7) Inter – £18.78m
8) Porto – £17.08m
9) Atletico Madrid – £16.14m
10) Benfica – £15.2m
11=) Botafogo – £14.83m
11=) Flamengo – £14.83m
13) Palmeiras – £14.06m
14) River Plate – £13.29m
15) Juventus – £12.73m
16=) Boca Juniors – £12.52m
16=) Fluminense – £12.52m
18) Salzburg – £11.02m
19) Inter Miami – £9.69m
20=) Esperance de Tunis – £8.92m
20=) Mamelodi Sundowns – £8.92m
22=) Al Ahly – £8.15m
22=) Al Hilal – £8.15m
22=) Monterrey – £8.15m
25=) Al Ain – £7.38m
25=) Los Angeles FC – £7.38m
25=) Pachuca – £7.38m
25=) Seattle Sounders – £7.38m
25=) Ulsan HD – £7.38m
25=) Urawa Red Diamonds – £7.38m
25=) Wydad AC – £7.38m
32) Auckland City – £2.76m
How does the Club World Cup prize money compare to other competitions?
It is a ludicrously lucrative tournament even before taking into account how the riches are available through playing no more than seven games in a month.
Pep Guardiola might not feel he or his players and coaching staff deserve it, but if Manchester City win the Club World Cup as the highest-ranked European team they would be earning £13.88m per game in the process.
The maximum prize money payment for the 2024/25 Champions League winners was around £135m, but teams need to play a minimum of 15 matches to win that tournament.
The absurdly profitable Premier League is worth close to £180m for nine months of excellence from champions who are almost always picked for televised games, but in terms of rapid remuneration it really is no contest: the Club World Cup is ridiculously financially rewarding and justified complaints over player welfare will only ever fall on money-stuffed ears as a result.
What is the new format for the 2025 Club World Cup?
While the Club World Cup in its former guise from 2007 to 2023 pitted just seven teams against each other with the representatives from South America and Europe entering at the semi-final stage, from 2025 onwards the tournament will instead use the same format as the World Cup from 1998 to 2022: 32 teams divided into eight groups of four teams with the top two teams in each group qualifying for the knockout stage.
A total of 16 teams earned their invitation as continental champions from the last four seasons, while a further 15 places were awarded based on individual confederations’ club rankings. Inter Miami took the last slot as representatives of the host nation.
Group A
Palmeiras
Porto
Al Ahly
Inter Miami
Group B
Paris Saint-Germain
Atletico Madrid
Botafogo
Seattle Sounders
Group C
Bayern Munich
Auckland City
Boca Juniors
Benfica
Group D
Flamengo
Esperance de Tunis
Chelsea
TBD
Group E
River Plate
Urawa Red Diamonds
Monterrey
Inter
Group F
Fluminense
Borussia Dortmund
Ulsan HD
Mamelodi Sundowns
Group G
Manchester City
Wydad AC
Al Ain
Juventus
Group H
Real Madrid
Al Hilal
Pachuca
Red Bull Salzburg
