The race for the golden boot at the 2026 World Cup is perhaps the most competitive of all-time with four genuine world class superstars all very much in the running.
Kylian Mbappe pulled level with Lionel Messi on eight goals by scoring in his side’s quarter-final victory over Morocco.
England duo Jude Bellingham and Harry Kane both sit on six goals each after Jude’s brace helped the Three Lions knock out Norway and book a last-four clash with Argentina.
Ousmane Dembele is next with five, while Mikel Oyarzabal’s tally of four still leaves him in contention with a semi-final and a potential fight left to play.
Check out the latest World Cup 2026 top goalscorer odds below, as well as the current top scorer standings.
Latest World Cup 2026 Golden Boot odds
World Cup 2026 Top Scorer Standings
Here’s how the current table looks in the race for the 2026 World Cup Golden Boot.
Who are the favourites for the 2026 World Cup Golden Boot?
Kylian Mbappe
Going into the 2022 World Cup Final, Kylian Mbappe and Lionel Messi were level on five goals each. But the famous hat-trick the French forward scored was enough to edge him past Messi and win him the Golden Boot for that version of the tournament, despite his team going on to lose on penalties to Argentina.
The 27-year-old appears to have hit full throttle at Real Madrid this season and has been scoring at a better rate than a goal a game across all competitions. He did the same for France in qualifying for this competition, finding the net five times in only four games.
The draw has handed Les Bleus a fairly tough group, but that didn’t stop Mbappe from beginning his campaign with a stunning brace in a 3-1 win over Senegal – two goals that took him to the top of France’s all-time leading scorer charts. He added another two against Iraq, moving level with Miroslav Klose as the second-highest goalscorer in World Cup history. Mbappe didn’t score against Norway in the final group game, but he did find the net in the knockout stage wins over Sweden, Paraguay and Morocco to move above Klose. And he’s improved on that tally even more, sitting on 20 World Cup goals in total — with eight in 2026 already.
Lionel Messi
The crowning moment of Lionel Messi’s glittering international career came four years ago in Qatar as he lifted the World Cup trophy, and in what will surely be his final World Cup, the legendary forward is out to make more headlines in the USA, Mexico and Canada in 2026.
Messi wasted no time in making an impact, producing a stunning hat-trick in Argentina’s opening match against Argentina. He was expected to push Klose’s all-time record close at the tournament, but nobody would have expected him to equal it after one game. Even fewer people would have predicted he’d have the record outright after two games. But he does, and he’s added another three goals, making it 20 overall at World Cups. Eight have come in 2026 so far, a tally that he’ll no doubt add to in search of a first World Cup Golden Boot.
Harry Kane
The 2018 World Cup Golden Boot winner was England’s Harry Kane, and despite now being 32, the goals have shown no sign of drying up for the superstar striker.
Kane came into the 2026 World Cup having scored 61 goals in 51 games for Bayern Munich across all competitions, dreaming of more for England. He started the tournament with a brace against Croatia, taking his total World Cup tally to 10. No Englishman has scored more World Cup goals than Kane, who drew level with Gary Lineker. He beat that record in the win over Panama to end the group stage, before adding two to help England come from behind to beat DR Congo in the last-32. Kane then levelled another Lineker record in the last-16 with his sixth World Cup knockout stage goal for England as they beat Mexico.
Jude Bellingham
But for Jude Bellingham, the script has been completely rewritten. The 23-year-old Real Madrid midfielder arrived at the 2026 World Cup as England’s creative heartbeat, but he has evolved into their ultimate goalscoring weapon. After finding the net against Croatia and adding another against Panama, Bellingham truly caught fire once the knockout rounds commenced.
In a staggering run of form, he scored consecutive braces against Mexico in the round of 16 and Norway in a grueling extra-time quarter-final victory. By doing so, Bellingham became the first player to score two or more goals in back-to-back World Cup knockout matches since Diego Maradona in 1986, while drawing level with Pele on seven career World Cup goals.
Now sitting on six goals for the 2026 tournament – none of which have come from the penalty spot – Bellingham finds himself in a dead heat with his captain, Harry Kane. As England prepare for a monumental semi-final clash against Argentina, the young midfielder is no longer just pulling the strings, he is a bona fide Golden Boot contender.
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World Cup Golden Boot tips
Harry Kane looks overpriced at 9/1 with bet365 to win the Golden Boot and the Bayern Munich striker has every chance of ending the tournament as the top scorer once again.
The England captain is enjoying another sensational campaign in Germany, finishing the 2025-26 Bundesliga season with a remarkable 36 goals in just 31 appearances for Bayern Munich. Kane also arrived in excellent form after ending the domestic season with a hat-trick against Cologne and has now scored 98 Bundesliga goals in only 94 games since joining Bayern in 2023.
England’s attack still revolves around Kane and their struggles without him earlier this year only highlighted how important he remains to Thomas Tuchel’s side.
Few forwards in world football can match Kane’s consistency in front of goal right now and, given many expect England to go deep into the competition, the Bayern man looks a strong contender to lead the scoring charts for a second time.
2026 World Cup Golden Boot FAQs
How is the World Cup Golden Boot decided?
The player who finishes the tournament with the most goals wins the Golden Boot. If two or more players tie, the player with the most assists wins the award. If a tie remains, minutes played decides the winner, with the player who played the fewest minutes taking the award.
However, most Golden Boot World Cup outright markets are actually ‘Top Scorer’ markets – which is slightly different as explained below.
What’s the difference between the Golden Boot and Top Scorer?
The difference between the Golden Boot and the Top Scorer market is that there are no tie-breaks and the market considers players to be joint-winners of the Top Scorer market. If players tie, dead heat rules will apply.
This usually means that you divide the total stake by the number of players involved in the dead heat and then multiply it by the odds at which you placed your bet. However, please check with your chosen bookmaker for their Dead Heat rules before you place your bet.
How many goals does it take to win the Golden Boot?
This varies from tournament to tournament and given that teams at the 2026 World Cup tournament will need to play more games than ever before in order to lift the trophy, it’s hard to even give an estimated answer.
The number of goals scored by the top goalscorer so far in World Cup history ranges from 13 by Just Fontaine in 1958, to just four in 1962, a number which six different players achieved in that tournament.
Who won the 2022 World Cup Golden Boot?
Kylian Mbappe was the 2022 World Cup Golden Boot winner after he scored a hat-trick in the final against Argentina to take his total to eight goals in the competition.
Who has the most goals in World Cup history?
Lionel Messi currently holds the record for World Cup goals, having scored 18 times in 28 games since his debut in 2006.
Who has scored the most goals in a single World Cup?
Just Fontaine scored the most goals in a single World Cup in 1958 when he scored an incredible 13 goals in just six games. The next closest is Sandor Kocsis, who scored 11 for Hungary four years earlier in 1954.
Since the turn of the millennium, Ronaldo in 2002 and Kylian Mbappe in 2022 managed the most in one tournament with a total of eight.
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