Villa 11th, Leverkusen 3rd - Which clubs have made the most from player sales in 2025?

Top 20 revealed 

The business of football has changed a lot in the last few decades and that couldn’t be more obvious in the transfer window. Once upon a time, rich clubs would simply buy the best players from poorer clubs, but due to financial fair play regulations imposed by national associations and UEFA itself, some of the biggest clubs in Europe now have to balance their books by selling players. And some of them have not only managed to match clubs that have been selling top talents for a number of decades, but have perhaps even surpassed them. Most football fans can rhyme off the biggest spenders in the transfer window, but which clubs have earned the most money from player sales in 2025? Today’s Transfermarkt ran through the data to find out.

When we compile a list of the top 20 clubs around the world by income earned from player sales in the January transfer window and the summer transfer window, we get a list like the one below. To no great surprise there are a number of clubs that have come to be known for selling top-class talents each year. Some examples are Sporting (€131m in player sales in 2025) in 19th place, Stade Rennais (€141m) in 16th, Brighton (€148m) in 14th, Porto (€188m) in 10th and Bundesliga duo RB Leipzig (€195m) and Eintracht Frankfurt (€206m) in seventh and fifth respectively. Each of these clubs routinely tops or ranks highly when it comes to income made from player sales each season.

Two clubs also stand out for having particularly profitable summer windows in Bayer Leverkusen and Bournemouth. The Bundesliga giants made 86% of their annual income from player sales in the summer window, where they sold Florian Wirtz for €125m, Jeremie Frimpong for €40m and a number of other first team players. Similarly, Bournemouth were unfortunately raided for last season’s impressive back line and eventually sold Ilya Zabarnyi, Dean Huijsen and Milos Kerkez for a collective €172m, alongside Dango Ouattara somewhat unexpectedly departing the club for €43m.

However, as previously noted there are a number of Europe’s biggest clubs that now work hard to make as much money in the transfer market as they spend. One such example are Aston Villa, who sit 11th on the list having earned €167m from player sales since the start of 2025. Just above them in eighth place are Newcastle, who made €189m from player sales this year alongside sitting sixth among all clubs for money spent on new players in 2025. And the same can certainly be said for fourth-placed Liverpool and first-placed Chelsea. The Anfield club earned €220m from player sales this year to largely offset the €483m they spent on players, while Chelsea’s spending spree of €354m on new players since January 1 has been entirely covered by €363m in player sales in that same period.