In recent decades, the popularity of the German Bundesliga has reached new levels, with millions of fans all over the world tuning in to watch games.
The Bundesliga is also the European league that attracts the most in-stadium fans each week. The fans go for the goals and drama of the German top flight, as it ranks at the top of the European leagues for goals per game.
Since the Bundesliga began in 1963, there have always been players who are prolific in front of goal. But who have been the most effective players at finding the net in the history of the league?
Gerd Muller (365 goals scored in 427 appearances for Bayern Munich)
The most prolific player in the history of the Bundesliga is, of course, “Der Bomber”, who is a legend at both club and international level.
Muller joined Bavarian giants Bayern Munich in 1964 from his hometown club Nordlingen and enjoyed a 15-year career with Der Rekordmeister.
Not only did Muller score 365 Bundesliga goals for Bayern, but he also scored an incredible 565 goals in 607 games in all competitions.
The goal poacher was the Bundesliga’s top goalscorer on seven occasions while also winning the European Golden Shoe twice in seasons 1969/1970 and 1971/72.
The fact that Muller scored at least 15 goals per season in the Bundesliga from 1965 until 1978 illustrated the forward’s consistency in front of goal.
Robert Lewandowski (312 goals scored in 385 appearances for Borussia Dortmund and Bayern Munich)
The Polish striker is one of only two foreign players to rank among the top ten Bundesliga goal-scorers.
Lewandowski first arrived in Germany in 2010 when he joined Borussia Dortmund from Lech Poznan in his homeland.
After a slightly slow start and scoring just eight goals in his debut season, Lewandowski was highly prolific in the German top flight, scoring at least 20 goals in each of the following three seasons.
His goalscoring feats caught the eye of Dortmund’s title rivals Bayern Munich. The forward joined the Bavarian giants in the summer of 2014 at the expiration of his BVB contract.
Lewandowski was even more prolific for Bayern, as he scored at least 17 Bundesliga goals in all eight seasons of his career in Munich.
That run included the season 2020/21, when he scored 41 goals in the German top flight, beating Gerd Muller’s record of 40 goals in a single Bundesliga campaign.
Unsurprisingly, Lewandowski was the Bundesliga’s top goalscorer in seven seasons while also winning the European Shoe on two occasions in the 2020/21 and 2021/22 campaigns.
Klaus Fischer (268 goals scored in 535 appearances for 1860 Munich, Schalke, Koln and Bochum)
Fischer enjoyed a highly prolific 20-year career in the Bundesliga with 1860 Munich, Schalke, Koln and Bochum.
His Bundesliga career started at 1860 Munich in 1968. He spent two seasons with the Bavarians, scoring 30 goals in 65 appearances before a big move to Schalke in 1970.
Fischer produced his best form in Gelsenkirchen, scoring 185 goals in 295 Bundesliga appearances in a career that spanned 12 years.
His most prolific campaign for Die Knappen came in season 1974/75, when he scored 29 Bundesliga and won the league’s top goalscorer award.
He left Schalke in 1981 to join Koln for three seasons before ending his playing career with a four-stint with Bochum.
Fischer’s goalscoring record may have been even better if he had not been banned for the whole of the 1971/72 season after his alleged involvement in a bribery scandal during the 1970/71 campaign.
The one-season ban will have come as a relief, as initially, he faced a lifetime ban from football.
Jupp Heynckes (220 goals scored in 369 appearances for Monchengladbach and Hannover)
Heynckes enjoyed two stints with Monchengladbach. He started his career with the Foals in 1963 after coming through the club’s youth ranks.
He stayed with the club until 1967 when he joined Hannover. However, he remained with Die Roten for just three seasons, where he managed double figures of goals in just one campaign in the Bundesliga.
A return to Gladbach in 1970 lit the touch paper to reignite his goalscoring form. During the eight seasons of his second spell with the club, he was prolific.
His highest Bundesliga goal tally came in season 1973/74, when he scored 30 times in 33 league appearances. His lowest was a still respectable 12 in the 1975/76 campaign when he made just 24 league appearances.
Heynckes’s goalscoring exploits saw him finish as the Bundesliga’s top goalscorer in seasons 1973/74 and 1974/75. His goals also got him into the Bundesliga’s Team of the Year in the 1971–72, 1973–74 and 1974–75 campaigns.
Manfred “Manni” Bergsmuller (213 goals scored in 447 appearances for Essen, Borussia Dortmund, Nurnberg and Werder Bremen)
Bergsmuller kicked off his Bundesliga career with just ten appearances over two seasons with Essen from 1969 until 1971.
However, he moved to Regionalliga Bayer Uerdingen, where he really found his shooting boots, scoring 80 goals in 101 appearances.
His form earned him a move back to Essen, where this time, he enjoyed a more fruitful spell in front of goal, as he scored 32 goals in 64 Bundesliga appearances.
He once again returned to Bayer Uerdingen for season 1976–77. However, he moved to Borussia Dortmund in the same season.
The forward then enjoyed the most consistent goalscoring form of his career at the highest level of the German game, as he fired home 135 goals in 224 appearances in the Bundesliga for BVB.
In 1983, he moved to Nurnberg, where he scored 12 Bundesliga goals in 34 appearances in the German top-flight.
He then spent two seasons in the 2. Bundesliga with Rot-Weiss Oberhausen. However, he ended his playing career with a five-year spell with Werder Bremen.
Bergsmuller decided that a change of career was in order in 1996. He became the kicker for Rhein Fire in NFL Europe, a role that lasted until 2002. During his short-lived American football career, he became the oldest professional player in the game at 52.