Cristiano Ronaldo Tops Global Athlete Google Searches, No Moroccans in Top Rankings

Cristiano Ronaldo is the most searched on Google, across all disciplines (football, basketball, gymnastics, boxing, tennis, golf, cricket, Badminton, running, martial arts) between September 2022 and August 2023, with nearly 200 million searches (199.4 million). With 72.1 million searches, American basketball player LeBron James takes second place in the ranking. He is followed by Indian cricketer Virat Kohli (68.0 m). Then come Spanish tennis player Carlos Alcaraz (60.0 million), British racing driver Lewis Hamilton (34.9 million), American football player Aaron Charles Rodgers (33.3 million) and Irish MMA champion Conor McGregor (27.6 million). American boxer Jake Paul is in 8th place with 24.1 million searches. American golfer Tiger Woods (17.2 million) and American artistic gymnast Simone Biles (6.3 million) complete the top 10.

In the ranking dedicated to football, Cristiano Ronaldo is the most searched player on Google with 199.4 million searches. He is followed by Brazilian Neymar (140.9 million) and Argentine Lionel Messi (104.4 million). Frenchman Kylian Mbappé ranks sixth with 63.7 million searches. Norwegian Erling Haaland (43.4 million) is in 9th place.

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To compile its rankings, the site olbg.com explains that it used the list of the highest paid athletes in the world, established by Sportico and Forbes, while excluding all retired athletes. Then, Google’s keyword planner was used to find the most searched athletes and female athletes with the biggest year-over-year increase. "From our selection list, we created another list of countries based on the nationalities of the players who appeared in our first selection list. We then used Google’s keyword planner to find the most searched athletes in each country. We then used Instagram to see the athletes with the most followers. Finally, we used BuzzSumo. [...]," it is detailed.