Most Goals in a Premier League Season: Team and Player Records
The most goals scored by a team in a single Premier League season is 106, set by Manchester City in 2017–18. The most scored by an individual player is 36, set by Erling Haaland for City in 2022–23. Those are the two records people mean when they ask about goals in a Premier League season, and both belong to the modern 38-game era.
Everything else is a question of which record you want, and which era you are comparing across. The Premier League switched from 22 clubs to 20 in 1995–96, cutting the season from 42 matches to 38. Any goal or points total from before that cut had two extra games to accumulate in, so the two eras are not directly comparable — and this article keeps them separate.
The team record: Manchester City, 106 goals
Pep Guardiola’s 2017–18 side is the highest-scoring team in Premier League history. City finished with 106 goals in 38 games, breaking the previous record of 103 set by Chelsea in 2009–10. They also posted a goal difference of +79, the largest ever recorded in the competition, and became the first team to reach 100 points.
Here is how the top-scoring Premier League teams line up:
| Team | Season | Goals | Games |
|---|---|---|---|
| Manchester City | 2017–18 | 106 | 38 |
| Chelsea | 2009–10 | 103 | 38 |
| Manchester City | 2013–14 | 102 | 38 |
| Manchester City | 2019–20 | 102 | 38 |
| Manchester City | 2023–24 | 96 | 38 |
The pattern is hard to miss: four of the five highest-scoring seasons belong to Manchester City. Guardiola’s teams have rebuilt what the top of a scoring chart looks like. And yet even the 106-goal side dropped points — four of their 38 matches were draws. A team that scored a hundred goals still did not win every game.
The individual record: Erling Haaland, 36 goals
When Haaland joined Manchester City in the summer of 2022, the single-season record for the 38-game era was Mohamed Salah’s 32, set in 2017–18. Haaland passed it with weeks to spare and finished on 36 goals — and he reached that figure in only 35 appearances, not the full 38.
The complication is the older 42-game era. Alan Shearer scored 34 for Blackburn Rovers in 1994–95, and Andy Cole scored 34 for Newcastle United in 1993–94. Both were played across 42 matches. For years those two totals stood as the outright Premier League record, which is why you will still see Shearer and Cole cited — their 34 was the number Haaland was chasing. He beat it, and did so in a shorter season.
| Player | Season | Goals | Games in season |
|---|---|---|---|
| Erling Haaland | 2022–23 | 36 | 38 |
| Alan Shearer | 1994–95 | 34 | 42 |
| Andy Cole | 1993–94 | 34 | 42 |
| Mohamed Salah | 2017–18 | 32 | 38 |
| Cristiano Ronaldo | 2007–08 | 31 | 38 |
| Luis Suárez | 2013–14 | 31 | 38 |
So the honest answer depends on how strict you are. Haaland holds the outright record at 36. Salah’s 32 was the 38-game record before him. Shearer and Cole set the mark in a longer season that no longer exists. All three claims are true; they just describe different things.
What about Dixie Dean?
If you widen the question from “Premier League” to “English top flight of all time,” the numbers change completely. Dixie Dean scored 60 league goals for Everton in 1927–28. That is the all-time English top-flight record and it has stood for nearly a century. It sits outside Premier League record books because it predates the competition by 64 years, but it is worth knowing before anyone claims 36 is the highest a First Division striker has ever managed. It is not — it is the highest of the Premier League era.
The 38-0 angle
Goals win matches, but matches are what a perfect season is built from. City’s 106-goal team scored more than anyone in history and still finished with four draws. That is the recurring lesson across every record on this site: overwhelming attacking numbers do not guarantee a clean sweep of results. For the closest anyone has come to winning them all, see our look at the greatest single-season league campaigns and at why a perfect 38-0 season is almost impossible. Even a hundred goals leaves gaps, and it is the gaps — the draws, not the defeats — that separate a record-breaking team from a perfect one.
Frequently asked questions
Why doesn't Dixie Dean's 60 goals count as the Premier League record?+
Dean scored 60 in 1927–28 for Everton, but that was in the old First Division, decades before the Premier League began in 1992. It remains the all-time English top-flight record for a single season and is very unlikely ever to be beaten, but it sits outside Premier League record books.
Has any player scored 40 goals in a Premier League season?+
No. Haaland's 36 in 2022–23 is the closest anyone has come. Only three players — Haaland, Shearer and Cole — have ever passed 33 in a single campaign, and no one has reached 40 in the competition's history.
Did Manchester City score 106 goals in 38 games or fewer?+
38 games. City's 106 goals came across a full 38-match season in 2017–18, an average of just under 2.8 per match, alongside a record goal difference of +79.