Among some of his many accomplishments, he has been awarded The Best FIFA Men’s Player three times, UEFA Best Player in Europe four times, and awarded the prestigious Ballon d’Or five times.

When Portugal played its first match in the 2026 World Cup campaign, a 1-1 tie against Congo, the 41-year-old Portuguese soccer icon officially joined Argentina’s Lionel Messi and Mexican goalkeeper Guillermo Ochoa as the only three players in history to appear in six World Cups.

Competing to set records

The Portuguese captain could also get close to setting a world record in the total number of matches played in World Cups. Ronaldo currently has 23 appearances in the competition, while Messi leads the ranking with 27 matches. Ronaldo shares fourth place with Italian left-back Paolo Maldini, with German centre-forward Miroslav Klose at 24 matches, and German defensive midfielder Lothar Matthäus at 25 World Cup matches.

Another historic record within Ronaldo’s reach is becoming the first soccer player in history to score in six different World Cup editions, according to Executive Digest. Ronaldo achieved the record in 2022 for being the only player to score in five consecutive World Cups, from Germany in 2006 to Qatar in 2022, and this year might be the edition where he breaks his own record.

The hat-trick club

Ronaldo scored the only hat-trick in his World Cup participation in the 2018 World Cup against Spain. If he scores a second hat-trick in this year’s edition, he will join a small, exclusive club of only four players who have scored multiple hat-tricks in World Cup history: Hungary’s Sandor Kocsis, France’s Just Fontaine, West Germany’s Gerd Müller and Argentina’s Gabriel Batistuta, according to FIFA.


Kocsis, Fontaine, and Müller all scored their multiple hat-tricks in the same World Cup editions, while Batistuta currently holds the record for scoring hat-tricks in different World Cup editions, respectively in 1994 and 1998. If Ronaldo scores a hat-trick in this year’s edition, he will join the elite group, becoming the first player since Batistuta in 1998 to score multiple World Cup hat-tricks.

Portuguese triumph

Ronaldo could also set a new national record, becoming the top-scoring player in Portugal’s World Cup history. At the moment, Eusébio da Silva Ferreira holds the record with 9 goals, all scored in the 1966 campaign, Executive Digest reports. Ronaldo, with a total of 8 World Cup goals, must hit the back of the net two more times to break the record.

Winning the World Cup is likely the record Ronaldo has set out to achieve this year, and should Ronaldo lift the 18-karat gold trophy at the final match in the tournament, it will be the first World Cup win in Portugal’s history.