Before we start!
Throughout the piece you'll see a slider below that lets you control the year the data starts from
You can see how the data changes depending on the starting year you pick in the dynamic texts, which are underlined in orange
When you see text underlined in blue you can click on it to change the data shown in the accompanying chart
Data from 2003
Last updated on August 16, 2024
Every year, 32 teams battle it out to lift Old Big Ears. Only 9 teams have pulled it off in the last 20 years. The competition starts with eight groups of four teams and, after everyone has played each other, only the top two move on to the next round. From then on, every round is decided over two legs until we get to the final.
Since 2003, 0 teams have taken part in the UEFA Champions League, Europe's biggest club competition. However, not that many have really left their mark on the tournament. Since then, Real Madrid is the team that has reached 4 of the Champions League's 5 rounds more times than anyone else.
Teams that have reached each Champions League round the most times between the 03/04 and 23/24 seasons
Real Madrid
Real Madrid
Bayern München
Real Madrid
Real Madrid
Although in most cases a single team holds the record, the competition is fierce and the teams are right on each other's heels. Below you can see the five teams that have reached each round of the Champions League the most times (or more if several are tied).
Teams that have reached the of the Champions League the most times between the 03/04 and 23/24 seasons
| Team | Seasons |
|---|---|
| Real Madrid | |
| Liverpool | |
| FC Barcelona and Bayern München | |
| Manchester United and Chelsea |
Staying on top isn't easy
Of the 0 teams that have played in the UCL since 2003, 45 (35.4%) have only played a single season, such as Trabzonspor, Real Betis, and RC Lens. On the other hand, 1 (0.8%) has played in every edition, namely Real Madrid.
Champions League appearances by - 1899 Hoffenheim
- AA Gent
- AaB Aalborg
- AC Milan
- AEK Athens
- AJ Auxerre
- Ajax
- Anderlecht
- Anorthosis Famagusta
- APOEL Nicosia
- Arsenal
- AS Monaco
- AS Roma
- Atalanta
- Athletic Bilbao
- Atlético Madrid
- Austria Wien
- AZ Alkmaar
- BATE Borisov
- Bayer Leverkusen
- Bayern München
- Benfica
- Besiktas
- Borussia Dortmund
- Borussia Mönchengladbach
- Bursaspor
- Celta de Vigo
- Celtic
- CFR Cluj
- Chelsea
- Club Brugge
- CSKA Moscow
- Deportivo La Coruña
- Dinamo Kiev
- Dinamo Zagreb
- DVSC Debrecen
- Eintracht Frankfurt
- FC Barcelona
- FC Basel
- FC København
- FC Midtjylland
- FC Nordsjælland
- FC Porto
- FC Salzburg
- FC Thun
- FC Twente Enschede
- FC Zürich
- Fenerbahçe
- Ferencváros
- Feyenoord
- Fiorentina
- FK Astana
- FK Krasnodar
- FK Rostov
- Galatasaray
- Girondins Bordeaux
- Glasgow Rangers
- Hamburger SV
- Hapoel Tel-Aviv
- Internazionale
- Istanbul Basaksehir
- Juventus
- Lazio
- Legia Warsaw
- Leicester City
- Levski Sofia
- Lille OSC
- Liverpool
- Lokomotiv Moscow
- Ludogorets Razgrad
- Maccabi Haifa
- Maccabi Tel-Aviv
- Málaga CF
- Malmö FF
- Manchester City
- Manchester United
- Montpellier
- MSK Zilina
- Napoli
- Newcastle United
- NK Maribor
- Olympiakos Piraeus
- Olympique Lyon
- Olympique Marseille
- Otelul Galati
- Panathinaikos
- Paris Saint-Germain
- Partizan Belgrade
- Petrzalka Bratislava
- PSV Eindhoven
- Qarabag FK
- Racing Genk
- Rapid Wien
- RB Leipzig
- RC Lens
- Real Betis
- Real Madrid
- Real Sociedad
- Red Star Belgrade
- Rosenborg BK
- Royal Antwerp
- Rubin Kazan
- Schalke 04
- Sevilla
- Shakhtar Donetsk
- Sheriff Tiraspol
- Slavia Praha
- Sparta Praha
- Spartak Moscow
- Sporting Braga
- Sporting CP Lisbon
- Stade Rennais
- Standard Liège
- Steaua Bucuresti
- Tottenham Hotspur
- Trabzonspor
- Udinese
- Union Berlin
- Unirea Urziceni
- Valencia
- VfB Stuttgart
- VfL Wolfsburg
- Viktoria Plzen
- Villarreal
- Werder Bremen
- Young Boys
- Zenit St. Petersburg
- 1899 Hoffenheim
- AA Gent
- AaB Aalborg
- AC Milan
- AEK Athens
- AJ Auxerre
- Ajax
- Anderlecht
- Anorthosis Famagusta
- APOEL Nicosia
- Arsenal
- AS Monaco
- AS Roma
- Atalanta
- Athletic Bilbao
- Atlético Madrid
- Austria Wien
- AZ Alkmaar
- BATE Borisov
- Bayer Leverkusen
- Bayern München
- Benfica
- Besiktas
- Borussia Dortmund
- Borussia Mönchengladbach
- Bursaspor
- Celta de Vigo
- Celtic
- CFR Cluj
- Chelsea
- Club Brugge
- CSKA Moscow
- Deportivo La Coruña
- Dinamo Kiev
- Dinamo Zagreb
- DVSC Debrecen
- Eintracht Frankfurt
- FC Barcelona
- FC Basel
- FC København
- FC Midtjylland
- FC Nordsjælland
- FC Porto
- FC Salzburg
- FC Thun
- FC Twente Enschede
- FC Zürich
- Fenerbahçe
- Ferencváros
- Feyenoord
- Fiorentina
- FK Astana
- FK Krasnodar
- FK Rostov
- Galatasaray
- Girondins Bordeaux
- Glasgow Rangers
- Hamburger SV
- Hapoel Tel-Aviv
- Internazionale
- Istanbul Basaksehir
- Juventus
- Lazio
- Legia Warsaw
- Leicester City
- Levski Sofia
- Lille OSC
- Liverpool
- Lokomotiv Moscow
- Ludogorets Razgrad
- Maccabi Haifa
- Maccabi Tel-Aviv
- Málaga CF
- Malmö FF
- Manchester City
- Manchester United
- Montpellier
- MSK Zilina
- Napoli
- Newcastle United
- NK Maribor
- Olympiakos Piraeus
- Olympique Lyon
- Olympique Marseille
- Otelul Galati
- Panathinaikos
- Paris Saint-Germain
- Partizan Belgrade
- Petrzalka Bratislava
- PSV Eindhoven
- Qarabag FK
- Racing Genk
- Rapid Wien
- RB Leipzig
- RC Lens
- Real Betis
- Real Madrid
- Real Sociedad
- Red Star Belgrade
- Rosenborg BK
- Royal Antwerp
- Rubin Kazan
- Schalke 04
- Sevilla
- Shakhtar Donetsk
- Sheriff Tiraspol
- Slavia Praha
- Sparta Praha
- Spartak Moscow
- Sporting Braga
- Sporting CP Lisbon
- Stade Rennais
- Standard Liège
- Steaua Bucuresti
- Tottenham Hotspur
- Trabzonspor
- Udinese
- Union Berlin
- Unirea Urziceni
- Valencia
- VfB Stuttgart
- VfL Wolfsburg
- Viktoria Plzen
- Villarreal
- Werder Bremen
- Young Boys
- Zenit St. Petersburg
They have played in 0 seasons between 2003/04 and 2023/24. Their best finish has been the final (6 times).
Methodology
The data comes from Bert Kassies' website, which compiles the results of every European club competition match. I scraped the data with the rvest package and then cleaned and prepared it with tidyverse in RStudio. The data behind each chart and interactive text was built with Svelte and D3
The data is updated automatically every Friday at noon through GitHub Actions. You can see the repository with the data here
Although there is data for earlier seasons, I decided to start with the 2003/04 season because that's when the current competition format began