Most Goals in a Premier League Season: The 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 one player is 36, set by Erling Haaland for City in 2022–23. Those are the two figures people mean when they ask about goals in a Premier League season, and both belong to the modern 38-game era.

Everything past that depends on which record you want and which era you compare across. The Premier League cut from 22 clubs to 20 in 1995–96, shortening the season from 42 matches to 38. Any total from before that change had two extra games to build in, so the two eras do not line up directly. This article keeps them apart.

Which team has scored the most goals in a Premier League season?

Pep Guardiola’s 2017–18 side scored 106 goals in 38 matches, the highest any team has managed. They beat the previous record of 103, set by Chelsea in 2009–10, and posted a goal difference of +79, the largest ever recorded in the competition. That was also the season City became the first English top-flight team to reach 100 points.

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

Four of the five highest-scoring seasons belong to Manchester City, which tells you how thoroughly Guardiola’s teams have reset the top of the chart. Even so, the 106-goal side drew four of its 38 games. A team that scored more than a hundred still did not win every match, which is the same gap you find in the most points in a Premier League season: scoring freely and sweeping every result are different achievements.

Who has scored the most goals in a single Premier League season?

When Haaland joined City in 2022, the 38-game record was Mohamed Salah’s 32 from 2017–18. Haaland passed it with weeks to spare and finished on 36, reaching that figure in only 35 appearances rather than the full 38.

The older 42-game era complicates the “record” label. Alan Shearer scored 34 for Blackburn Rovers in 1994–95, and Andy Cole scored 34 for Newcastle United in 1993–94, both across 42 matches. For years those totals stood as the outright Premier League mark, which is why Shearer and Cole still get cited. Haaland beat them, and did it 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 strict answer has three parts. 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 format that no longer exists. All three claims are true; they simply describe different things. If you want the players behind these numbers set in their wider context, our ranking of the greatest soccer players of all time puts the goalscorers alongside the game’s other icons.

Does Dixie Dean’s 60 count?

Widen the question from “Premier League” to “English top flight ever” and the numbers change completely. Dixie Dean scored 60 league goals for Everton in 1927–28. That is the all-time English top-flight record for a single season, and it has stood for nearly a century. It sits outside Premier League record books because it predates the competition by 64 years. Worth knowing before anyone claims 36 is the highest a First Division striker has managed: it is not, it is the highest of the Premier League era.

The one figure that puts the records in perspective

City scored more goals than any side in Premier League history and still ended the season with four draws. That is the honest frame for every attacking record. A hundred goals guarantees a title challenge, not a clean sheet of results. For the full record book in one place, see our guide to Premier League records, and for the flip side of the table, the worst Premier League team ever. Both records go stale slowly: City have pushed the goals mark twice this decade, so re-check the team figure after any dominant title-winning campaign.