Football
The club that has shaped German football more than any other, on and off the pitch.
City
Munich
Country
Germany
Bayern Munich were founded on 27 February 1900 by eleven footballers led by Franz John, who walked out of a Munich gymnastics club after it refused to let them join the German football association. Since 2005 they have played at the Allianz Arena on the northern edge of the city, a 75,024-seat ground whose panelled shell lights up red on match nights and which replaced 33 years at the Olympiastadion.
No club has shaped German football more. Bayern have won more Bundesliga titles than every other club in the league's history combined, and the 2025/26 championship was the club's 35th German title overall. Six European Cups sit behind them, three of those won in consecutive years in the mid-1970s under Franz Beckenbauer, and the most recent in 2020, when Bayern became the second European club to complete a second continental treble.
Like every German club, Bayern are bound by the 50+1 rule, which keeps control in the hands of members rather than an outside owner. Membership runs into the hundreds of thousands, which makes the club's internal politics a running story in its own right.
For Arena Bulletin, Bayern are the way into the Bundesliga, and a permanent presence in the Champions League, where they meet several of the clubs we already cover.
