Silvio Piola scored his last Serie A goal seven decades ago, and he's still the league's all-time top scorer. Francesco Totti came closest to catching him, but even a 25-year career at one club wasn't quite enough. Here's Serie A's all-time scoring list, and the very different careers behind each name on it.

The all-time top 6

Rank	Player	Goals	Main club(s)
1	Silvio Piola	274	Pro Vercelli, Lazio, Juventus, Novara
2	Francesco Totti	250	Roma
3	Gunnar Nordahl	225	AC Milan, Roma
4	Giuseppe Meazza	216	Inter Milan, AC Milan, Juventus
4	José Altafini	216	AC Milan, Napoli, Juventus
6	Antonio Di Natale	209	Empoli, Udinese

Meazza and Altafini finish level on 216, one of the closer ties near the top of any major league's all-time scoring chart.

Silvio Piola's 90-year-old record

Piola played from 1929 to 1954, scoring 274 goals across spells with Pro Vercelli, Lazio, Juventus and Novara, with his best individual spell coming at Lazio, where he scored 143 goals in 227 appearances. He also won two World Cups with Italy, in 1934 and 1938, scoring in the 1938 final itself. His Serie A scoring record has now stood since before television existed as a mainstream medium, let alone modern sports science, and shows no sign of falling, since the closest active challengers today aren't within striking distance.

Francesco Totti's one-club loyalty

Totti spent his entire 25-year career at Roma, from his debut as a teenager in 1992 to his retirement in 2017, scoring 250 Serie A goals along the way and captaining the club to its most recent Serie A title in 2001. In an era when even the most loyal stars tend to move clubs at least once for a bigger contract or a shot at more trophies, Totti's decision to stay at one club for his entire career, turning down offers from some of Europe's biggest sides along the way, is arguably as remarkable as the goal total itself. He remains Roma's all-time record appearance holder and top scorer in every competition, not just Serie A.

Gunnar Nordahl and José Altafini: the great imports

Nordahl arrived in Italy from Sweden in 1949 and immediately became one of the most feared strikers in Europe, scoring 225 goals in just 291 Serie A appearances for AC Milan and Roma, a scoring rate of 0.77 goals per game that remains the best of anyone on this list by a wide margin. He formed part of Milan's legendary "Gre-No-Li" forward line alongside fellow Swedes Gunnar Gren and Nils Liedholm, one of the most dominant attacking trios European football had seen up to that point. Altafini, by contrast, built his 216 goals gradually across a much longer career (1958 to 1976) split between AC Milan, Napoli and Juventus, a dual national who'd already won a World Cup with Brazil in 1958 as Mazzola before adopting the Italian surname Altafini and becoming one of Serie A's most reliable finishers for nearly two decades.

Giuseppe Meazza, the man the stadium is named after

Meazza's 216 goals for Inter Milan, AC Milan and Juventus came mostly during a 20-year spell at Inter between 1927 and 1947, where he wore the number 10 shirt, later retired by the club in his honor. He's remembered for more than just goals: Meazza captained Italy to back-to-back World Cup titles in 1934 and 1938, and in 1980, a year after his death, Milan's San Siro stadium, shared by both Inter and AC Milan, was officially renamed the Stadio Giuseppe Meazza in his honor. It remains one of the clearest examples in world football of a stadium named for a player rather than a sponsor or a founder.

Antonio Di Natale, the unheralded modern great

Di Natale is the only player in the top six whose career fell mostly within living memory for most fans today. He started at Empoli before moving to Udinese in 2004, where he spent 12 seasons, became club captain in 2007, and won Serie A's top scorer award (the Capocannoniere) twice, in 2010 and 2011, all while playing for a club that never seriously competed for the Serie A title itself. That's what makes his 209 goals stand out: he built a top-six career total almost entirely at a mid-table club, without ever getting the sustained platform of a Roma, Milan or Juventus side around him. Udinese fans still refer to him simply as "Totò," and his statue now stands outside the club's stadium, an honor usually reserved for players at Italy's biggest, richest clubs rather than a provincial side from Friuli.

The chasing pack: Baggio, Del Piero, Batistuta and Immobile

Just outside this list sit several more of Italian football's most recognizable names. Roberto Baggio and Alessandro Del Piero both built careers well into the 200s, tied closely enough together that their exact order shifts depending on the source and how each site counts loan spells and lower-division seasons. Gabriel Batistuta, one of the most feared strikers ever to play in Italy, built a similarly huge total mostly at Fiorentina in the 1990s. More recently, Ciro Immobile has climbed into that same neighborhood during his years at Lazio, becoming the club's own all-time leading Serie A scorer along the way and giving the current generation a genuine active name to follow, even if none of them have yet threatened Piola's record at the very top.

Three World Cup winners on the same list

What's unusual about Serie A's top six is how many of them were also decorated on the international stage at the same time they were setting Italian club scoring records. Piola won the World Cup with Italy in both 1934 and 1938, scoring in the 1938 final itself. Meazza captained Italy to those same two titles. Altafini won a World Cup too, though for Brazil rather than Italy, as a teenager in 1958, several years before he ever set foot in Serie A. It's a reminder that the league's early golden age produced players who weren't just dominant domestically, but were shaping the international game at the very same time.

How Serie A's record compares to other leagues

Piola's 274 sits above the Premier League's all-time record of 260, held by Alan Shearer, but below Ligue 1's record of 299, held by Delio Onnis, a reminder that these numbers aren't directly comparable across leagues with very different histories, season lengths, and eras. Serie A's list is also unusually top-heavy with pre-war and immediate postwar names: Piola, Nordahl and Meazza all built the bulk of their totals before 1955, which says as much about the era's longer careers and lower squad rotation as it does about any individual player's brilliance. A modern Serie A striker, by contrast, faces far more European competition, rotation, and injury-prevention rest than any of the names at the top of this list ever had to deal with.

See how Italy's clubs are shaping up this season in our Serie A 2026/27 preview, and compare this list with Europe's other major leagues in our Champions League all-time top scorers, Bundesliga all-time top scorers and Ligue 1 all-time top scorers guides.

For Serie A's official historical records, see LegaSerieA.it.

FAQ

Who is Serie A's all-time top scorer?

Silvio Piola, with 274 goals scored between 1929 and 1954 for Pro Vercelli, Lazio, Juventus and Novara.

How many Serie A goals did Francesco Totti score?

250, all for Roma, across a 25-year, one-club career from 1992 to 2017.

Why is the San Siro also called the Stadio Giuseppe Meazza?

It was renamed in 1980, a year after Meazza's death, in honor of the Inter and Italy legend who scored 216 Serie A goals and won two World Cups.

Who has the best goals-per-game ratio among Serie A's all-time top scorers?

Gunnar Nordahl, who scored 225 goals in just 291 appearances for AC Milan and Roma, a rate of 0.77 goals per game.

Is Antonio Di Natale's Serie A total mostly from one club?

Mostly, yes. Of his 209 goals, the large majority came during his 12 seasons at Udinese, where he remains the club's all-time top scorer.

Are Meazza and Altafini really tied on the all-time list?

Yes, both finished their Serie A careers with 216 goals, a rare exact tie for 4th place on the all-time chart.

Could any active player break Silvio Piola's Serie A scoring record?

Not realistically in the near future. No player active in Serie A today is within reach of Piola's 274, given how much longer careers and lower rotation were in his era.

How many of Serie A's all-time top scorers won a World Cup?

At least three of the top six. Piola and Meazza won it with Italy in 1934 and 1938, and José Altafini won it with Brazil in 1958 before joining Serie A.

Is Ciro Immobile close to Serie A's all-time top scorers list?

He's built one of the strongest totals of any active player and is Lazio's own all-time leading Serie A scorer, though he still sits behind the top six on this list.