Club history
How did FC Bayern go from a 1900 founding to a serial winner?
The club's story splits cleanly into five eras. Expand any era for the short version, or open its page for the full narrative.
By MiaSanMia Editorial · Last updated
Accuracy note. Figures on this page are documented facts, current to the end of the 2024-25 season. Transfer fees are reported figures: German clubs rarely confirm them officially.
1900–1965
Foundation, one title, and a long wait
Founded in 1900, a first German championship in 1932, then decades outside the elite — including being left out of the original Bundesliga.
FC Bayern München was founded on 27 February 1900 by eleven members of a Munich gymnastics club, MTV 1879, who wanted to play football. The club spent its early decades in regional southern German competition, where the local rival was not Borussia Dortmund but TSV 1860 München.
The first German championship came in 1932, beating Eintracht Frankfurt 2–0 in the final in Nuremberg. The side was led by president Kurt Landauer and coach Richard Dombi, both Jewish. After 1933 Landauer was forced out and later imprisoned in Dachau before escaping to Switzerland; he returned after the war and served as president again. The club's willingness to tell that part of its history openly is unusual in German football and is central to how it understands itself.
When the Bundesliga launched in 1963, Bayern were not invited: only one Munich club could go, and 1860 München were the better side at the time. Bayern won promotion in 1965 with a squad that already contained Franz Beckenbauer, Gerd Müller and Sepp Maier — three teenagers who would define the next fifteen years.
1965–1979
Beckenbauer, Müller, Maier and three European Cups
Promotion in 1965, a first Bundesliga title in 1969, then three consecutive European Cups in 1974, 1975 and 1976.
1980–1997
FC Hollywood: domestic power, European near-misses
League titles kept coming, but the biggest nights ended in defeat — 1982, 1987 and, most famously, 1999.
1998–2012
Hitzfeld, Kahn, and the treble that kept escaping
The 1999 final in Barcelona, redemption in 2001, a move to the Allianz Arena in 2005, and the 2012 final lost at home.
2013–today
Two trebles and eleven titles in a row
The 2013 and 2020 trebles, Guardiola's positional football, and a decade of league dominance that ended in 2024.