Bayern Munich was born when gymnasts barred their footballers from the league
On 27 February 1900, members of a Munich gymnastics club voted that their football section could not join the national football association. Eleven footballers walked out and founded their own club that same evening. Bayern Munich went on to become Germany's most successful team and the world's largest sports club by membership.
Led by Franz John, the breakaway side quickly thrashed local rivals, once winning 15–0, and took its first national title in 1932 under coach Richard Kohn. The Nazi era abruptly ended that rise. President Kurt Landauer, who was Jewish, left Germany along with the coach, and the club was mocked as the 'Jew's club' while rival 1860 Munich gained favour. Landauer returned from exile in 1947 to lead the club again and is credited as the key figure in its move toward professionalism.
The postwar years were rocky, with 13 coaches between 1945 and 1963, relegation in 1955 and near bankruptcy by the late 1950s. When the Bundesliga launched in 1963, Bayern was left out: selection rested on twelve years of results, where it ranked only sixth, and 1860 got the Munich place. Its answer came swiftly. After promotion, Bayern won the Cup Winners' Cup, and in 1969 became the first team since the league's creation to take both league and cup in one season.
Under Franz Beckenbauer's captaincy it won three straight European Cups from 1974 to 1976. The 1972 title decider against Schalke, a 5–1 win, was the first match at the new Olympiastadion and the first live televised Bundesliga game. Later eras brought the Breitner and Rummenigge partnership and, in 2020, a Champions League win within a treble, followed by the rest of a so-called sextuple.
Bayern holds a record 35 national titles, including eleven in a row from 2013 to 2023, and six European crowns. By November 2025 it had more than 432,500 official members. Since the 2005–06 season it has played at the Allianz Arena, and it still fields teams in chess, handball and table tennis.
Source: FC Bayern Munich
