MLS Cup Winners by Year (1996 – 2021)

Over the last few decades, Major League Soccer has taken massive strides to becoming one of the world’s most popular soccer leagues.

The American population typically loves to watch sports like American football, baseball, basketball and ice hockey, but it’s quite encouraging to see a steady stream of increased soccer viewership, which does in fact round up “the Big-Five”.

Today’s article focuses precisely on the topic of MLS Cup winners, because as America’s premier soccer division continues to grow in popularity, more questions about the competition arise.

Which is why answering the question of which teams have won the league title and in what year is so pertinent.

Right, that’s enough waffle!

Let’s get into the finer details.

MLS Cup winners list

The table below contains all the past winners of this competition, all the way from its initial inception in 1996:

Who has the most MLS Cup wins?

According to the history books, Los Angeles Galaxy currently hold the record for the most MLS Cup wins as they have an enviable total of five titles.

It’s pretty easy to see why when they’ve had a fantastic crop of past players like Landon Donovan, David Beckham and Robbie Keane represent them in years gone by.

Following closely behind the team from Los Angeles is D.C. United, who’ve managed to rack up four MLS Cup wins within the same period of time.

Here’s a table that accurately breaks down the total number of wins recorded by the teams that have had the honor of lifting this trophy:

How many teams have won the MLS Cup?

From the data above, it’s quite easy to decipher how many teams have been a league champion.

All you have to do is count each row and you’ll arrive at your answer!

But for those of you that are too lazy to put your finger on the screen and do a manual count, we’ll make things easier for you.

A total of 15 teams have won the MLS Cup on at least one occasion.

This list includes:

• Los Angeles Galaxy;
• D.C. United;
• Seattle Sounders FC;
• Columbus Crew SC;
• Houston Dynamo;
• San Jose Earthquakes;
• Sporting Kansas City;
• Toronto FC;
• Chicago Fire;
• Colorado Rapids;
• Portland Timbers FC;
• Real Salt Lake City;
• Kansas City Wizards;
• New York City FC; and
• Atlanta United

Who won the MLS Cup in 2021?

In the past season (i.e. the campaign before the current one), the last MLS Cup trophy was lifted by New York City FC.

This was their first ever MLS Cup win, and they fought extremely hard for it as they had to overcome the Portland Timbers in a penalty shootout after a one-goal draw in normal time.

New York managed to net four penalties as opposed to their rivals’ lower tally of two.

Who won the MLS Cup in 2020?

In 2020, Columbus Crew SC emerged as the victors of the MLS Cup final.

They battled bravely to defeat Seattle Sounders by a 3-0 scoreline in normal time.

Columbus Crew SC had waited a long time to lift the trophy for a second time, as their most previous MLS Cup success before this one was far back in the year 2008.

How is the MLS Cup won?

The MLS Cup title is the culmination of the league’s playoff system which pits the winners of the Eastern Conference against the victors of the opposite Western Conference.

So, whoever manages to prevail in this final fixture is awarded a prestigious spot in soccer’s history books.

The qualification system is actually quite similar to basketball in America, where the top eight finishers of each conference in the NBA go through a playoff phase to determine the winner of each conference.

And after the two finalists have emerged, they face off in a winner takes all best of 7 championship series.

However, in the case of the MLS Cup final, only a single fixture between winners of the Eastern and Western Conferences takes place.

Wrap up

This article has shown you which teams have won the MLS Cup  by detailing the list of winners across multiple seasons.

If you’ve enjoyed this read, then you might also want to check out the article detailing the Premier League historic top goal scorers.

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Samuel Waihenya

CEO & Digital Publisher at Cosy Content Limited

Samuel Waihenya is 27 years of age and has been watching, discussing, as well as playing soccer for well over 10 years.

With a solid educational background in business management, the Soccer Whizz website is his first foray into the digital web space and it has been created with the intention of providing the absolute best soccer content for its readership.

Have a read through Samuel Waihenya's author bio page here.

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