Bayern vs Dortmund on Saturday 31 October is a proper top-of-the-table game for once. After six rounds the two clubs are level on 14 points, both unbeaten, with Bayern ahead only on goal difference. It is the first time in a while that Der Klassiker has arrived with Dortmund looking like more than a speed bump.
Why does this one matter more than usual?
Because the table says so. Bayern have won four and drawn two, scoring 22 and conceding five. Dortmund have the same record with far fewer goals, 11 scored, but they have let in only four, the fewest in the Bundesliga. Freiburg and Leverkusen are a point behind, so the winner here gets a little breathing room going into November.
Last season the gap between these two was 16 points, with Bayern champions on 89 and Dortmund second on 73. Nobody is predicting a title race on the strength of six games. A Dortmund win in Munich would at least make people check.
| # | Team | P | GD | Pts | Form |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  Bayern Munich | 6 | 17 | 14 | WDWWD |
| 2 |  Borussia Dortmund | 6 | 7 | 14 | DDWWW |
| 3 |  Freiburg | 6 | 9 | 13 | LWDWW |
| 4 |  Bayer Leverkusen | 6 | 7 | 13 | WWWDW |
Can anyone actually stop Bayern's attack?
Not many have managed it so far. Vincent Kompany's side beat Stuttgart 5-1 on the opening weekend, put seven past Union Berlin in September and thumped RB Leipzig 6-1 on 17 October, when Luis Díaz scored a hat-trick and Harry Kane, Michael Olise and Aleksandar Pavlović also got on the scoresheet.
Olise leads the club with five league goals. Kane, who scored 36 in the Bundesliga last season, has been playing provider as much as finisher, with four goals and five assists in the league by FotMob's count, and he and Olise have nine apiece in all competitions. With Díaz in that sort of form, Dortmund can't simply crowd one man.
The squad has shifted a bit too. João Palhinha went back to Portugal with Benfica and Leon Goretzka left when his contract ran out, while Bayern paid Eintracht Frankfurt a reported €55m for left-back Nathaniel Brown and added Ismael Saibari from PSV.
The two draws show Bayern are not unbeatable. They just don't lose very often, and they haven't lost to Dortmund since March 2024.
What has changed at Dortmund under Kovač?
Niko Kovač knows this fixture from the other side. He coached Bayern to a league and cup double in 2018-19 before being sacked that November, and he has built a Dortmund team that is very hard to score against.
The summer was busy. Karim Adeyemi left for Barcelona and Julian Brandt joined Ajax on a free, while Dortmund spent on Konstantinos Karetsas from Genk, Giannis Konstantelias from PAOK and Joey Veerman from PSV, and borrowed Ethan Nwaneri from Arsenal.
The results have been built on that defence. Dortmund won 3-2 at Hoffenheim and 1-0 in Stuttgart, and beat Hamburg 2-0 and Paderborn 3-0 at home, without ever looking like a team that blows people away.
The worry is the goals. Serhou Guirassy scored 17 league goals last season but has only two so far, and he missed two late chances in the 0-0 at Union Berlin on 17 October. That came straight after a 2-2 with Werder Bremen, when Daniel Svensson and Nico Schlotterbeck both scored in the last ten minutes. So it's two draws in a row after four straight wins. Lars Ricken, Dortmund's head of sport, has defended the team, but going to the Allianz Arena without a win in a fortnight isn't ideal.
How have the recent Klassiker meetings gone?
Mostly Bayern's way, which is the long-term pattern too. In 140 official meetings Bayern have won 70 and Dortmund 33, with 37 draws. The fixture also holds the Bundesliga's most lopsided memory of the lot, an 11-1 Bayern win in 1971.
The big nights are spread across both sides. Dortmund beat Bayern 5-2 in the 2012 DFB-Pokal final; a year later Bayern won the first all-German Champions League final 2-1 at Wembley. Robert Lewandowski, who played for both, scored 32 goals in the fixture, more than anyone else. Anyone who remembers those years will tell you Bayern vs Dortmund felt like a genuine rivalry then, rather than an annual Bayern procession.
| Date | Competition | Result |
|---|---|---|
| 30 Mar 2024 | Bundesliga | Bayern 0-2 Dortmund |
| 30 Nov 2024 | Bundesliga | Bayern 1-1 Dortmund |
| 12 Apr 2025 | Bundesliga | Dortmund 2-2 Bayern |
| 18 Oct 2025 | Bundesliga | Bayern 2-1 Dortmund |
| 28 Feb 2026 | Bundesliga | Dortmund 2-3 Bayern |
| 22 Aug 2026 | Franz Beckenbauer Supercup | Dortmund 1-2 Bayern |
Bayern have won the last three, including the Supercup in August. Dortmund's last win, the 2-0 in Munich in March 2024, is the one their fans will be clinging to.
The Allianz Arena in Munich. Photo: Richard Bartz, CC BY-SA 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons.
When is Bayern vs Dortmund, and how can I watch it?
Kick-off is 18:30 in Germany, 17:30 in the UK and 13:30 Eastern in the US (10:30 Pacific). That is the Saturday evening "Topspiel" slot, which belongs to Sky in Germany. In the UK and Ireland, Sky Sports has the Saturday top match each week, so expect it there.
The US picture has changed this season. ESPN no longer has the Bundesliga: English-language rights moved to USA Sports, and Telemundo and Peacock have the Spanish-language rights. Elsewhere, check local listings.
Or skip the subscriptions altogether. DAMITV streams the game free in HD with no sign-up on our Bundesliga streams page, and we keep dedicated pages for Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund. The official Bundesliga match centre will have line-ups an hour before kick-off.
Bayern Munich
Borussia DortmundSo who wins on Saturday?
Bayern, probably. They are scoring at nearly four a game, they are at home, and they have beaten Dortmund three times running. But Kovač's side won't be opened up as easily as Leipzig were, and a defence that has conceded four goals in six games deserves some respect.
I'll say 2-1 Bayern, with Dortmund making it awkward for an hour or so and Guirassy finally getting a goal. If you're making a day of it, the earlier Bundesliga game at the BayArena is in our Leverkusen vs Stuttgart preview.
