What was the FIFA Ballon d'Or of 2010–2015, and how did its votes go?

From 2010 to 2015 there was no separate Ballon d'Or: in an agreement with FIFA, France Football's award was merged with FIFA's World Player of the Year and rebranded the FIFA Ballon d'Or. The recipients of the joint award are counted as winners by both organizations. In 2013 the electorate was three voters per FIFA member federation: one journalist and the coaches and captain of the national men's team. The partnership ended in 2016, when the award reverted to the Ballon d'Or and FIFA reinstated its own award, The Best FIFA Men's Player.

The merged years left two disputed votes. In 2010 Lionel Messi won, his second in a row, and all three finalists came from FC Barcelona's academy, La Masia: Messi, Andrés Iniesta and Xavi. Wesley Sneijder had helped Inter win the Champions League, assisting the first goal in the 2–0 final over Bayern Munich, and reached the World Cup final with the Netherlands. He finished fourth. In 2019 he said people still approach him to tell him he should have won.

In 2013 the deadline for voting was 15 November, but for the first time ever FIFA announced on 20 November that voting was extended to 29 November, after not receiving a response from enough eligible voters. In that period Cristiano Ronaldo scored a hat-trick that took Portugal to the World Cup, and UEFA president Michel Platini joked that FIFA did it "to please" him. Ronaldo won, with Messi second and Franck Ribéry, who had been widely tipped after Bayern Munich's treble, third. Ribéry later said: "I felt that it was a political choice."

A 2022 study of FIFA's voting data found that if only the journalists had voted, the winners would have been Sneijder in 2010 and Ribéry in 2013.