He is the first eight-division world champion, in which he has won ten world titles, as well as the first to win the lineal championship in four different weight classes. He is also the second highest paid athlete in the world.He was named "Fighter of the Decade" for the 2000s (decade) by the Boxing Writers Association of America (BWAA), World Boxing Council (WBC) and World Boxing Organization (WBO). He is also a three-time The Ring andBWAA "Fighter of the Year," winning the award in 2006, 2008 and 2009, and the Best Fighter ESPY Award in 2009 and 2011.

He was long rated as the best pound-for-pound boxer in the world by some sporting news and boxing websites, including ESPN, Sports Illustrated, Sporting Life, Yahoo! Sports, About.com, BoxRec and The Ring. In April 2012, Pacquiao dropped to number two in the rankings, behind Floyd Mayweather, Jr.However on May 7, 2012, The Ring declared the top position vacant and jointly ranked Pacquiao and Mayweather in the number two spot.

Aside from boxing, Pacquiao has participated in acting, music recording and politics. In May 2010, Pacquiao was elected to the House of Representatives in the 15th Congress of the Philippines, representing the province ofSarangani.

Pacquiao has been included by Time Magazine as one of the world's most influential people for the year 2009, for his exploits in boxing and his influence among the Filipino people. Pacquiao was also included by Forbes Magazine in its annual Celebrity 100 list for the year 2009, joining Hollywood actress Angelina Jolie and fellow athletes Tiger Woods and Bryant. Forbes also listed Pacquiao as the World's 6th Highest Paid Athlete, with a total of 40 Million Dollars ($40,000,000.00) or 2 Billion Pesos (₱2,000,000,000.00) from the second half of 2008 to the first half of 2009. Tied with him on the sixth spot was the NBA player LeBron James and golfer Phil Mickelson. Pacquiao was again included in Forbes' list of Highest Paid Athletes from the second half of 2009 to the first half of 2010; he was ranked 8th with an income of $42 million. Pacquiao had also won the 2009 ESPY Awards for the Best Fighter category, beating fellow boxer Shane Mosley and Brazilian mixed martial arts fighters Lyoto Machida and Anderson Silva. More recently, ESPN Magazinereported that Pacquiao is one of the two top earning athletes for 2010, alongside American Major League baseball player Alex Rodriguez. According to the magazine's annual salary report of athletes, Pacquiao earned $32 million (approximately PhP 1.38 billion) for his two 2010 boxing matches against Clottey and Margarito.

Pacquiao has also graced the cover of Time Magazine Asia for their November 16, 2009 issue. According to their five-page feature story, "(Pacquiao is) a fighter with enough charisma, intelligence and backstory to help rescue a sport lost in the labyrinth of pay-per-view. Global brands like Nike want him in their ads." They also added, "Pacquiao has a myth of origin equal to that of any Greek or Roman hero. He leaves the Philippines to make it even bigger, conquering the world again and again to bring back riches to his family and friends."[160][162] He became the eighth Filipino to grace the cover of the prestigious magazine, after former Philippine presidents Manuel L. Quezon, Ramon Magsaysay, Ferdinand Marcos, Corazon Aquino, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Benigno Aquino III and Filipino actress and environmentalist Chin Chin Gutierrez. Pacquiao was also featured on the cover of Reader's Digest Asia, where a seven-page story was written about the Filipino boxing superstar. The issue came out before Pacquiao’s epic match against De La Hoya on November 2008.