ABSTRACTThis paper studies the problem of global output feedback control for nonlinear time-delay systems with input matching uncertainty and the unknown output function, whose nonlinearities are bounded by lower triangular linear unmeasured states multiplying the unknown constant, polynomial-of-output and polynomial-of-input growth rates. By constructing a new extended state observer and skillfully combining the dynamic gain method, backstepping method and Lyapunov–Krasovskii theorem, a delay-independent output feedback controller can be developed with only one dynamic gain. It is proved that all the signals of the closed-loop system are bounded, the states of the original system and the corresponding observer converge to zero, and the estimation of input matching uncertainty converges to its actual value. Two examples demonstrate the effectiveness of the control scheme.