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I was looking up some information on the new Ares V launch vehicle today, and I ran across an intersting page listing heavy-lift launch vehicles of the world. "Heavy Lift" here is defined as being able to life more than 20,000 kg into low orbit.
It's interesting to see the whole list. For some reason I'd thought that the Soviets had a rocket that could lift more than the Saturn V, but apparently not. The big Soviet/Russian workhorse is the Proton at 21,600 kg to orbit (The shuttle is 24,400 kg, but I presume part of that is people). The Soyuz-FG rocket that launches the Soyuz spacecraft is a smaller vehicle and thus isn't on this list.
So the Saturn V rocket built for Apollo stands as the largest launch vehicle ever made, at 118,000 kg to low orbit, and it was retired with a perfect launch record, 12 out of 12 successful. Here's hoping the Ares rockets are as successful.