What Are the 4 Majors in Golf? The PGA Tour and Its Major Championships Explained

By the Sportz Trivia editorial team · Updated August 2026

Golf's four majors are, in calendar order, the Masters Tournament in April, the PGA Championship in May, the U.S. Open in June and The Open Championship in July. Those four tournaments stand above every other event in men's professional golf. Each is played over 72 holes of stroke play from Thursday to Sunday, each cuts the field roughly in half after 36 holes, and each is counted for life, long after the money and the ranking points are forgotten.

That table is the short answer. The rest of this guide explains what makes each major different, why the game settled on four and not five, what the Grand Slam means, and how the PGA Tour season is built around those four weeks. For how the four grew into majors in the first place, see our companion piece on the history of golf's major championships.

The Masters Tournament: April at Augusta National

The Masters is the youngest of the four and the only one played at the same course every year. Bobby Jones and Clifford Roberts founded it in 1934 on the grounds of a former plant nursery in Augusta, Georgia, and that fixed venue is why the tournament feels so familiar: viewers who have never held a club still recognize the pond short of the 12th green and the creek guarding the 13th.

The field is deliberately small. Invitations go to past champions, recent major winners, the leading players in the world ranking, the top finishers from last year's Masters, and a set of leading amateurs, producing a field of roughly 90 to 100 rather than the 156 used by the other three. The cut takes the top 50 and ties, and a tie after 72 holes is settled by sudden death, alternating the 18th and 10th holes.

The green jacket is the prize that makes the Masters instantly identifiable, presented to the new champion by the previous winner. If you want the detail on the course itself, we have a full profile of Augusta National Golf Club in the Stadium Chaser archive.

Recent editions have been unusually memorable. Rory McIlroy won in 2025 in a playoff to complete the career Grand Slam, then won again in 2026, one stroke clear of Scottie Scheffler, joining Jack Nicklaus, Nick Faldo and Tiger Woods as the only players to win the Masters in consecutive years.

The PGA Championship: May, and the club professionals

The PGA Championship is run by the PGA of America and was first played in 1916, which makes it older than the Masters by nearly two decades. For its first 42 years it was a match play event, decided by head-to-head elimination rather than a 72-hole score, and it only became a stroke play championship in 1958. That history is why the roll of champions includes Walter Hagen winning it four years in a row in the 1920s.

The other distinguishing feature is the club professional element. Twenty spots in the 156-player field are reserved for the leading finishers at the PGA Professional Championship, meaning the teaching professionals who run pro shops and give lessons get to tee it up alongside the best players in the world. It is the only major that guarantees that.

The championship spent decades in August as the last major of the year. It moved to May in 2019, which gave the season the tidy April-May-June-July rhythm it has now. Aronimink Golf Club outside Philadelphia hosted in 2026, where Aaron Rai won by three over Jon Rahm and Alex Smalley for his first major, and the first PGA Championship won by an Englishman since Jim Barnes in 1919.

The U.S. Open: June, and the hardest test in golf

The U.S. Open was first played in 1895 and is conducted by the United States Golf Association. Its identity comes from its setup: narrow fairways, deep rough, firm greens and demanding pin positions, with the stated aim of identifying the most complete player rather than the hottest putter. Winning scores are routinely far closer to par than at the other majors.

It is also the most genuinely open of the four. Any golfer with a low enough handicap index can enter, and a chain of local and final qualifying rounds feeds players into the 156-man field every June. Amateurs and unknown club players have made it through, which is part of the appeal.

The cut takes the top 60 and ties, the tightest of the four, and a tie is broken with a two-hole aggregate playoff. The USGA used an 18-hole Monday playoff for most of its history and only switched to the shorter format in 2018.

Shinnecock Hills on Long Island hosted in 2026, where Wyndham Clark led from start to finish to win at four under par, one shot ahead of Sam Burns. It was Clark's second U.S. Open and the first wire-to-wire win in the championship since Martin Kaymer in 2014.

The Open Championship: July, and the oldest trophy in golf

The Open Championship is simply called The Open in Britain, and it was first played at Prestwick in 1860, which makes it the oldest of the four by 35 years. It is run by the R and A on a rota of links courses in Scotland, England and Northern Ireland: seaside layouts on sandy ground with firm turf, deep pot bunkers and very few trees.

Links golf plays nothing like the manicured parkland of the American majors. The ball runs a long way, the wind is a constant factor, and a low running shot is often better than a high soft one. The weather can also split the field, because a calm morning tee time and an afternoon in a gale are effectively different tournaments.

The champion receives the Claret Jug and the title Champion Golfer of the Year. The playoff is a three-hole aggregate, a format adopted in 2019 to replace the four-hole version used since 1989. Royal Birkdale hosted the 154th Open in 2026, where Ryan Fox birdied the last to win at ten under, one clear of Cameron Young, for his first major title.

Why there are four majors and not five

People search for the five majors in golf often enough that it is worth answering directly: in men's professional golf there are four, and there have been four since the modern definition settled in during the 1960s. Before that the set shifted around. Bobby Jones's 1930 sweep of the U.S. Open, the British Open, the U.S. Amateur and the British Amateur was called the Grand Slam, because two of the four majors of that day were amateur championships.

The confusion has three sources. First, women's professional golf recognizes five majors and senior golf recognizes five as well, so the number is genuinely different elsewhere in the sport. Second, The Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass is regularly called the unofficial fifth major. It has the strongest field in golf, a purse to match, and a finish over the island green 17th, but it is a PGA Tour event rather than a championship of the wider game, and the Tour does not claim major status for it. Cameron Young won the 2026 edition by one shot over Matt Fitzpatrick.

The Ryder Cup adds to the muddle. It draws major-sized attention every two years, but it is a team match play contest between the United States and Europe with no prize money, so it sits outside the conversation entirely.

The Grand Slam and the career Grand Slam

Two different achievements share the Grand Slam name, and they are worth separating.

The calendar Grand Slam means winning all four in the same year, and no man has done it in the modern era. Ben Hogan came closest in 1953, winning the Masters, the U.S. Open and The Open, but that year's PGA Championship overlapped with The Open and he could not play both. Tiger Woods held all four titles at once across 2000 and 2001, the Tiger Slam, but not within one calendar year.

The career Grand Slam means winning each of the four at least once at any point, in any order. Six men have completed it:

• Gene Sarazen - completed in 1935 at the second Masters ever played.
• Ben Hogan - completed in 1953 with his only appearance at The Open.
• Gary Player - completed in 1965 at the U.S. Open, the first non-American to do it.
• Jack Nicklaus - completed in 1966 at The Open, and he went on to win each major at least three times.
• Tiger Woods - completed in 2000 at The Open at St Andrews, aged 24.
• Rory McIlroy - completed in 2025 at the Masters, eleven years after his fourth major.

That six-name list is one reason the majors matter more than ordinary tournaments: a player can win 30 events without getting close to it. For how that ledger is used to rank the all-time greats, see our GOAT debates guide.

How the PGA Tour season works

The majors are not run by the PGA Tour. Augusta National, the PGA of America, the USGA and the R and A each own one, and the Tour builds its schedule around them. Understanding that split is the key to understanding professional golf.

The PGA Tour is the leading circuit in North America. Players are not employed by teams; they are independent competitors who enter tournaments, keep their winnings, and earn playing privileges for the next year based on results. A standard week is 72 holes over four days with a cut after Friday, and the lowest total score wins.

Holding the season together is the FedEx Cup, a season-long points race. Points are awarded by finishing position: 500 to the winner of a standard event, 700 at a signature event, and 750 at a major or The Players. Those totals build a points list that decides who reaches the playoffs at the end of August.

The 2026 playoffs ran as three events. The top 70 in points went to the FedEx St. Jude Championship, the top 50 advanced to the BMW Championship, and the top 30 reached the Tour Championship at East Lake in Atlanta. The Tour Championship changed materially in 2026: the staggered starting-strokes format used since 2019 was scrapped, so all 30 players began level and the low 72-hole score won both the tournament and the FedEx Cup. Scottie Scheffler won it for his second FedEx Cup title and a 10 million dollar first prize.

The practical effect is that a golfer can have an excellent year without winning a major and still be rewarded for it, and that late-season tournaments stay meaningful for players on the bubble at 70th and 50th in points.

Most major championships

The all-time major list is the single most quoted table in golf, because it is the standard by which greatness is argued:

• Jack Nicklaus - 18 (6 Masters, 5 PGA Championships, 4 U.S. Opens, 3 Opens), plus 19 runner-up finishes.
• Tiger Woods - 15, including four in a row across 2000 and 2001 and a fifth Masters in 2019.
• Walter Hagen - 11, five of them PGA Championships won under the old match play format.
• Ben Hogan - 9 and Gary Player - 9.
• Tom Watson - 8, five of them Open Championships.
• Bobby Jones, Arnold Palmer, Gene Sarazen, Sam Snead and Harry Vardon - 7 each.

Among players still competing, Rory McIlroy leads with six after the 2026 Masters, ahead of Brooks Koepka with five and Scottie Scheffler with four. Nicklaus's 18 has stood since 1986.

How to start following the majors

Treat those four weeks as the spine of the year and the Tour Championship in late August as the finale. Learn the scoring first: par is the number of strokes an expert is expected to need, a birdie is one under par on a hole, an eagle is two under, a bogey is one over, and totals are quoted relative to par, so lower is better. Then test what you have picked up in our Q and A archive, browse the course profiles in Stadium Chaser, or play Sportz Trivia.

Frequently asked questions

What are the 4 majors in golf?

Golf's four majors are the Masters Tournament in April, the PGA Championship in May, the U.S. Open in June and The Open Championship in July. They are the four most prestigious events in men's professional golf, and they are the tournaments by which great careers are measured. Each one is decided over 72 holes of stroke play across four days.

What order are the golf majors played in?

The majors are played in calendar order: the Masters first, in early April at Augusta National, then the PGA Championship in May, the U.S. Open in mid-June and The Open Championship in July. That running order has been fixed since 2019, when the PGA Championship moved from August to May and became the second major of the year.

How many majors are there in golf?

There are four majors in men's professional golf. Women's professional golf recognizes five majors and senior golf recognizes five as well, which is one reason people search for a fifth men's major. On the men's side the number has been four since the modern definition took hold in the 1960s, and no event has been added since.

Is The Players Championship a major?

No. The Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass is often called the unofficial fifth major because it has the strongest field in golf and one of the largest purses, but the PGA Tour and the game's governing bodies recognize only four majors. Cameron Young won the 2026 edition, holding off Matt Fitzpatrick by a single shot.

Who has won the most majors?

Jack Nicklaus has won the most majors with 18, ahead of Tiger Woods with 15 and Walter Hagen with 11. Ben Hogan and Gary Player each won nine and Tom Watson won eight. Among active players Rory McIlroy leads with six, after back-to-back Masters titles in 2025 and 2026.

What is the career Grand Slam?

The career Grand Slam means winning all four majors at least once over a career, in any order and in any years. Six men have done it: Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, who completed the set at the 2025 Masters after an eleven-year wait.