World Golf Rankings 2024: Top 10 Men's and Women's

The Official World Golf Rankings – shortened to OWGR – is a system used to rate the performance levels of male professional golfers.

It was first introduced in 1986 and is endorsed by the four major championships and six professional golf tours, these are the PGA Tour, European Tour, Asian Tour, PGA Tour of Australasia, Japan Golf Tour, and the Sunshine Tour.

How are the Golf World Rankings calculated?

The system used to calculate the rankings can be confusing.

Golfers receive points based on their performance and the quality of the event that they are playing in. Points remain on a player’s tally for two years but are reduced on a sliding scale of 13 weeks so more recent success carries a greater weighting.

A player’s points tally is calculated by dividing the number of points by the number of events they have played in over the two-year period with a minimum of 40 events needed to obtain a ranking. The World Golf Rankings are updated every Monday.

How the OWGR changed in 2022

After a lengthy review process, the Official World Golf Ranking changed to a new system in 2022.

One of the main changes to the system will see ranking points awarded to all players who make the cut in a tournament using a strength of field rating. This will use a statistical evaluation of every player in that particular tournament, rather than just those ranked in the top 200.

This means pro tours will also no longer be handed extra points for so-called “flagship events” – like the European Tour’s BMW PGA Championship, for example – though The Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass will still carry 80 points for the winner. Major championships will continue to award 100 points.

“What these reviews revealed was that through the use of assigned values in its strength-of-field calculation, which includes tour minimums, flagship tournaments and the home tour rating, there was some level of bias in the system,” said Bill Schroder of the OWGR technical committee. “Which means there was some level of performances that were either being undervalued or overvalued.”

The start date for the new system was August 14, 2022 – but as it still operates on a two-year cycle, new changes didn’t come until the end of 2023.

In December of that year, an OWGR release said a new points distribution curve would be applied to official OWGR events that have 80 players or less with a greater percentage of points given to the top finishers.

This would apply to events such as Signature Events on the PGA Tour. If events have no cut, which some of these events do, the number of players receiving points will be limited.

The board also introduced a multi-win benefit that provides a 60% bonus to players who win for a second time within a 52-week period on an eligible tour, and a 70% bonus for those who win three or more times in that period too.

Men’s World Golf Rankings: Top 10

World No 1: Scottie Scheffler

World No 2: Rory McIlroy

World No 3: Xander Schauffele

World No 4: Jon Rahm

World No 5: Wyndham Clark

World No 6: Viktor Hovland

World No 7: Ludvig Aberg

World No 8: Patrick Cantlay

World No 9: Max Homa

World No 10: Brian Harman

Women’s World Golf Rankings: Top 10

World No 1: Nelly Korda

World No 2: Lilia Vu

World No 3: Celine Boutier

World No 4: Ruoning Yin

World No 5: Minjee Lee

World No 6: Jin Young Ko

World No 7: Charley Hull

World No 8: Lydia Ko

World No 9: Hyo-Joo Kim

World No 10: Xiyu Lin

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Matt Chivers

Now on the wrong side of 25, Matt has been playing golf since the age of 13 and was largely inspired to take up the game by countless family members who played golf during his childhood.

Matt is a member at Royal Cinque Ports in Deal playing off a 5 handicap, just a pitching wedge away from his hometown of Dover where he went to school and grew up. He has previously been a member at Etchinghill and Walmer and Kingsdown in Kent.

Having studied history at the University of Liverpool, Matt went on to pass his NCTJ Exams in Manchester a year later to fulfil his lifelong ambition of becoming a journalist. He picked up work experience along the way at places such as the Racing Post, the Independent, Sportsbeat and the Lancashire Evening Post.

Matt joined NCG in February 2023 and is the website’s main source of tour news, features and opinion. He has reported live from events such as The Open, the Ryder Cup and The Players Championship, having also interviewed and spent time with some of the biggest names in the sport.

Consuming tour golf on what is a 24/7 basis, you can come to Matt for informed views on the game and the latest updates on the PGA Tour, DP World Tour, LPGA Tour, Ladies European Tour and LIV Golf.

What’s in Matt’s bag: Cobra LTDx LS driver, Cobra LTDx 3-wood, TaylorMade P7MC irons, Ping Glide 4.0 wedges, Odyssey putter.