Methodology and sources

Golf earnings figures differ mostly because they count different things. We keep each kind of money separate and let you combine them.

• Official prize money: money paid by finishing position at official PGA Tour events. This is the default on every page and the basis of all money lists and rankings.
• Seasons: from 2014 to 2023 the PGA Tour season began the previous fall (the 2014 season ran from October 2013 to September 2014). Every season is named by the year it ends.
• FedEx Cup bonus: the bonus pool paid to the top 150 in the FedEx Cup standings every season since 2007. It's kept separate from prize money and shown only when you switch it on. From 2019 to 2024 the Tour Championship paid out bonus money instead of prize money. From 2025 it has its own official purse again, and the bonus is paid separately. Some years paid part of the bonus into a deferred retirement account. We show the full amount.
• Unofficial events (Hero World Challenge, team cups, shootouts, the PNC and others) are shown on their own pages but never added to career or season totals.
• Careers: a career total adds every season on the official money list to every event payout we have. From 1980 the official money list is complete, so careers that began in 1980 or later are complete. For seasons before 1980, published lists cover only the top finishers, so a few older careers are shown as the prize money on record. Season-level figures (starts, wins, money-list rank) cover a whole career. Finish-by-finish details come from event results. We have full results for every official event from 2001 and for about 70% of official events from 1980 to 2000 (tournaments that have since ended aren't in the PGA Tour's past results). For those seasons, the official money list stays the source of each player's season total, and starts without an itemized result are shown as such. Cuts made and top-10s appear only where results cover the full career, and the share of a career's prize money by finish is labeled when part of it has no recorded finish.
• DP World Tour (2009 on) and LIV Golf (2022 on): kept separate from PGA Tour totals and rankings, and added together only in the all-tours figures. Events co-sanctioned by the PGA Tour and the DP World Tour (the majors, the WGCs and others) are counted once, on the PGA Tour side. DP World Tour money is paid mostly in euros, and we convert each amount to US dollars at the Federal Reserve's average rate for the month of the event and show the original beside it. LIV Golf money includes individual prize money, each player's share of team prize money and the season-long individual bonus. LIV contracts and signing fees aren't public, so they aren't included.
• Reported, calculated and estimated: almost every figure is the amount the tour reported. Where a tour didn't publish a player's money, we calculate it from the purse and the tour's published payout table, and mark it “calc.” (about 1% of DP World Tour results). LIV's 2026 team prize split isn't published, so we show an equal share per player, marked “est.”
• Coming next: the regular-season Top 10 bonus, and endorsements as labeled estimates.

Amounts are US dollars as paid unless a figure says otherwise. Inflation-adjusted figures are always labeled "in 2026 dollars": each year's dollars are scaled by the consumer price index for that year relative to 2026. Seasons after 2026 are treated as 2026 dollars until a full year of price data is published.

• ESPN tournament leaderboards for every PGA Tour event from 2001 to 2026: finishing positions, scores and reported earnings per player, plus purses.
• FedEx Cup bonus by player: final bonus lists published by Golf News Net (2013 and 2015 on), the FedEx Cup Playoffs articles on Wikipedia for the top 10 and the per-position bonus tables, and archived pgatour.com standings for ranks 126 to 150. Where only the per-position table is published, the bonus is derived from the player's final rank and labeled derived.
• PGA Tour past results (pgatour.com) for event-by-event fields from 1980 to 2000: every player's finish, including missed cuts, and official prize money. Each edition is matched to the season schedule by year and winner.
• The PGA Tour's official money lists for 1980 to 2000, every player on each season's list, from Internet Archive copies of pgatour.com. They match the published figures we checked, for example Tiger Woods's 1997 season ($2,066,833) and K.J. Choi's rookie year ($305,745).
• Wikipedia season, major championship and Players Championship articles, for the earlier years: season money lists and schedules, major and Players Championship payouts, and season-by-season earnings tables in golfers' articles. Each figure keeps the article revision it came from. We check it against known records, for example Jack Nicklaus's 1972 money title ($320,542) and Tiger Woods's $486,000 for winning the 1997 Masters.
• DP World Tour official results pages (europeantour.com) for each player's prize money at DP World Tour events from 2009, and for the WGC Match Play, where ESPN has no money.
• ESPN leaderboards for DP World Tour and LIV Golf finishing positions.
• Wikipedia season articles for purses and LIV season bonuses, and published LIV Golf results and payout tables for LIV prize money.
• Federal Reserve exchange rates (monthly averages for DP World Tour events, and annual averages from 1971) convert The Open's prize money, which was paid in pounds, to US dollars. Before 1971 we use sterling's fixed official rate for the year. The original amount in pounds is shown beside each converted figure.
• US consumer price index (CPI-U, from the Bureau of Labor Statistics via the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis) for every inflation-adjusted figure. Each year uses its annual average, and the current year uses the average of the months published so far, so adjusted figures are in this year's dollars and update as each month's index is released.

Each source is collected once and stored as facts only (positions, amounts, dates). We check our totals against published official money lists: for example, Tiger Woods's 2001 season matches the official record of $5,687,777 from 5 wins.

A player gets a page with at least 10 paid official starts or at least one win in our data. Notable players from earlier eras (major and Players champions, money-list top 10s, Hall of Fame members and the most-wins lists) also get a page.

The data is refreshed every week, after each tournament finishes. If you spot a wrong figure, email hi@whatgolfpays.com and we'll correct it and note the change here.