The Open Championship: Golf’s Oldest Major

What makes The Open different

The Open is the oldest of the four major championships and the only one staged outside the United States. It is played each July on a rotation of links courses in Britain and Ireland, and the winner receives the Claret Jug, the most recognisable trophy in the sport.

Its defining feature is the ground it is played on. Links courses are built on coastal sand dunes, with firm fast-running turf, deep revetted bunkers and almost no trees. Wind is the primary defence rather than length, and the same course can play entirely differently between morning and afternoon.

That produces a style of golf found nowhere else in the majors. Shots are run along the ground as often as flown to the pin, bad weather is a competitive factor rather than an interruption, and the draw can matter enormously — a player teeing off in benign conditions has a genuine advantage over one who draws a gale.

St Andrews and 2027

The Open returns to St Andrews from 11 to 18 July 2027 for the 155th Championship. It will be the thirty-first time the Old Course has hosted the tournament, more than any other venue, and the first since 2022 when the Championship drew record crowds.

St Andrews occupies a unique position in golf. The Old Course is among the oldest in the world, it is public rather than private, and its features — the Swilcan Bridge, the Road Hole, the vast shared double greens — are as familiar to golfers as any landmarks in sport.

The rota of Open venues rotates between a small number of courses that meet the championship’s requirements, but St Andrews is the fixed point within it. Returns there are treated as occasions in their own right, and milestone Championships are deliberately scheduled to fall at the Old Course.

How the tournament runs

The field plays seventy-two holes across four days, with a cut after thirty-six holes reducing the field for the weekend. The lowest total score wins, and a tie is settled by a play-off over a small number of holes rather than sudden death alone.

Qualification is unusually open for a major. Alongside exemptions for leading players and past champions, Final Qualifying gives club and tour professionals a genuine route into the field. That combination of the world’s best and relative unknowns is part of the Championship’s character.

The rota

The Open rotates between a small group of courses that meet its requirements, spread across Scotland and England with occasional stagings in Northern Ireland. A venue must combine genuine championship links golf with the space and infrastructure to host enormous crowds, which is a demanding combination and keeps the rota short.

That rotation means a given course hosts perhaps once a decade, which makes each staging an event in its own right for the town concerned. St Andrews is the exception, returning more often than any other venue and treated as the Championship’s home.

Attending

Tickets are allocated primarily through a ballot that opens well in advance, with priority given to members of The R&A’s supporter scheme. Demand for St Andrews is substantially higher than for other venues on the rota, and a milestone Championship there is the hardest ticket the tournament produces.

Practice days are the underrated option. They are cheaper, far easier to obtain, and allow closer access to players than competition rounds, when crowd management is tighter. For a first visit they are frequently the better experience.

A day at The Open is a walking day of several miles over uneven coastal ground, in weather that can change completely within an hour. Spectators either follow a group around the course or pick a vantage point and let the field come to them — the latter being far less tiring across a full day.

Golf around London

St Andrews is a long way from London, and attending realistically means an overnight stay rather than a day trip. Rail connections run to Leuchars, the nearest station, with onward travel into the town.

Closer to home, the capital has an extensive golf scene of its own. Golf tee times in London covers playing options across the city, and entertainment golf in London covers the indoor and social formats that have grown rapidly in recent years. For the other majors and championships, the Ryder Cup and the AIG Women’s Open are the other significant fixtures in the British golf calendar.

Frequently asked questions