What Are The Hardest Courses On The PGA Tour?

When it comes to determining the toughest courses on the PGA Tour, there are several metrics that can be used.

For example, statistics on everything from the percentage of fairways hit off the tee and three-putt avoidance during a tournament, to winning scores collated over the years, all point to a course’s difficulty. However, some stats can be wildly different from one edition to the next based on factors including weather conditions and course set-up.

In general though, the data offered by scoring average relative to par provides a good indication of the course’s overall difficulty and that’s what PGATour.com uses to rank the toughest courses on the circuit on a year-by-year basis.

Its data for 2024 gives us an unsurprising top three. While not technically PGA Tour events, the four Majors are listed as part of its schedule - and they take up three of the top four places.

The US Open is usually the Major set up to be the most difficult and that proved the case last year when Pinehurst No.2 provided a stern test of the players' abilities, in particular with the famous domed greens of Donald Ross' design - something Rory McIlroy found to his cost on the back nine of the final round. The course comes top of the 2024 list with a scoring average relative to par of a brutal +2.891.

Immediately beneath it was the venue for The Open, Royal Troon, where Xander Schauffele triumphed in typically challenging weather conditions. Its scoring average relative to par came in at +2.851. Home of The Masters, Augusta National, was next, where players struggled for low scores all week on the famously undulating greens and fairways, and that’s reflected in its position of third as players finished on average +1.906 over par.

Valhalla was the outlier of the 2024 Majors, coming in at 14^th on the list with -.426 as many players, including eventual winner Schauffele, indulged in a birdie-fest.

In terms of regular PGA Tour venues, PGA National's Champion Course ranks as the toughest over recent seasons, as shown by Data Golf, which offers a statistical breakdown of each Shotlink-equipped PGA Tour course since the 2015 season.

The host venue for the Cognizant Classic came in with a scoring average of +1.41, as players regularly face windy conditions while attempting to find its narrow fairways. There’s also one of the toughest stretches in golf to contend with – The Bear Trap, comprising holes 15, 16 and 17. Per Blue Golf, the course has a slope rating of 144 and a course rating of 75.4, further emphasizing just how difficult a challenge it presents.

Torrey Pines’s South Course, which hosts the bulk of the Farmers Insurance Open and was also the venue for the 2025 Genesis Invitational, is another course all but guaranteed to test the world’s best. As well as being one of the longest courses on the PGA Tour, winds can be a big factor at the course, which has also hosted two US Opens, thanks to its coastal location. It was the ninth toughest on the PGA Tour in 2024, while its scoring average relative to par over the period tracked by Data Golf is +1.18.

Host venue for the Arnold Palmer Invitational, Bay Hill, is another that can usually be relied upon to challenge the best thanks to its firm fairways and greens, thick rough, doglegs and deep bunkers. Its scoring average relative to par is +1.06 going back to 2015, although it was somewhat easier in 2024, with +.331, although still 10^th on the PGA Tour’s list (including Majors).

Last year, host of the Memorial Tournament, Muirfield Village, with its fast greens and penal rough, was right beneath the three most testing Major venues on the PGA Tour’s toughest courses list. It had a scoring average relative to par of +1.504. The 2024 event also had a cut line of +4, which is a good indicator of how hard the world's elite players found it. The difficulty is reflected over time, too, although not quite as severely, with Data Golf’s measurement of the past decade of +1.14. Muirfield Village also has a slope rating of 155 - the maximum - and a course rating of 77.4.

The Charles Schwab Challenge’s home is Colonial Country Club, and it came fifth on the PGA Tour’s list for 2024 at +.824, not that you’d think so given winner Davis Riley finished on 14-under to win the tournament. Further down the leaderboard it was a different story, though, as players tackled the narrow, tree-lined fairways and small greens, with the cut line set at two-over.

Quail Hollow is the regular host venue for the Truist Championship (previously the Wells Fargo Championship) and, in 2024, it was the sixth toughest on the PGA Tour with +.732. Since 2015, that has been +.096. Expect it to be even more difficult in 2025 when it hosts the PGA Championship as players tackle not only its punishing length of over 7,500 yards but also its closing three-hole stretch The Green Mile with its narrow fairways, deep bunkers and water.

It would be surprising if the PGA Tour’s flagship event, The Players Championship, didn’t offer a stern test for players, and sure enough TPC Sawgrass has proved one of the hardest over the last decade, with an average score relative to par of +0.68, although 2024 bucked the trend with players on average coming in under-par at -.529.

Right behind TPC Sawgrass in Data Golf’s list is the Copperhead Course at Innisbrook, with the average at +0.67 since 2015, while it’s eighth on the PGA Tour’s 2024 list at +.408 as players face narrow fairways and the ominously named three-hole closing stretch The Snake Pit. Like Muirfield Village the slope rating at TCP Sawgrass is the maximum 155, while the course rating is 76.8.

Other famous PGA Tour venues with a scoring average over par since 2015 include host of the Texas Children’s Houston Open, Memorial Park Golf Course, at +0.67, and Riviera Country Club, which usually hosts the Genesis Invitational, at +0.59. Slightly easier, the venue for the Tour Championship, East Lake, has a scoring average relative to par of +0.57 with the Valero Texas Open's TPC San Antonio at +0.39.

Hardest Regular PGA Tour Courses 2024 (Non Majors)

Hardest Regular PGA Tour Courses Since 2015 (Non Majors)