2023 PGA Championship format, cut rules and playoff format
PGA Championship

2023 PGA Championship format, cut rules and playoff format

A photo of golfer Justin Thomas


The 2023 PGA Championship format remains unchanged from 2021, with the PGA of America-run major championship remaining in May and being played at Oak Hill Country Club in Pittsford, New York.

The 2023 PGA Championship field is 156 players. A total of 20 players in the field are PGA of America professionals who qualified through their finish in the PGA of America Professional Championship.

The remainder of the players in the field qualify through 13 other categories, including all former PGA champions, recent winners in the other majors and effectively the top 100 in the Official World Golf Ranking.

PGA Championship format

The PGA Championship format is a 72-hole event. The field is divided into morning and afternoon waves for the first two rounds, with players competing in threesomes each day. The same threesomes play together in each of the first two rounds, with one round starting on No. 1 tee and one round on No. 10 tee. There's one round in the morning wave and one round in the afternoon wave.

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A cut is made after 36 holes to the top 70 players and ties, including the PGA of America professionals in the field.

For the third and fourth rounds, pairings and tee times are made based on each player's total score through two and three rounds, respectively. Players with the highest total score go first, then in descending order until the two players with the lowest total score in the final group.

The player with the lowest total score after 72 holes is the winner.

A playoff to settle any ties after 72 holes will be played under rules different than the PGA Tour. The PGA Championship playoff format is a three-hole, aggregate-score format, with holes 16, 17 and 18 played together by any qualifying players. The player with the lowest combined score on those three playoff holes wins. If any players are tied after the aggregate playoff, the playoff then becomes a sudden-death playoff, played hole-by-hole until a winner is determined.

The winning player will get a five-year PGA Tour exemption and a lifetime exemptions into the PGA Championship. The winner is exempt into the next five editions of the Masters, US Open and Open Championship and The Players. The winner earns 600 FedEx Cup points.

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Ryan Ballengee

Ryan Ballengee is founder and editor of Golf News Net. He has been writing and broadcasting about golf for nearly 20 years. Ballengee lives in the Washington, D.C. area with his family. He is currently a +2.6 USGA handicap, and he has covered dozens of major championships and professional golf tournaments. He likes writing about golf and making it more accessible by answering the complex questions fans have about the pro game or who want to understand how to play golf better.

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