The Official World Golf Ranking announced Tuesday that starting this season players participating in LIV Golf events will receive ranking points.
The OWGR’s governing board unanimously voted to award points to LIV events starting with this week’s season-opener in Saudi Arabia, but the approval came with caveats.
Only the top 10 players at each LIV event will receive points and the field rating for each tournament will roughly be the same as opposite-field events on the PGA Tour, with LIV winners projected to earn 23 ranking points at this week’s event.
By comparison, last year’s ISCO Championship was played the same week as the Genesis Scottish Open and the winner, William Mouw, earned 24 points. Last week’s Farmers Insurance Open, a full-field Tour event, awarded 56 points to Justin Rose for the victory, while the winner of the DP World Tour event in Bahrain, Frederik Schott, earned 20 points.
The announcement appears to be a compromise following months of negotiations. LIV applied for ranking points in 2023 but withdrew that bid in March 2024 when it became clear the OWGR board was concerned with the circuit’s lack of promotion and relegation.
“In order to obtain inclusion in the OWGR system, it is necessary for you to develop a structure that invites new players based on objective, recent performance and relegates under-performing players more quickly and equitably,” then-OWGR chairman Peter Dawson wrote in a letter to LIV in October 2023.
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At the time, LIV offered three spots via a promotions event and one via a season-long points list on the International Series. That number has now increased by one player with three spots going to the promotions event and two for the International Series.
Current OWGR governing board chairman Trevor Immelman indicated in December that the dialogue between LIV and the ranking was ongoing and suggested a decision could be reached before the circuit began its season.
“This has been an incredibly complex and challenging process and one which we have devoted a huge amount of time and energy to resolving in the seven months since LIV Golf submitted their application,” Immelman said in a statement. “We fully recognized the need to rank the top men’s players in the world but at the same time had to find a way of doing so that was equitable to the thousands of other players competing on other tours that operate with established meritocratic pathways.”
The governing board includes PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan, DP World Tour chief executive Guy Kinnings and representatives from the PGA of America, R&A, Augusta National Golf Club, the USGA and a representative from “participating eligible tours.” Immelman does not have a vote.
“We respect today’s decision by the Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR) governing board and the considerable time the board and chairman Immelman committed to this process,” the PGA Tour said in a statement.
Promotion and relegation likely remain a sticking point for the board and at least partially explains why points are only going to be awarded to the top 10 finishes at each LIV event. Of the other 24 professional tours that are part of the ranking ecosystem, every player who makes the cut earns points.
“We acknowledge this long‑overdue moment of recognition, which affirms the fundamental principle that performance on the course should matter, regardless of where the competition takes place,” LIV Golf said in a statement. “However, this outcome is unprecedented. Under these rules, a player finishing 11th in a LIV Golf event is treated the same as a player finishing 57th.
“We entered this process in good faith and will continue to advocate for a ranking system that reflects performance over affiliation. The game deserves transparency. The fans deserve credibility. And the players deserve a system that treats them equally.”
