Ingolf, winning all of the sport'smajor championships in the same calendar year constitutes theGrand Slam. The modern (professional) Grand Slam would mean winningThe Open Championship,U.S. Open,PGA Championship andMasters Tournament in the same year. Before the rise of professional tournament golf, the Grand Slam was achieved in 1930 whenBobby Jones won the four major championships of that era:The Amateur Championship, The Open Championship, the United States Open, and theUnited States Amateur.[1]
Variations include aCareer Grand Slam, which involves winning all of the major tournaments within a player's career. Six golfers have accomplished this:Gene Sarazen,Ben Hogan,Gary Player,Jack Nicklaus,Tiger Woods, andRory McIlroy. Holding all four major titles at the same time has been done only once, by Woods in 2000–2001, and has become known as theTiger Slam. A pre-Masters era professional career Grand Slam was achieved byTommy Armour andWalter Hagen, in winning The Open, U.S. Open and PGA along with the next three biggest tournaments of the time.






The Grand Slam in men's golf is an unofficial term for winning all fourmajor championships in the same year.
In the modern era, the Grand Slam requires victories in four tournaments in a single calendar year (listed in current playing order):
Prior to the creation of the Masters Tournament, the national amateur championships of the U.S. and the UK were considered major championships. During that earlier era, the Grand Slam comprised consecutive victories at theU.S. Amateur,The Amateur Championship (British Amateur) along with the U.S. Open and the Open Championship.
The termGrand Slam was first applied toBobby Jones' achievement of winning the four major golf events of1930 open to amateurs:The Open Championship (containing pros and amateurs), theU.S. Open (containing pros and amateurs), theU.S. Amateur (containing amateurs only), and theBritish Amateur (containing amateurs only). When Jones won all four, the sports world searched for ways to capture the magnitude of his accomplishment. Up to that time, there was no term for such a feat because no one had thought it possible. TheAtlanta Journal's O. B. Keeler dubbed it the "Grand Slam," borrowing abridge term. George Trevor of theNew York Sun wrote that Jones had "stormed the impregnable quadrilateral of golf." Keeler would later write the words that would forever be linked to one of the greatest individual accomplishments in the history of sports:
This victory, the fourth major title in the same season and in the space of four months, had now and for all time entrenched Bobby Jones safely within the 'Impregnable Quadrilateral of Golf,' that granite fortress that he alone could take by escalade, and that others may attack in vain, forever.
During this era, a professional Grand Slam was also talked about, comprising the two open major championships, along with the PGA Championship and the three next biggest tournaments: theCanadian Open,Western Open andMetropolitan Open. Completing this professional grand slam during their career was achieved byTommy Armour andWalter Hagen, who both completed it in 1931.[2]
The modern definition of four majors open to pros and amateurs could not be applied until at least1934, when the Masters was founded, and still carried little weight in1953 whenBen Hogan won theMasters,U.S. Open, andOpen Championship. That year, it was impossible to win all four as thePGA Championship preceded and overlapped with the Open Championship; the PGA's 36-hole match play semifinals and finals nearDetroit were the same days as the mandatory 36-hole qualifier atCarnoustie inScotland for the Open Championship; the only way to compete in both events was to lose an early match at the PGA. Hogan is the only player to have won the Masters, U.S. Open, and Open Championship in the same calendar year.
In 1960, Arnold Palmer won theMasters in April andU.S. Open in June. According to his autobiography,A Golfer's Life, he and his friend Bob Drum (of thePittsburgh Press), while on the trans-Atlantic flight toThe Open Championship atSt Andrews, came up with the idea that adding it and thePGA Championship titles that July would constitute a modern Grand Slam. Drum spread the notion among the gathered media and it caught on.[3] However, a newspaper article on 12 April 1960 titled "Biggest Grand Slam May Be Palmer Goal" stated "Arnold Palmer, the Midas of the fairways, has charted a course which could carry him to the biggest grand slam in golf since Bobby Jones' feat in 1930. The Pennsylvania strongman with golfdom's golden touch passed his first landmark when he won the 24th Masters tournament yesterday with a pulsating stretch drive. Three more big ones remain- the U.S. Open in Denver June 16–18, the 100th anniversary British Open at historic St. Andrews July 4–9 and the PGA championship in Akron, Ohio, July 28–31. If the 29-year-old Palmer can add those three jewels to his Masters crown the performance will rank on a par with Jones' grand slam year."[4]Two years earlier, the PGA had changed tostroke play, and it started to be held two weeks after the Open Championship in 1960. Scheduling problems continued through the 1960s as the last two majors were held in successive weeks in July on five occasions. The PGA was played in August in1965 but returned to July for the next three. With the formation of the Tournament Players Division in late 1968, now thePGA Tour, the PGA Championship moved to August in1969 and, except for the1971 edition, held in late February to avoid the summer heat ofFlorida, continued to be held during that month until2018. From2019 it is held in May.
Tiger Woods came closest to winning a modern Grand Slam by holding all four major titles at the same time. He won all four major championships consecutively – theU.S. Open,Open Championship, andPGA Championship in2000, and the2001Masters – but not in the same calendar year. This has been called theTiger Slam.[5] In fact, even before Woods accomplished this, there was much debate over the definition of "Grand Slam."Fred Couples said, "I don't know how I can put it more simply . . . if he wins all four, it's a Slam."
Only six golfers have won all four of golf's modern majors at any time during their careers, an achievement which is often referred to as aCareer Grand Slam:Gene Sarazen,Ben Hogan,Gary Player,Jack Nicklaus,Tiger Woods, andRory McIlroy. Woods and Nicklaus have won each of the four majors at least three times.
The term also refers to a former tour tournament, thePGA Grand Slam of Golf, an annual off-season tournament, that was cancelled after the 2014 tournament, contested by the winners of the four major championships.
| Most overall ‡ |
| Player | Major titles | Grand slams | U.S. Amateur | U.S. Open | The Open | The Amateur |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 13 | 1: 1930 | 5: 1924, 1925, 1927, 1928, 1930 ‡ | 4: 1923, 1926, 1929, 1930 ‡ | 3: 1926, 1927, 1930 | 1: 1930 |
Years inbold denotes win that completed the career Grand Slam.
| Player | Major titles | The Open | U.S. Open | PGA | Western Open | Canadian Open | Metropolitan Open |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3 | 1:1931 | 1: 1927 | 1: 1930 | 1: 1929 | 1: 1930 | 1: 1928 | |
| 11 | 4: 1922, 1924, 1928, 1929 | 2: 1914, 1919 | 5: 1921, 1924, 1925, 1926, 1927 ‡ | 5: 1916, 1921, 1926, 1927, 1932 | 1:1931 | 3: 1916, 1919, 1920 |
Years inbold denotes win that completed the career Grand Slam.Number denotes which of multiple Grand slams was completed by winning this event.
| Player | Major titles | Career Grand Slams | Masters | U.S. Open | The Open | PGA | Years to complete 1st Grand Slam[6] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 | 1 | 1:1935 | 2: 1922, 1932 | 1: 1932 | 3: 1922, 1923, 1933 | 14: 1922–1935 | |
| 9 | 1 | 2: 1951, 1953 | 4: 1948, 1950, 1951, 1953 ‡ | 1:1953 | 2: 1946, 1948 | 8: 1946–1953 | |
| 9 | 1 | 3: 1961, 1974, 1978 | 1:1965 | 3: 1959, 1968, 1974 | 2: 1962, 1972 | 7: 1959–1965 | |
| 18 ‡ | 3 ‡ | 6: 1963, 1965, 1966, 1972, 1975, 1986 ‡ | 4: 1962, 1967, 1972, 1980 ‡ | 3:19661, 1970,19783 | 5: 1963,19712, 1973, 1975, 1980 ‡ | 5: 1962–1966 | |
| 15 | 3 ‡ | 5: 1997, 2001, 2002, 2005, 2019 | 3: 2000, 2002,20083 | 3:20001,20052, 2006 | 4: 1999, 2000, 2006, 2007 | 4: 1997–2000 | |
| 5 | 1 | 1:2025 | 1: 2011 | 1: 2014 | 2: 2012, 2014 | 15: 2011–2025 |
Several players in the modern era have been one major championship short of completing the career grand slam, having never won (those in italics remain active as of 2025):
Tommy Armour (3),Jim Barnes (4) andWalter Hagen (11) also won three of the four but were in the twilight of their careers when the Masters Tournament was founded and would not have been expected to win at that time.



Women's golf also has a set ofmajors. No woman has completed a calendar year four-major Grand Slam, butBabe Zaharias won all three majors contested in1950 andSandra Haynie won both majors in1974.
Seven women have completed the Career Grand Slam by winning four different majors. There are variations in the set of four tournaments involved as the players played in different eras, and the women's tournaments defined as "majors" have varied considerably over time in a way that has not been paralleled in the men's game. The seven arePat Bradley,Juli Inkster,Inbee Park,Annika Sörenstam,Louise Suggs,Karrie Webb, andMickey Wright. Webb is separately recognized by the LPGA as its only "Super Career Grand Slam" winner, for she is the only one of the group to have won five different tournaments recognized as majors.
Although other women's tours, notably theLadies European Tour (LET) and theLPGA of Japan Tour, recognize a different set of "majors", theU.S. LPGA is so dominant in global women's golf that the phrase "women's majors", without further qualification, is almost universally considered as a reference to the U.S. LPGA majors.
The five current major championships are:
| Most overall ‡ |
| Player | Major titles | Career slams | Chevron | LPGA | U.S. Women's Open | du Maurier | Women's Open |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 | 1 | 2: 2000, 2006 | 1: 2001 | 2: 2000, 2001 | 1: 1999 | 1: 2002 |
| Player | Major titles | Career slams | Women's Western | LPGA | U.S. Women's Open | Titleholders |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 13 | 2 ‡ | 3: 1962, 1963, 1966 | 4: 1958, 1960, 1961, 1963 ‡ | 4: 1958, 1959, 1961, 1964 ‡ | 2: 1961, 1962 | |
| 11 | 1 | 4: 1946, 1947, 1949, 1953 | 1: 1957 | 2: 1949, 1952 | 4: 1946, 1954, 1956, 1959 |
| Player | Major titles | Career slams | Kraft Nabisco | LPGA | U.S. Women's Open | du Maurier |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 | 1 | 2: 1984, 1989 | 2: 1999, 2000 | 2: 1999, 2002 | 1: 1984 | |
| 6 | 1 | 1: 1986 | 1: 1986 | 1: 1981 | 3: 1980, 1985, 1986 ‡ |
| Player | Major titles | Career slams | Kraft Nabisco | LPGA | U.S. Women's Open | Women's Open |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | 1 | 3: 2001, 2002, 2005 ‡ | 3: 2003, 2004, 2005 | 3: 1995, 1996, 2006 | 1: 2003 |
| Player | Major titles | Career slams | Chevron | Women's PGA | U.S. Women's Open | Women's Open | The Evian Championship |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 | 1 | 1: 2013 | 3: 2013, 2014, 2015 | 2: 2008, 2013 | 1: 2015 | – |
A Inbee Park is recognized as achieving the career Grand Slam for winning four different major championships, even though The Evian Championship had since been designated as the fifth major championship.[8]
Senior (i.e., 50 and over) men's golf also has a set ofmajors. Like the women's majors, the senior majors are not globally recognized. However, because the U.S.-basedPGA Tour Champions overwhelmingly dominates worldwide senior golf, its roster of majors is by far the most widely recognized.
Unlike the mainstream men's and women's (until 2013) Grand Slams, the senior version (as recognized by PGA Tour Champions) now contains five events.
In the current order of play, the five majors are:
The Senior PGA is by far the oldest of the senior majors, having been founded in 1937, decades before the establishment of PGA Tour Champions (as the Senior PGA Tour) in1980. The other events were all founded in the 1980s—the U.S. Senior Open in 1980, the Senior Players Championship in1983, The Senior Open in 1987, and The Tradition in1989. This era saw senior golf became a commercial success as the first golf stars of the television era, such asArnold Palmer andGary Player, reached their fifties. The Senior Open, however, was not recognized as a U.S. senior major until2003.
The stability of the majors in senior golf falls somewhere between mainstream men's golf and the LPGA:
No man has ever won all of the senior majors contested in a year, even in the period between 1980 and 1982 when only two senior majors existed.Bernhard Langer is the only man to have won all five of the current senior majors in his career, having completed the career Slam by winning both the Senior PGA Championship and Senior Open Championship in 2017.Miller Barber won both of the 1980-1982 senior majors, the Senior PGA and U.S. Senior Open, during that time span, and won the inaugural Senior Players Championship in 1983. Those three tournaments would be the only senior majors until The Tradition was first played in 1989. Prior to the founding of The Tradition, Palmer and Player also completed that era's Career Senior Grand Slam. However, neither Barber, Palmer, nor Player would ever win The Tradition.
Jack Nicklaus is the only other player to have completed any era's Career Senior Grand Slam, doing so in his first two years on the Senior Tour. In his first year of eligibility in1990, he won The Tradition and the Senior Players Championship.The next year, he defended his Tradition title and went on to win the Senior PGA and U.S. Senior Open. However, he failed to defend his Senior Players title and thus missed out on a calendar-year Grand Slam.
Langer and Nicklaus are the only players to have won four or more different senior majors in their careers. Although Nicklaus never won The Senior Open, that event was not recognized as a U.S. senior major until 2003, which was also the only year he played the event. Player won The Senior Open three times before 2003, when it was considered a major by theEuropean Senior Tour but not the circuit now known as PGA Tour Champions.
| Most overall ‡ |
| Player | Senior majors | Career Sr slams | Tradition | Senior PGA | U.S. Senior Open | Senior Players | Senior Open |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 12‡ | 1 | 2: 2016, 2017 | 1: 2017 | 2: 2010, 2023 | 3‡: 2014, 2015, 2016 | 4‡: 2010, 2014, 2017, 2019 | |
| 8 | 1 | 4‡: 1990, 1991, 1995, 1996 | 1: 1991 | 2: 1991, 1993 | 1: 1990 | Not recognised as a major at the time |