Most Majors in Golf: The All-Time List

Jack Nicklaus has won the most professional majors in golf history, with 18 titles captured across the Masters, U.S. Open, Open Championship and PGA Championship between 1962 and 1986. Tiger Woods is second with 15, the only player to seriously threaten the record in the modern era.

Majors are how golf keeps its history. A player can win dozens of regular tour events and still be judged largely on how many of the four biggest tournaments they claimed, which makes this leaderboard the most important in the sport. Here is the full list of the greatest major champions, the eras behind them, and why Nicklaus’s 18 has proven so hard to reach. All figures are through the 2025 season.

The record holder: Jack Nicklaus and 18 majors

Nicklaus won his majors over an extraordinary 24-year span, from the 1962 U.S. Open to the 1986 Masters, which he claimed at age 46 as the oldest champion in the tournament’s history. His total breaks down as six Masters, five PGA Championships, four U.S. Opens and three Open Championships, a spread that shows he could win on any type of course.

Just as telling as his 18 wins are his 19 runner-up finishes in majors, the most ever. That consistency, contending almost every time he teed it up in a major for two decades, is why his record is regarded as the hardest in golf to break.

The full leaderboard of major champions

The table below ranks the men’s professional major champions by total wins.

Rank	Majors	Golfer	Country	Span
1	18	Jack Nicklaus	United States	1962-1986
2	15	Tiger Woods	United States	1997-2019
3	11	Walter Hagen	United States	1914-1929
4	9	Ben Hogan	United States	1946-1953
4	9	Gary Player	South Africa	1959-1978
6	8	Tom Watson	United States	1975-1983
7	7	Arnold Palmer	United States	1958-1964
7	7	Gene Sarazen	United States	1922-1935
7	7	Sam Snead	United States	1942-1954
7	7	Harry Vardon	England	1896-1914
7	7	Bobby Jones*	United States	1923-1930

*Bobby Jones won his majors as an amateur; some of the earliest totals vary depending on how pre-1934 majors are counted.

The list is a tour through golf history, from Vardon and Sarazen in the game’s early decades, through Hogan, Snead and Palmer, to Watson, Nicklaus and Woods in the modern era.

Tiger Woods and the modern chase

Tiger Woods’s 15 majors make him the only player of the past half-century to approach Nicklaus. He won at least three of each major, completed the career grand slam three times over, and at his peak held all four titles at once across 2000 and 2001, the feat nicknamed the “Tiger Slam.” His comeback win at the 2019 Masters, after years of injury, added a 15th major many thought he would never reach. For how a single Augusta title fits into a legacy, see our guide to the most Masters wins.

The four majors and the grand slam

Winning all four different majors at least once is its own landmark, known as the career grand slam. Only a handful of men have done it, and Nicklaus and Woods are both among them. Our explainer on the career grand slam in golf breaks down that exclusive club, while our guide to the golf majors in order covers when each tournament is played through the season.

Why the record matters

Majors are the currency of golf greatness, so a player’s total is often the first and last word in any all-time debate. Nicklaus’s 18, gathered with a consistency no one has matched, is the number every ambitious golfer measures themselves against, and the fact that even Tiger Woods fell three short shows just how formidable it is.

The short version: Jack Nicklaus has won the most majors in golf with 18, ahead of Tiger Woods’s 15 and Walter Hagen’s 11. Ben Hogan and Gary Player share fourth on nine. Nicklaus’s record has stood since 1986 and remains golf’s defining benchmark through the 2025 season.