Most Open Championship Wins in Golf

Harry Vardon has the most Open Championship wins in golf history, with six Claret Jugs claimed between 1896 and 1914. Four golfers share second place with five wins each, J.H. Taylor, James Braid, Peter Thomson and Tom Watson, but none has matched Vardon’s total in the more than a century since.

The Open Championship, first played in 1860, is golf’s oldest major and the only one staged outside the United States, on the windswept links courses of Britain. Winning it repeatedly means mastering conditions that change by the hour, which makes the players at the top of this list a special breed. Here is the full list of multiple Open winners, the records around them, and why six still stands, all figures through 2025.

The record holder: Harry Vardon and six Claret Jugs

Vardon won his six Opens across nearly two decades, from 1896 to 1914, a span that speaks to his longevity as much as his brilliance. He was the defining figure of golf’s Great Triumvirate alongside Taylor and Braid, and the overlapping grip he popularized, still called the Vardon grip, remains the standard today.

Six wins at the sport’s oldest championship is a record that has survived every era since, through the game’s expansion, equipment revolutions and global stars. No one has reached it, which is what makes Vardon’s mark so durable.

The full list of multiple champions

The table below shows every golfer with four or more Open Championship titles.

Wins	Golfer	Era
6	Harry Vardon	1896-1914
5	J.H. Taylor	1894-1913
5	James Braid	1901-1910
5	Peter Thomson	1954-1965
5	Tom Watson	1975-1983
4	Old Tom Morris	1861-1867
4	Young Tom Morris	1868-1872
4	Walter Hagen	1922-1929
4	Bobby Locke	1949-1957

Vardon stands alone at six. The four players on five span more than 80 years of golf, and the group on four includes the Morris father and son who helped invent the championship itself.

The chasers on five

The four golfers tied on five wins each tell the story of different golfing ages. Taylor and Braid, with Vardon, formed the Great Triumvirate that ruled the game around 1900. Peter Thomson dominated the 1950s links game with his precise, controlled style. Tom Watson won five Opens between 1975 and 1983 and nearly added a sixth at age 59 in 2009, falling agonizingly short in a playoff.

Any of them reaching Vardon’s six would have tied the oldest record in major golf. That none did, despite their brilliance, underscores how high the bar sits.

The four-win legends

The group on four is a who’s who of golf history. Old Tom Morris and his son Young Tom Morris won eight Opens between them in the championship’s earliest years, when the field was tiny and the courses raw. Walter Hagen brought American flair in the 1920s, and Bobby Locke’s smooth putting carried him to four titles around 1950.

Below them, a long list of three-time champions includes Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Seve Ballesteros, Nick Faldo and Tiger Woods, an illustration of just how hard the Open is to win even three times.

Why Open wins matter

The Open rewards a particular kind of golf, patient, creative and unbothered by wind and rain, so a big Open tally signals a complete player. It sits alongside the sport’s other defining win records, from the most Masters wins at Augusta to team golf’s showpiece covered in our look at the most Ryder Cup wins. Together they map the different challenges that separate golf’s greatest champions.

The short version: Harry Vardon has the most Open Championship wins with six, a record standing since 1914, with Taylor, Braid, Thomson and Watson tied on five, all figures through 2025.