Who is going to be on the PGA Tour in 2028, when everything changes?
We won’t know the complete roster until the 2027 season wraps up, of course. But as of Tuesday morning we know how most players will qualify — and we can see that, even a year-plus out, quite a few already have.
To catch you up: In 2028 the PGA Tour is being bifurcated into two tiers: an elite “Championship Series” comprised of roughly 120 players and a secondary “Challenger Series” comprised of everybody else. That much we’ve known for months. But we didn’t know all the specifics until, following the latest rounds of committee meetings and approval votes, the Tour released its updated policies, which you can see in their entirety here.
Following that release, Tour CEO Brian Rolapp took questions from media, which ranged from the big-picture (what to do about LIV golfers?) to the inane (how will points be allocated in a “last chance” fall series that doesn’t even really exist yet?). But Rolapp is effective at distilling what’s important, which he did in opening remarks like these:
“For our players, there is now a clear understanding of the pathways available to them, both as we transition to the new competitive structure and for the future. As for our fans and partners, this provides a clear understanding of what is at stake each week and how players can earn their way into the highest level of competition.”
Rolapp was right. Overall, the announcement clarified and simplified the Tour’s intricate competitive structure, which means success; that was the goal of the entire process. If, say, a friend asked you to explain which golfers will be on the Championship Series versus the Challenger Series, the basic formula is as follows:
-The top 90 players on the Championship Series will retain membership year over year
-The top 20 players from the second-tier Challenger Series get promoted to the Championship Series
And there you have it. Big-picture, that’s the vision.
But this is professional golf, which has always been a patchwork quilt of qualifiers, exemptions, memberships, invitations and loopholes. So although this new system will have fewer of those sorts of things — head-scratchers like Vijay Singh stepping into a one-off PGA Tour start, or Blades Brown wondering which tour he should be competing on in a given week, or endless scrutiny around sponsor invites — the transition to the new system still has more than a few interesting details tucked into its corners. Here are 10 that caught my eye — and hopefully help paint a picture of the new system.
1. Thirty players can already book travel for 2028
I guess they can’t charter their jets just yet, given the Championship Series schedule still includes some TBDs — Rolapp said they’re fielding final bids from presenting sponsors this month — but one interesting eligibility detail is that every player who qualified for the 2026 Tour Championship is guaranteed a spot in the Championship Series, whether or not they won on Tour this season.
This is in place to continue the established two-year Tour exemption for the 30 players who made it to East Lake. But because there are now going to be two Tours, it should come as comforting news to these 30 that they’ll be exempt to the better one. That means we’re already guaranteed to see Tour mainstays like Adam Scott, Patrick Cantlay, Robert MacIntyre and Sam Burns as well as players who had their best seasons yet like Min Woo Lee, Ryan Gerard, Si Woo Kim and Alex Smalley on the top tier in 2028.
The entire PGA Tour playoff system is going through an overhaul, so this is the last chance for this particular exemption category; good on these guys for taking advantage.
2. Eight more golden tickets are up for grabs this fall
Because the Tour is incorporating these changes in real time, the transition is inevitably a mix of old ways and new. That means grandfathering in two-year win exemptions from all kinds of Tour events. And that means every winner from the 2026 PGA Tour season will get a berth on the Championship Series in 2028.
Those winners include some brand-name pros like Justin Rose and Collin Morikawa as well as rising stars like Michael Thorbjornsen and Jackson Koivun. But there have been other winners, too, who didn’t make the Tour Championship and may have in fact slipped your mind, like opposite-field champs Brandt Snedeker, Steven Fisk and Ricky Castillo, who will get some extra mileage out of their victories.
There’s another interesting version of these exemptions: Under the old rules, wins were worth a two-year exemption and additional wins meant you could stack more years on top. Under that system, Max Homa’s victories have him qualified for the 2028 season, even though he hasn’t won since 2023. (He was doing a lot of winning at the time.) Brian Campbell is in for 2028, too, thanks to his unlikely two-win 2025 season. There will be no win-stacking in the future system, so good on these guys for taking advantage.
But now that eligibility is out in the open, it’s confirmed that this fall’s events — beginning with this week’s inaugural Biltmore Championship, then continuing through Utah, Japan, Bermuda, Mexico, Austin and Sea Island — will come with a massive added perk in the way of a 2028 Championship Series berth.
“Try to win” doesn’t seem like particularly helpful advice for pro golfers, but that’s what I’d tell everybody in this week’s field — and the next seven, too.
3. Aaron Rai picked a good year to win a major
Under the current system, major champions (and Players champions) have received five-year PGA Tour exemptions. The new structure will grandfather in those exemptions. That’s great news for every recent major champ, but it’s especially good news for first-time major champs like this year’s PGA winner, Aaron Rai, and Open champ Ryan Fox. Those two (plus Masters champ Rory McIlroy and U.S. Open winner Wyndham Clark) will now be eligible on the Championship Series until 2031.
That’s especially valuable considering the exemption structure going forward, in which major wins (as well as Championship Series wins) will be rewarded with two-year exemptions. In other words, Rai’s win gives him longer job security on Tour than whoever wins the 2028 PGA Championship. (They’d be exempt through 2030.)
They say timing is everything.
4. Jon Rahm and Bryson DeChambeau’s futures remain a mystery
Rolapp addressed LIV in his opening remarks on Tuesday morning. Given the collapse of its financials, the cancelation of events and its recent entry into bankruptcy, it’s safe to say that LIV faces an uncertain future. It turns out the prospects of its stars returning to the PGA Tour are uncertain, too.
Rolapp referenced “accountability and discipline” in declaring that the Tour is not currently considering a returning-member program. In other words, the door Brooks Koepka used to reenter the Tour earlier this season — which was also extended to Cameron Smith, Jon Rahm and Bryson DeChambeau — may now be closed.
But just how closed? There’s still some question as to what penalties await LIV defectors. If they didn’t return to LIV, could Rahm and DeChambeau serve out a year’s suspension from the PGA Tour in 2027 and then in 2028 lean on their recent major wins (Rahm at the 2023 Masters, DeChambeau at the 2024 U.S. Open) to grant them access to the Championship Series? It’s hardly out of the question.
The Tour has made it clear that they won’t have official discussions with any player still under contract with LIV, so there’s no way to know how they’d handle this hypothetical. But it sits at the center of several coexisting unresolved eligibility questions.
5. Brooks Koepka left LIV at the right time
Even though Koepka didn’t have the season he wanted on Tour — he called his 94th-place FedEx Cup finish “pathetic” — he has reason to celebrate: Because of his five-year exemption for winning the 2023 PGA Championship, he’s onto the Championship Series in 2028. It also allows him to maintain his Career Money List exemption for further down the line, but more on that in a minute.
Other ex-LIV pros may have made their moves at the perfect time, too. Patrick Reed is currently in position to earn his spot back on the PGA Tour via the DP World Tour and may well be in all next year’s Signature Events; he’ll likely be on the Championship Series in 2028.
Kevin Na may be in prime position, too. I’m waiting to hear back from the PGA Tour on the specifics surrounding his case, but if he’s deemed eligible to play a full schedule next season, he could find himself on the Championship Series in 2028, too. Because…
6. The Career Money List option means guaranteed big names
Under the existing rules, if you’re inside the top 50 on the career money list, you have a one-year exemption you can deploy to keep your status. If you’re inside the top 25, you have an additional exemption. This has been one of the ways the Tour protects its existing stars.
Those exemptions will live on with “guardrails” around them, per one Tour official. Here’s how: Anybody who has a top 25 or top 50 exemption remaining can use it to get onto the Championship Series for 2028, provided he plays at least 15 PGA Tour events in 2027.
That means a sigh of relief for anyone from Jordan Spieth (No. 10 on the career money list that doesn’t include LIV pros, which is the one I believe they’re using, though I’m waiting for confirmation there, too) to Jason Day (No. 12) to Matt Kuchar (No. 14) to Rickie Fowler (No. 15) to Tony Finau (No. 23) to veteran pros like Lucas Glover (No. 34) and Billy Horschel (No. 35).
Could things get weird with these exemptions? In theory, they could. There are a few older players whose eyes could light up at the prospect of the Championship Series, choose to play more full time on Tour in 2027 and then deploy exemptions for 2028, like Zach Johnson (No. 20). But I don’t think we’ll actually see much of this. Johnson, for instance, played just four PGA Tour events this year, opting instead for full-time dominance on PGA Tour Champions. It’s unlikely he’d suddenly return. (Same goes for Singh, who caused a stir this winter but went on to play…zero additional PGA Tour events.)
7. Tiger Woods could theoretically play in 2028
Coincidentally, also on Tuesday morning Tiger Woods was filmed hitting balls at Liberty National in New Jersey ahead of the Nexus Cup, an event he hosts that benefits his foundation. It was the first time we’d seen Woods in a golf setting since his March car crash and everything that came after.
While the Signature Event system had a special Woods eligibility carve-out, this one doesn’t. And nobody expects Woods to tee it up 15 times in 2027. But he could get a medical exemption next year to bypass that 15-event requirement — and then use a Career Milestone exemption to play whichever events he chooses to in 2028.
8. Cuts are back. Way back
Several years ago, as the Tour scrambled to respond to LIV, it established its structure of Signature Events, which were set up as limited-field, no-cut events that promised extra perks to top players. Cuts vanished from some of the Tour’s biggest events.
But now? Cuts aren’t just back — they’re stronger than ever.
Not only is the Tour doubling down on larger fields and reinstating cuts in every event, they’ve also restructured their points system to emphasize making the cut.
This is a change from previous years; the FedEx Cup has notoriously rewarded players who “spike” and record a few high finishes throughout the year. The new system seems more obsessed with consistency; players will rack up points via made cuts, and the standings we’ll get at season’s end may be slightly more fair, if less volatile.
9. Majors? They’re not exactly emphasized in the new system
Rolapp certainly hasn’t declared war on golf’s majors. But he hasn’t knelt at their throne, either. The new system shrugs at the idea that majors need always be placed on their own pedestal; here they’re awarded the same number of points as every other event on the Championship Series calendar, and winning one yields the same two-year exemption as winning any other event.
When Rolapp was asked about the decision, he emphasized a “simple point system” and “more consistent fields.” Chief Competitions Officer Tyler Dennis doubled down on that idea.
“The simplicity and the meritocracy of it were the two factors that the members of the Future Competition Committee really focused on, and as Brian said, you’ve got the best players in the world competing against each other each week,” he said.
The majors are still going to be the majors; no PGA Tour point allocation decision will change that. But it does seem to send a message. It has always been a fascinating dynamic that the Tour doesn’t own any of the sport’s four biggest tournaments. With this new system, it’s clear the Tour is trying to juice up its own events — not to make them majors, but at least to keep them in closer proximity.
10. There’s still a massive DP World Tour question
Tuesday’s announcement included details on promotion from the Challenger Series, it included mention of the Korn Ferry Tour and of PGA Tour Americas and it even detailed exemptions for college players. But what of the Tour’s strategic partner, the DP World Tour?
“We’re also thinking through and haven’t made any decisions on how the DP World Tour will fit into that,” Rolapp said. “You notice that’s not part of the announcement. That’s very much under discussion both internally and as we continue our discussions with the DP World Tour.”
Rolapp added later that he fully expects a pathway to continue from the DP World Tour directly to the Championship Series, even if it’s a smaller number of players than the 10 who currently get Tour cards. But at the moment the relationship with the DP World Tour — and what that means for LIV golfers, and LIV 2.0, and returning players, and Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton and Joaquin Niemann and more — is high on the list of things we don’t yet know.
Luckily we still have a year-plus to get the details ironed out.
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