Learn golf, from the first tee.

Read these pages in order if you are starting from nothing. They explain what happens on a golf course and why, before anyone talks about how to swing a club. When you are ready for more, the Rules section covers the situations golfers meet most often, the technique section sets out the principles coaches and researchers describe, and the glossary explains the vocabulary.

The shortest possible version

• Under the 2023 Rules of Golf (Rule 1.1), golf is played over a round of 18 holes or fewer by striking a ball with a club. Each hole starts with a stroke from the teeing area and ends when the ball is holed on the putting green.
• The two core principles in Rule 1.1 are to play the course as you find it and to play the ball as it lies, with exceptions where the Rules allow something else.
• Golfers apply their own penalties. The Rules say this is so that nobody gains an advantage over the other players.
• There are two forms of play under Rule 3.1a: match play, where you win, lose or tie each hole against an opponent, and stroke play, where everyone is ranked by total strokes, penalty strokes included.
• Rule 2.2 divides the course into five defined areas: the general area, the teeing area, penalty areas, bunkers and the putting green.
• A handicap lets players of different standards compete fairly. The World Handicap System (WHS), launched in January 2020, was used in 125 countries by November 2023, according to the R&A.

Whose rules?

Golf has a single set of Rules, written jointly by the R&A and the USGA. According to Wikipedia, the USGA governs the game in the United States and Mexico and the R&A governs it everywhere else, with both applying the same code. The R&A's guide to the Rules says the current edition took effect in January 2023 for golfers worldwide.

So every page here names its edition: the 2023 Rules of Golf, in effect from 1 January 2023. In an article of 14 January 2026, the R&A said the next edition is due on 1 January 2028. Committees that run courses and competitions can also adopt Local Rules, including the Model Local Rules the governing bodies publish. A Model Local Rule applies only when a Committee adopts it, so the notice board and the Terms of the Competition always come first.

Handicaps have their own rule book, the Rules of Handicapping, which sets out the World Handicap System. The R&A says the WHS launched in January 2020, and the R&A and USGA announced the first set of revisions, the 2024 revisions, in November 2023. The handicaps page explains the formulas and the dates.

How many people play

The R&A's 2025 Global Participation Report, announced in an R&A article of 4 June 2026, counted 112.2 million adults and juniors playing golf in some form outside the United States and Mexico. For the United States, the National Golf Foundation reported 48.1 million people aged 6 and over playing on or off course in 2025, and at least 3 million on-course beginners every year since 2020. A lot of people are new to the game, and these pages are written with them in mind.

Where to go next

Start with how golf works, then the course and the scoring terms you will hear on any broadcast. Formats of play covers Stableford, foursomes, four-ball and the rest. If you are about to play a new course, the course handicap calculator works out how many strokes you receive. If you want to take up the game, getting started and juniors set out the routes in.