With an overall purse of $12 million, $1 million more than a year ago, the 2024 U.S. Women’s Open has the biggest prize money payout of an women’s tournament in golf history. As you let that impressive fact settle in, what makes it even more remarkable is that just three years ago, the purse in the same championship was just $5.5 million.
The exponential increase is a testament to the powers that be involved in women’s golf recognizing the need to better reward the game’s best players on the game’s biggest stages. The total amount of prize money being played for on the LPGA Tour in 2024 is up to nearly $124 million, compared to $88.9 million in 2022. And the purses in the other four women’s majors have also seen similar growth in recent years. Take a look:
KPMG Women’s PGA Championship: $10 million in 2024, $4.5 million in 2021
AIG Women’s Open: $9 million in 2023; $4.5 million in 2020
Chevron Championship: $7.9 million in 2024; $3.1 million in 2021
Evian Championship: $6.5 million in 2023; $4.5 million in 2021
As for the winner’s payday in the U.S. Women’s Open, the champion on Sunday at Pennsylvania’s Lancaster Country Club will earn a record $2.4 million. Interestingly, the USGA decided to increase the winner’s payday in relation to the rest of the field, giving the champ 20 percent of the overall payout compared to 18 percent in previous years and the typical 15 percent on the LPGA Tour. Even if you don’t make the cut at the U.S. Women’s Open, you’re still walking away with a nice return: $10,000, a doubling of the “stipend” given to pros leaving after 36 holes compared to a year ago.
We’ve charted the growth in the U.S. Women’s Open before, but it’s worth showing again if only to remind everyone that that the overall purse for the U.S. Women’s Open didn’t pass $10,000 until 1965, the 20th year of the championship. And a winner of the major didn’t make $10,000 until 1977.
Here’s a historic look at the prize money payouts in the championship for context about this year’s historic payday:
YEAR: WINNER, OVERALL PURSE, WINNER’S SHARE
1947: Betty Jameson, $7,500, $1,200
1966: Sandra Spuzich, $20,000 $4,000
1975: Sandra Palmer, $55,000, $8,044
1977: Hollis Stacy, $75,000, $11,040
1978: Hollis Stacy, $100,000, $15,000
1990: Betsy King, $500,000, $85,000
1995: Annika Sorenstam, $1 million, $175,000
2000: Karrie Webb, $2.75 million, $500,000
2014: Michelle Wie, $4 million, $720,000
2017: Sung-Hyun Park, $5 million, $900,000
2019: Jeuong Lee6, $5.5 million, $1 million
2022: Minjee Lee, $10 million, $1.8 million
2023: Allisen Corpuz, $11 million, $2 million
The full prize money payout breakdown for this year’s championship was released Saturday morning. You can see it below. We’ll update this list when this year’s is announced and then update things again after the the finish of the championship on Sunday and we’ll update with individual names and official totals.
