Every British Open Champion Since 1860, and Who Has Won the Most

Who has won the most Open Championships

Taylor and Braid won theirs in Vardon's era, Thomson his from 1954 to 1965 and Watson his from 1975 to 1983. Walter Hagen and Bobby Locke have four, as do Willie Park Sr., Old Tom Morris and his son, Young Tom, who won 12 of the first 15 Opens between them.

Vardon's six match Jack Nicklaus's record at the Masters. Twenty-seven players have won The Open more than once, 89 times in all, and 65 have won it once. No one has won a second since Ernie Els in 2012: the last 13 Opens went to 13 first-time Open champions, the longest such run since 1860.

British Open champions by year, 1860 to 2026

The Open was played over 36 holes until 1891 and over 72 since; none was held in 1871, 1915-19, 1940-45 or 2020.

British Open winners by country

Scots won the first 29 Opens. John Ball, an English amateur, broke the run in 1890, and Arnaud Massy of France became the first champion from outside Britain in 1907. Americans first won in 1921 and have 49 wins in all, ahead of Scotland's 41, England's 28 and 10 each for South Africa and Australia. No Scot has won since Paul Lawrie in 1999, and no Englishman since Nick Faldo in 1992.

The American share has come in waves:

• 1921 to 1933: 12 of the 13 Opens
• 1934 to 1959: two of 20
• 1960 to 1983: 16 of 24
• 1984 to 1999: five of 16
• 2000 to 2026: 14 of 26, including four of the six played this decade

British Open courses: the rota and who won where

Fourteen courses have staged The Open. St. Andrews leads with 30, the latest Cameron Smith's win in 2022, ahead of Prestwick, the first host, with 24, then Muirfield (16), Royal St. George's (15) and Royal Liverpool (13). Royal Portrush has had three, most recently Scottie Scheffler's in 2025.

Watson is the only player to win on five courses, from Carnoustie to Royal Birkdale. Park and the Morrises won all 12 of their Opens at Prestwick, and five players have won twice at St. Andrews, most recently Tiger Woods, in 2000 and 2005.

Winning scores and margins at The Open

The 72-hole winning total has fallen from an average of 315 strokes in the 1890s to 269 in the 2020s. Taylor's 326 in 1894 is the highest and Henrik Stenson's 264, 20 under par, in 2016 the lowest. Since 2000 champions have averaged 11 under par, from 9.1 under in 2000-08 to 13.4 under in 2018-26, as our study of major winning scores shows.

Old Tom Morris won by 13 shots in 1862 and Young Tom by 12 in 1870, over 36 holes; over 72, the record is eight, by Taylor in 1900 and 1913, Braid in 1908 and Woods in 2000. But 33 Opens were won by one shot and 21 ended in a tie: 54 of the 154, 35 percent, were decided by a stroke or less.

Winning all week: champions who broke 70 every round

Few champions go low on all four days. Of the 123 Opens played over 72 holes, from 1892, only seven were won with every round under 70, and none of them came in the first 90, through 1992. Greg Norman did it in 1993, Nick Price in 1994, Tiger Woods in 2000, Henrik Stenson in 2016, Jordan Spieth in 2017, Collin Morikawa in 2021 and Scottie Scheffler in 2025, four of them in the last 10 Opens. Loosen the test to a worst round of 70 and the count is 15: five in the first 90 Opens, five in the 23 from 1993 to 2015 and five in the last 10, about one champion in 18 until 1992 and one in two since 2016. These are raw round scores from the leaderboards behind this list, not scores to par, because par changes from course to course; Fox, who opened with a 72, is in neither group.

British Open playoffs and 54-hole leaders

The first tie, in 1876, had no playoff: Davie Strath refused to play one and Bob Martin was declared champion. Willie Fernie won the first, over Bob Ferguson in 1883, and 19 more have followed, the last Zach Johnson's at St. Andrews in 2015, as our history of major playoffs details.

Since 1892 the leader after 54 holes, alone or tied, has won 69 of 123 Opens, 56 percent, but since 2000 only 14 of 26, the lowest rate of the four majors in our analysis of 54-hole leaders. The biggest comeback is Lawrie's at Carnoustie in 1999, from 10 shots behind Jean van de Velde, who had led by five.

First-time winners and the youngest and oldest Open champions

Thirteen of the 26 Opens since 2000 went to a first-time major winner, as our study of first-time major winners found, and 68 of all 154 did. Amateurs won six, the last three by Bobby Jones, in 1926, 1927 and 1930.

Young Tom Morris is the youngest champion, 17 years and 156 days old in 1868, and his father the oldest, 46 years and 102 days in 1867. Since 1900 the youngest is Seve Ballesteros, 22 in 1979, and the oldest Roberto De Vicenzo, 44 in 1967. Ben Hogan in 1953, Nicklaus in 1966 and Woods in 2000 completed the career Grand Slam at The Open.

Ryan Fox and the 2026 British Open

Fox opened with a 72 at Royal Birkdale, shot 62 in the third round and started the last day two shots behind Sam Burns. He closed with a 68, holing a birdie putt on the 18th to win by one from Young, who shot 64. It was one of three 62s that week, matching the lowest round in Open history, Branden Grace's in 2017. At 39, Fox is New Zealand's first champion since Bob Charles in 1963.

The 155th Open returns to St. Andrews for the 31st time in the week of July 11 to 18, 2027, according to the R&A. Our golf schedule has the tournaments left in 2026.

British Open champions: frequently asked questions

Who has won the most British Opens? Six wins make Harry Vardon the record holder, from 1896 to 1914; J.H. Taylor, James Braid, Peter Thomson and Tom Watson stopped at five.

Who won the 2026 British Open? Ryan Fox of New Zealand won it at Royal Birkdale at 10 under par, one stroke ahead of Cameron Young.

Has anyone won The Open four years in a row? One man has, Young Tom Morris, in 1868, 1869, 1870 and 1872. His third win let him keep the Challenge Belt, and with no trophy to play for there was no Open in 1871.

Where the numbers come from: the champion, total and margin of all 154 Opens, 1860 to 2026, and the 54-hole standings from 1892 come from the R&A's round-by-round leaderboards on theopen.com, with the PGA Tour's results for eight Opens and Wikipedia's for two that it lacks. They were checked against the R&A's list of champions, Wikipedia and the PGA Tour from 1934, which differ only in two totals on Wikipedia (1883 and 1909) and four PGA Tour leaderboards. Scores to par are used from 1984, when the sources agree on par. For the all-week count, the four round scores of each 72-hole Open come from the same leaderboards and add up to the champion's total in all 123. Ages are on the final day, from Wikipedia biographies (89 champions). Data collected November 2, 2026.