Prize money has never been so high, so who are the biggest money winners in women’s golf?
It was high to begin with but the emergence of LIV Golf has pushed the rewards to stratospheric levels.
LIV has nudged the PGA Tour, the PGA Tour has dragged the DP World Tour along with it, and demands for equivalence has meant that the women’s game purses have started to bulge, too.
But who in the women’s game has won the most?
The LPGA Tour, based in the United States, is the top level of the game and its prize money continues to be greater than in Europe, Japan and Korea.
The best way to establish the biggest earners in the game is to look at the LPGA’s career money list and it reveals a list of the game’s elite over the last 30 years.
Off-course earnings, plus winnings on other tours, will impact on entire totals, but this is a strong guide to who has pocketed how much.
1. Annika Sorenstam
- $22,583,693 in 307 starts ($73,562 per start)
It is only right that the Swede remains at the top of this list because she is the undoubted queen of the modern game.
And yet at first glance you’d never guess it. Her swing was simple and without anything remotely like explosiveness. But she was arrow straight and had a mind game that was relentless. She was, perhaps, the Bjorn Borg of the women’s game.
In all she won 96 tournaments worldwide which is female golf’s greatest tally.
72 of them were in LPGA events (third best of all-time) and she landed no less than 10 majors (winning the Chevron Champion, Women’s PGA Championship and US Women’s Open three times each). From the start of 2001 to victory in the 2006 US Women’s Open she played 23 majors, finished top five in 15 of them, and won eight. The best of the best.
2 Lydia Ko
- $21,001,801 in 256 starts ($82,038 per start)
When the Kiwi first emerged on the scene, winning an Australian event aged 14 to become the youngest-ever winner of a pro tournament, she looked, with her big smile, glasses and outrageous game, like the star of a Roald Dahl story. Her first win on the LPGA (at 15) was another youngest-ever record. So was her first major win at 18 (the 2015 Evian Championship).
She’s never quite lost that Dahl-like vibe even if the success, as superb as it has been, has never quite lived up to the initial promise. She’s a 23-time winner on the LPGA and three of those have been majors.
Now married, she has her eye on a future outside of golf and her last hurrah might have been a notable double in August 2024: gold at the Paris Olympics followed by Women’s Open triumph at the home of golf.
3. Karrie Webb
- $20,293,617 in 497 starts ($40,832 per start)
Questions of the greatest-ever Aussie golfer should always close on Greg Norman or Karrie Webb, and the latter really ought to win because the Queenslander was a 41-time winner on the LPGA and seven of those came in the majors.
Indeed, when she was at her best the Evian Championship was not a major so it is only fair to say that she completed the career grand slam (and even in the second year that it was a major she finished second).
The first six of her majors came in the four years from 1999 and it’s possible that she would have won even more majors (and titles) had she not been up against the force of nature that is Sorenstam.
4. Cristie Kerr
- $20,179,848 in 602 starts ($33,521 per start)
One of the great divisive characters in the women’s game yet also one of its gutsiest who topped the world rankings on three separate occasions.
She was a 20-time winner on the LPGA, including the 2007 US Women’s Open and the 2010 Women’s PGA Championship. A notably feisty player, especially in the Solheim Cup, she would frequently wind up her fellow competitors. She also appeared on The Apprentice with Donald Trump, whom she has supported.
5. Inbee Park
- $18,262,344 in 305 starts ($59,876 per start)
Winner of the 2008 US Women’s Open, Park really hit her straps between 2013 and 2015 when she won another six majors including the first three in 2013 (when she also briefly led the fourth, giving rise to talk of a grand slam).
She won 21 times in all on the LPGA and was World No. 1 in four stretches between 2013 and 2018. She was widely deemed to be the finest putter in the world at this time – not just in the women’s game, in the men’s too.
6. Minjee Lee
- $17,904,404 in 242 start ($73,985 per start)
The Aussie makes for a fantastic contrast with her brother Min Woo Lee. Where the latter is extrovert, the former is introvert. But she also wins more. Her brother has one win on the PGA Tour, Minjee has 11 victories on the LPGA, and three of them in the majors (three different ones, too, so she’s closing in on a career grand slam).
7. Amy Yang
- $16,053,483 in 363 starts ($44,224 per start)
One of the great mainstays of the women’s game. She first won on the Ladies European Tour aged 16 (then a record) and transferred her quality to the LPGA where she has racked up six wins including the 2024 Women’s PGA Championship, a major victory that topped and tailed a fine career.
Unlike many of her South Korean compatriots she has apparently remained impervious to the stresses and strains of life on the road.
8. Lexi Thompson
- $15,376,729 in 266 starts ($57,807 per start)
A darling of women’s golf in the States, Thompson is a remarkable phenomenon. When she appeared at the 2025 US Women’s Open, for example, it was her 19th consecutive start in the championship and yet she was only 30 years old at the time. Yes, she first played the event as a 12-year-old in 2007!
She turned pro three years later and enjoyed plenty of success but perhaps not as much as expected. She landed 11 LPGA wins, but one major win was less than her talent deserved. She had an enigmatic but thrilling long game, yet it was stymied by short putting woes. Now in semi-retirement she remains a fan favourite.
9. Nelly Korda
- $15,214,533 in 155 starts ($98,158 per start)
The daughter of Czech tennis legends (father Petr won the 1998 Australian Open, mother Regina played in the 1988 Olympics), her brother Sebastian plays on the ATP and he sister Jessica was also a winner on the LPGA.
Nelly, however, has usurped all of them. Her quality – and also modern prize money inflation – is revealed in her “per start” figure. She is a 15-time winner on the LPGA, a two-time major champion, and she also won the gold medal at the 2021 Olympics. Her star quality in the States had led to her appearing in the famous Sports Illustrated swimwear issue.
10. Lorena Ochoa
- $14,863,331 in 175 starts ($84,933 per start)
The World No. 1 for 158 consecutive weeks before her shock retirement in early 2010 at the age of 28. Mexico’s greatest-ever golfer, she wasted no time impressing at the top level winning LPGA Rookie of the Year in 2003.
Her money was amassed in just seven full seasons on the LPGA, a period that saw her win 27 times including two majors. Her first major win was notable for coming at St Andrews in the 2007 Women’s Open – the first time the event went to the home of golf.
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Article Link: Richest women golfers: Staggering $180m won in prize money between 10 elite names