The Women's PGA Championship (branded as the KPMG Women's PGA Championship for sponsorship reasons) is a women's professional golf tournament. First held in 1955, it is one of five majors on the

LPGA Tour The Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) is an American organization for female golfers. The organization is headquartered at the LPGA International in Daytona Beach, Florida, and is best known for running the LPGA Tour, a series of week ...

. It is not recognized as a major by the

Ladies European Tour The Ladies European Tour is a professional golf tour for women which was founded in 1978. It is based at Buckinghamshire Golf Club near London in England. Like many UK-based sports organisations it is a company limited by guarantee, a legal str ...

, which does not recognize any of the three majors played in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. Formerly known as the LPGA Championship, the

LPGA The Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) is an American organization for female golfers. The organization is headquartered at the LPGA International in Daytona Beach, Florida, and is best known for running the LPGA Tour, a series of wee ...

(Ladies Professional Golf Association) announced in 2014 that the

PGA of America The Professional Golfers' Association of America (PGA of America) is an American organization of golf professionals that was founded in 1916. Consisting of nearly 29,000 men and women members, the PGA of America's undertaking is to establish ...

would become a partner of the event, and that it would be renamed the Women's PGA Championship beginning in

2015 File:2015 Events Collage new.png, From top left, clockwise: Civil service in remembrance of November 2015 Paris attacks; Germanwings Flight 9525 was purposely crashed into the French Alps; the rubble of residences in Kathmandu following the April ...

—becoming a sister event to the men's

PGA Championship The PGA Championship (often referred to as the US PGA Championship or USPGA outside the United States) is an annual golf tournament conducted by the Professional Golfers' Association of America. It is one of the four men's major championships ...

(in a similar manner to the U.S. Women's Open being a sister event to the men's U.S. Open). The partnership included a new title sponsorship agreement with

KPMG KPMG International Limited (or simply KPMG) is a multinational professional services network, and one of the Big Four accounting organizations. Headquartered in Amstelveen, Netherlands, although incorporated in London, England, KPMG is a net ...

, an increase in purse, and a commitment by

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...

to provide network television coverage of the weekend rounds. The PGA of America partnership also allowed the tournament to be held at various top courses around the United States. Previously, the LPGA Championship had been usually held at a consistent location each year, most recently near

Rochester, New York Rochester () is a City (New York), city in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, the county seat, seat of Monroe County, New York, Monroe County, and the fourth-most populous in the state after New York City, Buffalo, New York, Buffalo, ...

as part of a title sponsorship agreement with Western New York-based supermarket chain

Wegmans Wegmans Food Markets, Inc. is a privately held American supermarket chain. It is headquartered in Gates, New York, and was founded in 1916 in Rochester. As of , Wegmans has 110 stores, mostly in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions. T ...

Professional-amateur controversy

Prior to

2005 File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; " Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris was discover ...

, the LPGA Championship had a "professionals only" rule. This is similar to the men's

, but contrasts with the U.S. and British Opens, which have long had both amateur and professional entrants through qualifying (henceforth the term "open"). Until its takeover by the

in 2015, the tournament was the LPGA's own event, and the LPGA was created specifically to provide opportunities for women in professional golf. In 2005 this rule was revoked, effectively to allow 15-year-old amateur Michelle Wie to compete, in order to attract more media coverage and sell more tickets, though this was not publicly acknowledged by the LPGA. Some professionals objected to this move, as they felt that places given to amateurs would come at the expense of the LPGA Tour's less successful professionals, who need to play regularly to make a living. One of the leading professionals,

Laura Davies Dame Laura Jane Davies, (born 5 October 1963) is an English female professional golfer. She has achieved the status of her nation's most accomplished female golfer of modern times, being the first non-American to finish at the top of the LPGA ...

, stated objections to the change were shortsighted. At the time, Wie had made the cut in all five majors that she had played, with two top-ten finishes, and had also played twice in the

Sony Open in Hawaii The Sony Open in Hawaii is a professional golf tournament on the PGA Tour, and is part of the tour's FedEx Cup Series. It has been contested at the Waialae Country Club in Honolulu, Hawaii, since the event's modern-day inception as the Hawaiian ...

on the

PGA Tour The PGA Tour (stylized in all capital letters as PGA TOUR by its officials) is the organizer of professional golf tours in the United States and North America. It organizes most of the events on the flagship annual series of tournaments also ...

, but missed both cuts. Despite the controversy, she outscored all but one of the pros in the 2005 LPGA Championship and was the runner-up, three strokes behind three-time champion

Annika Sörenstam Annika Charlotta Sörenstam (; born 9 October 1970) is a Swedish professional golfer. She is regarded as one of the best female golfers in history. Before stepping away from competitive golf at the end of the 2008 season, she had won 90 intern ...

. In

2006 File:2006 Events Collage V1.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2006 Winter Olympics open in Turin; Twitter is founded and launched by Jack Dorsey; The Nintendo Wii is released; Montenegro votes to declare independence from Serbia; The 2006 ...

, the LPGA Championship reverted to its "professionals only" status, with only pros in the field. Wie had turned professional the previous October, upon signing multimillion-dollar endorsement contracts with Nike,

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

, and other sponsors.

Tournament names

Tournament names through the years:

Winners

:''Note: Green highlight indicates scoring records.''

Multiple champions

: The defending champion has retained the title on seven occasions, most recently in

: :*2015 – Inbee Park :*2014 – Inbee Park :*2005 – Annika Sörenstam :*2004 – Annika Sörenstam :*2000 – Juli Inkster :*1984 – Patty Sheehan :*1961 – Mickey Wright Through 2022, three consecutive championships has been achieved only twice, by Sörenstam (

) and Park (2015).

Sites by state

Future sites

Since the PGA of America took control of the tournament, venues will often bid for both a men's, women's, and seniors' PGA Championship together.

Aronimink Golf Club Aronimink Golf Club is a private country club in the eastern United States, located in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania, a suburb west of Philadelphia. Its championship layout is consistently rated among the nation's top golf courses. Aronimink is cur ...

, which hosted the men's in 1962 and seniors in 2003, was awarded a joint bid for the 2020 women's and 2027 men's.

Congressional Country Club Congressional Country Club is a country club and golf course in Bethesda, Maryland, United States. Congressional opened in 1924 and its Blue Course has hosted five major championships, including three U.S. Opens and a PGA Championship. It was a ...

was awarded the 2025 seniors and both the 2022 and 2027 women's championships.

Baltusrol Golf Club The Baltusrol Golf Club is a private 36- hole golf club in the eastern United States, located in Springfield, New Jersey, about west of New York City. It was founded in 1895 by Louis Keller. In 1985, Baltusrol became the first club to h ...

, which had hosted the 2005 and 2016 men's championships, was awarded the 2023 women's and 2029 men's championships together. The tournament will also be held at the

's new home in

Frisco, Texas Frisco is a city in Collin and Denton counties in the U.S. state of Texas. It is part of the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex and about from both Dallas Love Field and Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. Its population was 200,509 at the 2 ...

. M = Denotes

S = Denotes Senior PGA Championship

References

External links

*
Coverage on the LPGA Tour's official site
{{coord, 34.0040, -84.1919, type:event, display=title LPGA Tour events Women's major golf championships Golf, Women Recurring sporting events established in 1955 1955 establishments in Indiana