The PGA Tour released the schedule for the 2026 season on Tuesday, and the new slate came with a few noteworthy changes that raised some eyebrows.
Among the tweaks is a jam-packed, six-week stretch between the Masters and PGA Championship, including two majors and three Signature Events. The golf world will descend on Augusta National for the year’s first major, then the PGA Tour will head to Harbour Town for the RBC Heritage, which is once again a Signature Event. Then, it’s off to the Zurich Classic at TPC Louisiana before back-to-back Signature Events with the Miami Championship at Trump National Doral and then the Truist Championship at Quail Hollow Club. Then, the PGA Tour heads to Aronimink Golf Club for the 2026 PGA Championship.
That’s a loaded April and May for the PGA Tour’s best, but Rory McIlroy views that high-volume section as one that can be a huge boost to the PGA Tour as it looks to build off the positive momentum from a bounce-back 2025 season.
“I think it’s all positive when you have — golf builds through the January, February, March months, and obviously golf gets a huge popularity spike or whatever through Augusta; and then to try to keep that momentum going, keep that momentum going through the next few weeks, through the PGA, U.S. Open, I think it’s a good thing,” McIlroy said on Tuesday ahead of the 2025 Tour Championship at East Lake. “It’s quite a bit of a workload for the players to play that much golf in that stretch, but I think it’s not as if we’re having to travel halfway around the world to do it. These are all pretty easy stops on the East Coast for the most part. But I think it’ll be good. It’ll be a good schedule, and I think if the Tour and the top players get off to a good start, I think that builds momentum for the Tour, and I think the Tour can just sort of ride that momentum through that stretch.”
This year, McIlroy skipped the RBC Heritage after his historic Masters win, although he and Shane Lowry once again played the team event at the Zurich Classic in New Orleans.
The five-time major champion will have some scheduling decisions to make next year during this stretch. Even if he skips the RBC Heritage again, it feels unlikely that he would return to the Zurich Classic, given that two Signature Events and a major directly follow it.
McIlroy has been carefully planning his PGA Tour schedule as he looks to make good on his promise to be a more global player. He will likely do so again next year, but it’s unclear if his schedule will look similar or if the events he chooses to forgo will be different in 2026.
“I’ll always look at the schedule at the start of the year and see what best fits me and my life and everything else that I sort of do, whether it’s with family or other opportunities that I’m pursuing outside of golf. I’ll always look at that,” McIlroy said. “I’ll always choose the schedule that best fits me, and this year that meant skipping a few Signature Events. I might skip less next year. I might skip the same amount, I don’t know. It’s all just — the luxury of being a PGA Tour player is we are free to pick and choose our schedule for the most part, and I took advantage of that this year and I’ll continue to take advantage of that for as long as I can.”
