The 2027 Open Championship

Golf was born on the links of Scotland, and The Open Championship — contested every July over links ground somewhere in Britain — is the closest the game has to a direct line back to its origins. Founded in 1860 at Prestwick Golf Club, it is the oldest major championship in the world by more than half a century. The Claret Jug, awarded to the Champion Golfer of the Year, carries a weight that the other three majors — as great as they are — cannot quite replicate.

In July 2027, the 155th Open Championship returns to the Old Course at St Andrews in Fife, Scotland — the Home of Golf — for the 31st time in the championship's history. Competitive play runs July 15–18, 2027, with practice rounds in the days beforehand. For those willing to organize the trip properly, this is the most transportive week in golf: the game's spiritual home, links terrain, coastal weather, a Scottish July, and the oldest trophy in the sport at stake.

LXV coordinates hospitality, Fife coast accommodations, and optional extensions into the broader Scottish links circuit. Register your interest below for priority notification.

The Venue: The Old Course at St Andrews

The Old Course at St Andrews is the most storied stretch of golfing ground on earth — the venue every player, historian, and traveler regards as the Home of Golf. The game has been played over these links since the 15th century, and the town has been at the center of golf's governance ever since the Society of St Andrews Golfers, now the R&A, was founded here in 1754. The Old Course is a genuinely public links, run today by the St Andrews Links Trust, and it has hosted The Open more often than any other course in the rotation.

The Old Course is unlike any other championship venue. It is laid out largely as an out-and-back routing along a narrow peninsula of linksland, sharing seven enormous double greens — each serving two holes at once — that are among the most recognizable features in the game. The fairways are wide but deceptive, seamed with hidden pot bunkers that gather even well-struck shots, and the ground is firm, running, and endlessly variable depending on the wind off the North Sea.

There is no artifice here and very little elevation change; the challenge is in reading the ground, the angles, and the weather. On a still morning the Old Course can be scored on. When the wind gets up off the estuary, it becomes one of the most exacting tests in championship golf. That range — benign to brutal within a single afternoon — is exactly what has made St Andrews the ultimate proving ground for more than 150 years.

Past Champions at St Andrews

No course in golf has crowned more Open champions, and its roll of honour reads like a history of the game itself:

• Bobby Jones — 1927
• Jack Nicklaus — 1970, 1978
• Seve Ballesteros — 1984
• Nick Faldo — 1990
• John Daly — 1995
• Tiger Woods — 2000, 2005
• Louis Oosthuizen — 2010
• Zach Johnson — 2015
• Cameron Smith — 2022

Tiger Woods' 2000 victory is among the most complete performances the venue has ever seen — an eight-stroke win at 19 under par, played famously without finding a single one of the Old Course's many bunkers all week, and the win that completed his career Grand Slam at just 24. Tiger, in command at St Andrews, is one of the defining images the course carries into every subsequent championship.

The Old Course's Iconic Features

No layout in golf is more instantly recognizable. The Swilcan Bridge — a small stone arch spanning the Swilcan Burn — is crossed by every player walking up the 18th, and has become the most photographed spot in the game, the traditional place where champions and legends take their leave of the championship. The closing hole itself is named Tom Morris, in honor of Old Tom Morris, whose life and work are woven into both the town and the course.

The penultimate hole — the par-4 Road Hole 17th — is widely regarded as the hardest hole in championship golf, guarded by the deep Road Hole bunker short-left of the green and, behind it, the paved road and stone wall that give the hole its name. Combined with the shared double greens and the exposed, wind-scoured turf, these features make the Old Course a test where experience and nerve matter as much as ball-striking.

The Championship

Format and Field

The Open uses 72-hole stroke play with a field of 156 players. The cut is made after 36 holes to the low 70 scorers and ties. The Claret Jug — formally the Golf Champion Trophy — is presented to the Champion Golfer of the Year in a ceremony on the 18th green that, along with the Masters, constitutes the most watched moment in the game's annual calendar.

Qualification is a global process: past champions, world ranking qualifiers, leading finishers from the previous year's major championships, and regional qualifying competitions from across the world. The field is as international as any event in golf — reflecting the fact that The Open, unlike the three American majors, was never conceived as a national championship.

Schedule

Hospitality at The Open

The R&A's hospitality program at St Andrews is organized across three tiers, each offering a materially different experience:

• Platinum — The flagship tier, centered on premium lounge facilities with the finest food and beverage service on the grounds. Platinum guests receive priority entry to the course, access to player Q&A sessions, fast-track access to The Open Shop, and dedicated parking. This is the most intimate and access-rich hospitality available.
• Premium — Elevated food and beverage experience with reserved areas and enhanced service, positioned for strong viewing across multiple competitive holes.
• Standard — The entry-level hospitality tier, offering dedicated dining and beverage areas with grounds credentials for all competitive rounds.

All hospitality tiers include grounds access. The distinction is in the quality of the facilities, the proximity to players, and the level of ancillary programming — player appearances, collector experiences, merchandise access. For the LXV member seeking the most complete Open experience, Platinum is the appropriate tier, and allocation at that level is limited.

The Fife Coast and Beyond

St Andrews sits at the heart of one of the densest concentrations of links golf in the world. The St Andrews Links itself extends well beyond the Old Course — the New Course, the Jubilee, and the Castle Course among them — and the surrounding Kingdom of Fife holds some of the most admired links in Scotland: Kingsbarns, a modern classic on the coast just south of town, and Carnoustie, a nine-time Open venue, a short drive across the Tay estuary.

For those prepared to extend the trip, the rest of Scotland's championship links are within reach of a week-long journey built around the event: Muirfield and the courses of East Lothian to the south, and Royal Troon on the west coast. Edinburgh — roughly ninety minutes away by road — offers the nearest major airport and a world-class city to bracket the golf. Ireland, with Royal County Down, Ballybunion, and Lahinch, is a short flight away.

LXV designs these extended itineraries as part of the core Open Championship package. The event is the anchor; the trip is the experience.