How to Follow Your Favourite Golfer Live - Hole by Hole

Following professional golf used to mean sitting in front of a television for five hours or refreshing a leaderboard page hoping for updates. Today, the official tour apps let you follow any golfer live, hole by hole, with real-time scoring, shot tracking and push notifications. You never have to miss a moment, even when you are away from the screen.

This guide explains exactly how to track your favourite players during PGA Tour, DP World Tour and major championship events.

Why Hole-by-Hole Tracking Matters

Golf is unique among major sports. A full-field PGA Tour event now carries up to 144 players, and the 2026 U.S. Open had 156, all spread across 18 holes at once. Television coverage can only follow a handful of groups at any given time. If your favourite player is not in contention or is playing in an early group, you might see just a few shots all day on the broadcast.

Hole-by-hole tracking solves this problem entirely. Instead of waiting for a camera to find your player, you see every score as it happens - birdies, bogeys, pars and everything in between - updated in real time.

Setting Up Player Tracking in the Official Tour Apps

Each major tour runs its own free app, and the setup is much the same in all of them. The PGA TOUR app covers the PGA Tour. The DP World Tour app covers the European circuit and the Race to Dubai. LIV Golf and the LPGA have apps of their own.

1. Find Your Player

Use the search or player list to find your golfer. Player profiles carry stats, news and scores, and the tour apps cover their own circuits: the PGA Tour, the DP World Tour and LIV Golf each need their own app if you follow players across tours.

2. Follow Them

Mark the player as a favourite. The PGA TOUR app lets you personalise the app with your favourites, and the DP World Tour app lets you pick favourite players and tournaments for tailored updates.

3. Enable Notifications

Turn on push notifications for the players you follow. The PGA TOUR app sends alerts for:

• Tee times - a reminder when your player is about to start
• Round results - the score when they sign their card
• News - updates on the players and tournaments you follow

The DP World Tour app sends tailored notifications for the players and events you choose.

Understanding the Live Scorecard

When you open a player's live scorecard during a tournament, you will see a detailed breakdown of their round in progress:

• Hole-by-hole scores - each hole shows the score relative to par (birdie, par, bogey, etc.), colour-coded for quick scanning
• Running total - the cumulative score for the round and the tournament
• Position on the leaderboard - where they stand relative to the rest of the field
• Shot detail - on the PGA Tour, TOURCAST adds shot trails and play-by-play for every shot from every player

This level of detail means you can follow a player's momentum through a round. You can see whether they are making a charge on the back nine or grinding to hold on to their position.

The Leaderboard View

While player tracking is brilliant for following individuals, the leaderboard gives you the full picture. Every tour app runs a real-time leaderboard that shows:

• Every player's current score and position
• Thru (holes completed in the current round)
• Today's round score versus tournament total
• Quick access to each player's scorecard

LIV Golf's leaderboard also shows groupings and shot tracking, and tracks the team standings alongside the individual race.

Following Multiple Tournaments

Professional golf runs nearly year-round, and it is common for multiple tours to have events running in the same week. You can follow a DP World Tour event in the morning (European time) and a PGA Tour event later in the day, keeping the two apps side by side on your phone.

Check our PGA Tour Schedule 2026 for the full calendar of upcoming events.

Tips for Getting the Most Out of Live Tracking

During Majors

The four major championships - the Masters, PGA Championship, U.S. Open and The Open - are the most exciting weeks of the golf calendar. Fields vary. The 2026 Masters had 91 players, the 2026 U.S. Open 156. With that many players on the course and every shot carrying enormous weight, set up notifications for several players and follow the drama across the course.

During the FedExCup Playoffs

The FedExCup Playoffs compress the excitement into three weeks. The fields shrink from 70 to 50 to 30 players, with no 36-hole cuts, and hole-by-hole tracking lets you watch the points race unfold in real time. The TOUR Championship now starts everyone at even par as a straight 72-hole stroke-play event. Check our PGA Tour guide for a full explanation of how the playoff format works.

For the Ryder Cup

Team events like the Ryder Cup use match play format, which is perfectly suited to player tracking. Follow individual matches hole by hole to see who is winning each point for their team.

Comparing Player Performance

Beyond simple score tracking, the official stats pages let you compare players. Want to see how Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy stack up? PGATOUR.COM publishes season statistics for scoring, approach play, driving and putting, including the strokes gained categories.

The Technology Behind Real-Time Scoring

On the PGA Tour, the scoring runs through ShotLink. A volunteer walking scorer goes with each group of up to three players, recording every score on a handheld device and staying in radio contact with ShotLink staff. Laser operators at fixed points plot where each ball finishes, and the data feeds the leaderboard and TOURCAST in real time. The result is a near-instantaneous view of what is happening on the course, no matter where you are.

Frequently Asked Questions

How quickly do live scores update?

On the PGA Tour, scores come in from walking scorers in real time. In practice, a player's score shows on the leaderboard shortly after they finish a hole.

Can I follow golfers on tours other than the PGA Tour?

Yes. The DP World Tour, LIV Golf and the LPGA each run official apps with live scoring, and PGATOUR.COM also covers PGA Tour Champions and the Korn Ferry Tour. You will need a separate app for each tour you follow.

Do I need an account to use live tracking?

The official tour apps are free to download. On the DP World Tour, a free My Tour membership adds personalised content and follow features.

How do push notifications work during a round?

Follow a player in the tour's app and allow notifications. The PGA TOUR app then sends alerts for tee times, round results and news about your favourites.

Can I see scorecards from past tournaments?

Yes. PGATOUR.COM keeps past results pages for each tournament, with every player's finishing position and round-by-round scores. It is a handy way to check form heading into a big event.

GolfMode, our own live scoring app, is still in development. Join the waitlist to hear when it launches.