Golf Handicap Calculator (WHS)

About the Golf Handicap Calculator (WHS)

Work out a Handicap Index estimate the way the World Handicap System (WHS) does. Each round gives a Score Differential from your adjusted gross score, the Course Rating and the Slope Rating of your tees (and the day’s playing conditions calculation, if you know it). Your index is the average of the lowest 8 of your most recent 20 differentials, or of the smaller set the Rules use while you have fewer than 20.

Add a tee’s ratings and par to turn any Handicap Index into a Course Handicap and a Playing Handicap for your format, and use the hole-by-hole card to apply net double bogey, so the score you enter is the adjusted gross score. Optional fields apply the soft and hard caps and the exceptional-score reduction. The result is an estimate from the published Rules, not an official Handicap Index, which only a golf club or association authorised under the WHS can issue.

Common uses

• Golfers without an official handicap who want to know roughly where they stand before joining a club or entering a competition.
• Checking the index on your club app: which rounds count, and why it moved after your last round.
• Working out the strokes you get on a course you have not played before, from its Course Rating and Slope Rating.
• Turning a scorecard into the adjusted gross score that counts for handicap purposes.

The formulas

• Score Differential = (113 ÷ Slope Rating) × (adjusted gross score − Course Rating − PCC), rounded to the nearest tenth with .5 rounded upwards (negative values upwards, towards 0) — Rule 5.1.
• Handicap Index = the average of the lowest 8 of the most recent 20 differentials, rounded to the nearest tenth (Rule 5.2b). With fewer: 3 scores, the lowest 1 − 2.0; 4, the lowest 1 − 1.0; 5, the lowest 1; 6, the average of the lowest 2 − 1.0; 7–8, the lowest 2; 9–11, the lowest 3; 12–14, the lowest 4; 15–16, the lowest 5; 17–18, the lowest 6; 19, the lowest 7 (Rule 5.2a). The maximum is 54.0 (Rule 5.3).
• Course Handicap = Handicap Index × (Slope Rating ÷ 113) + (Course Rating − par), rounded to the nearest whole number. For 9 holes, half the Handicap Index (rounded to a tenth) with the 9-hole ratings and par (Rule 6.1).
• Playing Handicap = the unrounded Course Handicap × the allowance for the format, then rounded (Rule 6.2): 95% in individual stroke play, 100% in individual match play, 85% in four-ball stroke play and 90% in four-ball match play (Appendix C).
• Net double bogey: the most a hole can count is par + 2 + the strokes you receive on it, or par + 5 before you have a Handicap Index (Rule 3.1).

All from the Rules of Handicapping published by The R&A and the USGA.

Caps and exceptional scores

Once you have 20 scores, your index cannot climb quickly. If it would be more than 3.0 above your Low Handicap Index (your lowest index of the past year), only half of the rise above 3.0 counts (the soft cap), and it can never be more than 5.0 above it (the hard cap) — Rule 5.8. The Rules do not say how a half tenth is rounded in the soft cap; this calculator rounds it up.

If the differential of your latest round, unrounded, is 7.0 to 9.9 strokes below the index you had when you played it, every differential in the record is reduced by 1.0; 10.0 or more below, by 2.0 (Rule 5.9). Enter your earlier index to check the latest round.

Which holes get your strokes

Strokes go to holes in the order of their stroke index on the scorecard. With a Course Handicap of 20, every hole gets one stroke and the holes with stroke index 1 and 2 get a second; with 5, only stroke index 1 to 5 get one. A plus handicap gives strokes back to the course, starting at stroke index 18.

Over 9 holes of an 18-hole course the strokes go to those nine holes in the order of their stroke index (on a front nine with the odd indexes, 4 strokes go to the holes with stroke index 1, 3, 5 and 7), unless the club publishes a separate 1–9 order; a plus handicap gives them back from the highest of the nine (Appendix E).

Limitations

• This is an estimate, not an official Handicap Index. Handicap Index® and the other WHS terms are trademarks owned or licensed by the USGA, and only a club or association authorised by your national federation can issue an official index.
• Rounds must be 18 holes. A 9-hole score is combined with an expected score that the handicapping software works out from your index, and the Rules do not publish that method, so it cannot be reproduced here. The Course Handicap part does work for 9 holes.
• The playing conditions calculation (PCC) is worked out each day by your association from everyone’s scores: enter it from your scoring record, or leave it at 0.
• Exceptional-score reductions from earlier rounds and committee adjustments in an official record are not known here; only the latest round is checked.
• The hole-by-hole card needs a score on every hole: holes not played (incomplete rounds) are scored with an expected score in the official system.

Privacy

Everything is worked out in your browser and nothing is uploaded. So that your record is still here next time, the rounds and the tees you enter are kept in this browser’s storage on this device only; Reset clears the rounds.