With The Open Championship 2025 now in the past, the spotlight shifts to the AIG Women’s Open, highlighting the contrasting narratives of men’s and women’s golf. As the women’s major tees off, you have to look at a few facts and numbers to understand the different paths these tournaments take under the R&A’s guidance.

Men vs Women: the story behind the numbers

In viewership only, the 2025 event attracted, on average, 4.1 million viewers on Sunday, peaking at 6.1 million. This marked a 24% year-on-year rise in the U.S. market, while an estimated 21 million viewers joined the network in the U.K., representing a 36% year-over-year increase.

Despite the impressive numbers, The Open faces several challenges, including a lack of younger audience engagement. This month, although a spectacular 278,000 fans attended the event, only 19,000 children were present on the course through the ‘Kids Go Free’ initiative. This marks a sharp decline from previous years:

• In 2019, among 237,750 fans, 30,000 were below the age of 25, and 21,000 children were under the age of 16 (Kids Go Free)
• In 2018, among the 172,000, only 20,000 fans were under the age of 25

AIG Women’s Open:

The LPGA’s AIG Women’s Open stands in sharp contrast to The Open, but it’s gaining momentum at its own pace. This week, it features a prize fund of $9.75 million, up by $250,000 from last year. Since the partnership between The R&A and AIG began in 2019, the prize fund has tripled. This year, the Champion will receive $1,462,500, the highest payout in the tournament’s 49-year history.

In the last 5 years, for instance, the purse has looked like this:-

On the other hand, the AIG is doing everything in its power to attract a young audience. In 2024, it hosted more female fans than male ones on a Saturday. And this year, it is introducing Hero Messages to attract a younger audience. These initiatives are helping AIG in viewership as well, in a pretty interesting way:

• In 2023, 57% of those who watched the AIG Women’s Open did not tune in to the men’s event, totaling 731,000 viewers.
• In 2024, AIG recorded 950,000k viewers, a sharp rise of 42% since last year.

AIG is investing in nature alongside supporting women’s resilience in sport. The AIG Women’s Open is going green with free water refill stations and reforestation efforts via its partnership with Mastercard. It’s also promoting low-carbon tech and social value through The R&A’s Greenlinks program.

Key stats and comparisons

If we are comparing the difference between The Open and AIG Women’s Open to understand the broader difference in men vs women’s pay, then it would serve as a pretty good example:-

So, has the sponsorship growth affected the purse? If we’re looking at the numbers, then the AIG Women’s Open purse has more than doubled (+117%) from 2019 to 2025. On the other hand, The Open Championship purse grew by about 58% over the same period. In conclusion, sure, the scale of The Open’s sponsorship and associated prize fund remains higher in absolute terms, but the women’s event’s growth rate is faster.

On the broadcast deals between these two last majors, here are some facts that you should consider:

• Sky Sports coverage in the U.K. and U.S. will be complemented by BBC and NBC Sports/USA Network/Peacock providing extensive live coverage in the U.S.
• BBC Sport has also secured a multi-year agreement with The R&A for the AIG Women’s Open from 2025 to 2027.
• The R&A and Sky Sports extended their rights agreement for both The Open and AIG Women’s Open until 2028.
• The BBC has secured a multi-year broadcast deal with The R&A for The Open starting in 2025 through 2027.

The Open may still dazzle as a global spectacle, but the AIG Women’s Open is quietly building momentum, with strategic investments poised to pay off as women’s golf gains mainstream recognition, potentially setting a powerful example for the sport’s future growth. It may be slow, but it is growing.