The 2025 LPGA season is here.
Thirty-two of the world’s best players will tee it up at the season-opening Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions in Orlando, Fla., at Lake Nona Golf and Country Club this week. It’s the first of 33 official events in 2025, which will collectively offer a historic total prize fund of over $131 million.
This season, the LPGA’s 75th, is sure to bring stardom, underdog victories and memorable moments.
Here are five players to watch as this year’s campaign kicks off.
Nelly Korda
It almost feels silly to include the world No. 1 on this list, because it’s obvious all eyes will be on her. In 2024, Korda had a historic run, winning seven times, becoming the first American player to notch that feat since Beth Daniel in 1990. The 26-year-old American also won five straight tournaments (including 2024’s first major, the Chevron Championship), joining Nancy Lopez (1978) and Annika Sörenstam (2005) as the only LPGA players to do so. And despite a neck injury late in the year, Korda still added another trophy to her shelf before the season’s end.
What will she do for an encore in 2025?
Ruoning Yin
The 22-year-old from China is one of the game’s brightest young stars. In 2023, she won twice, including the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship. Yet, doubt began to creep into her mind last season that she’d ever reach those heights again. However, she ended up joining Korda, Lydia Ko and Hannah Green as the LPGA’s only three-time winners in 2024. Now, Yin, the world No. 3, is halfway to Chinese legend Shanshan Feng’s LPGA wins total (10).
Lilia Vu
In 2024, the 27-year-old American didn’t match her success from 2023, when she won four times, including two majors. A back injury sidelined Vu for three months, but once she regained her health, Vu won the Meijer LPGA Classic in his first start back. Runner-ups in two of the year’s last three majors showed that Vu is still one of the game’s premier players, and the world No. 5 will look to challenge Korda as the face of American women’s golf in 2025.
Jin Young Ko
Is one of the sport’s greatest talents flying under the radar? Last year, Ko had her first winless season since 2016 and now sits outside the top 10 (currently No. 12) in the world rankings for the first time since 2019. The South Korean has been hampered by injuries over the past few years, but now healthy and still only 29 years old, the 15-time LPGA winner is a prime candidate for a bounceback season.
“Had so much pain last year from my knees and wrist, but this year I don't have any injury for this year,” Ko said at the season-ending CME Group Tour Championship, “so it’s really, really thankful being here. Like whole body is perfect right now, so I’m very thankful and very happy.”
Linn Grant
A little bit of an outside-the-box choice here. The 25-year-old Swede showed promise early in her career, winning the Ladies European Tour’s Order of Merit and Rookie of the Year award in 2022 and recording four top-10s in six LPGA starts. However, she was barred from playing on U.S. soil until the summer of 2023 because of her COVID-19 vaccination status.
Since then, Grant’s results have been good, but not great, with one win (2023 Dana Open) and nine top-10s in 36 LPGA starts. The two-time Solheim Cupper hits it long, ranking 17th on tour in driving distance last season (271 yards); however, she was 101st in driving accuracy, hitting just 69.98% of her fairways. If she’s a little cleaner off the tee in 2025, it shouldn’t be a surprise to see the world No. 29 back in the winner’s circle.
Honorable mentions
So many more names probably should have made this list. Let’s start with world No. 2 Lydia Ko, who won two majors in 2024 and the Olympic gold medal. There’s also Jeeno Thitikul, who captured the season-long Race to the CME Globe last year and finished with $6,059,309 in official prize money, breaking Lorena Ochoa’s single-season record from 2007.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as Five Players to Watch for the 2025 LPGA Tour Season.
