[Photo: Scott Halleran]
Some time before season’s end – potentially as early as this weekend – Annika Sorenstam will relinquish a title she’s held since 2001: all-time leading money winner on the LPGA Tour.
During the course of her 15-year career as a full-time LPGA player, Sorenstam won 72 titles and earned $US22,583,693 in official prizemoney. Yet with a two-way tie for second place or better finish at this week’s Lotte Championship, Lydia Ko can pass that number. The 29-year-old New Zealander trails Sorenstam in career earnings by $US223,228. The overall prizemoney payout in Hawaii this week is $US3 million, with the winner taking home $450,000, runner-up earning $282,976 and third-place claiming $205,279 with a standard cut of 65 players.
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If Ko does it this weekend, she will have eclipsed Sorenstam’s career mark while playing in 30 fewer events (308 to 278) and winning only 23 titles.
While Ko is in hot pursuit of Sorenstam, she isn’t the only one. Sitting third on the current all-time moneylist is Nelly Korda. The No.1 player in the world needs to earn only $US253,921 more in prizemoney to pass Sorenstam.
Korda is not in this week’s field, nor is she competing in any of the four events the LPGA is holding overseas during its upcoming Asian swing (Ko, meanwhile, is only listed with the LPGA Tour as being in the field at the Maybank Championship, where she finished second in 2025).
Korda’s next start is expected to come in November at, ironically, The Annika Driven by Gainbridge in Florida. It’s a tournament Korda has won three times and made $US1.1 million in five appearances.
Lydia Ko and Nelly Korda, pictured playing together at the 2025 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, are both on the cusp of passing Annika Sorenstam on the LPGA’s career moneylist. [Photo: Stacy Revere]
Both Ko and Korda have benefitted from a healthy increase in the overall prizemoney payouts on the LPGA Tour during the past few years. Korda has reached her spot on the LPGA moneylist while playing in just 177 events so far.
It was May 6, 2001, when Sorenstam took over the top spot on the moneylist, passing Betsy King, with victory at the Chick-fil-A Charity Championship. At the time, it was Sorenstam’s 28th career win in 152 LPGA starts, and it came during a record-breaking season in which Sorenstam won eight titles.
The transition that is taking place on the LPGA Tour is similar to what happened on the PGA Tour in August. That’s when Scottie Scheffler surpassed Tiger Woods on the men’s all-time list, winning the Tour Championship and its $US10 million first-place payday to reach $US130 million in career earnings. Tiger, at just shy of $US121 million, had been No.1 on the PGA Tour moneylist since February 2000.
