What is par in golf? Scoring terms explained

Quick answer

Every score in golf is named by its distance from par:

Past a triple bogey the naming mostly stops. Golfers say quadruple bogey or just “an 8”, and the handicap system stops counting anyway (more on that below).

How a course decides par for each hole

Par comes from length first, then difficulty. The R&A and USGA Rules of Handicapping, Appendix F recommend these hole lengths, assuming the course sits below 2,000 feet of elevation:

Notice the overlap. A 470-yard hole sits inside both the men’s par 4 range and the men’s par 5 range, and the committee picks based on elevation change, forced lay-ups, prevailing wind, and how the architect meant the hole to be played. That is why one course calls a 465-yard hole a par 4 and the course down the road calls it a par 5.

It also explains why the same hole can carry a different par for men and women. Appendix F’s own second example is a 400-yard hole for women, which lands inside both the women’s par 4 range and the women’s par 5 range, so the committee decides. Appendix F also recommends standardizing par across tee sets where appropriate, so a hole that plays as a par 5 from every other tee is usually set as a par 5 from the forward tee too.

What a real round of golf looks like

Par is a scratch player’s benchmark, so treating it as your target is a good way to feel bad every Saturday. Arccos tracked what goes on the card:

A 15 handicap makes one birdie every other round and pars fewer than a third of the holes. Bogey is the most common single result on the card, by a wide margin.

Shot Scope’s tracked rounds break the same picture down by handicap band. Birdies per round run 0.36 for 15 and 20 handicaps, 0.72 at a 10, 1.26 at a 5, and 2.34 for scratch players. The same Shot Scope write-up puts the 2025 PGA Tour average near 3.7. Doubles move much harder: 1.44 per round at a 5 handicap, 2.88 at a 10, 4.68 at a 15, and 6.66 at a 20.

Between a 20 handicap and a 5 handicap, birdies go up by less than one per round, while doubles drop by more than five. The route to a lower score runs through the doubles column.

How to keep score on a scorecard

Stroke play is the default, and the arithmetic runs four steps:

1. Count every stroke, including penalties. A whiff counts. A tap-in counts the same as a 300-yard drive.
2. Compare the hole total to the printed par. Scorecards print par for every hole next to the yardage.
3. Add the 18 holes for your gross score. An 89 on a par 72 course is 17 over.
4. Subtract your course handicap for a net score. A 92 off a course handicap of 18 is a net 74, which is what lets a 22 play a fair match against an 8.
5. Cap any blow-up hole before you post it. Handicap posting limits each hole to net double bogey, covered in the next section. Most scoring apps apply the cap for you.

Two other formats show up in most weekend games. Match play ignores your total and scores hole by hole: low score wins the hole, ties halve it, and a player 4 up with 3 to play wins 4 and 3. Stableford turns each hole into points against par, so a par is 2 points, a birdie is 3, a bogey is 1, and anything worse than a bogey is 0.

In a handicap Stableford the points come off your net score on the hole, so a bogey where you get a stroke still pays 2 points. Stableford is the reason a blow-up hole stings less in club competitions: once you are out of points, you pick up and move on.

The most you can write down on one hole

For handicap purposes, a blow-up hole gets capped. Rule 3.1 of the Rules of Handicapping limits each hole to a net double bogey:

par + 2 strokes + any handicap stroke you receive on that hole

So a par 4 where you get no stroke caps at 6. The same par 4 where you get one stroke caps at 7. A par 5 with two strokes caps at 9. There is no limit on how many holes in a round can be adjusted, and the rule defines net double bogey as the lowest score that earns zero Stableford points.

Golfers who have not established a Handicap Index yet use a different cap: par plus 5 on every hole. The same par-plus-5 cap applies when a course handicap runs above 54 and you receive 4 or more strokes on a hole.

The cap only applies to the score you post for handicap. In a stroke-play competition you still hole out and the real number counts. Those adjusted scores are what build your Handicap Index. The index is portable; the strokes you actually get in a match come from the course handicap it converts into at the tees you are playing.

Where the scoring terms came from

Atlantic City Country Club claims the birdie. Its own history dates the shot to December 1903, and other accounts put it a few years earlier, but the story is the same: a golfer named Abner Smith stuffed an approach on the 12th hole, someone called it “a bird of a shot,” and the group started saying birdie for one under par. American slang of the day used “bird” for anything excellent, so eagle and later albatross followed the same logic upward.

Bogey ran the other direction. It started in 1890s Britain as the good score a golfer chased, closer to what par means now, and slid to mean one over once par took hold as the official standard.

The scoring mistakes that cost the most

• Playing every hole at par. Par assumes a scratch player. A 15 handicap who takes on a tucked pin to “save par” trades a likely bogey for a real chance at a double, and the Arccos numbers say doubles are already the biggest hole in the round.
• Not writing down penalty strokes. A handicap built from soft scores collapses in the first match that matters.
• Ignoring the net double bogey cap. Golfers post a raw 10 on a par 4 and wonder why their index jumped. Post the capped score; the rule exists so one hole cannot distort the picture.
• Reading par 72 as a target. Course par tells you what a scratch golfer would shoot. Your average golf score and your handicap tell you what to expect, and those are the numbers worth moving.
• Counting scores instead of shots. A total tells you the round was bad. Strokes gained tells you which part of the round was bad. That is the version worth practicing against.

Where each leak gets fixed

Full disclosure: GameCaddie builds the apps below, so read this section knowing that. Doubles and triples come from a handful of repeatable places, and each one has its own tool:

Every app is free to start with no credit card, and none of the recommendations inside them come from affiliate deals.

The next step

Post a few real scores with the penalty strokes included, then attack whichever leak is turning bogeys into doubles: Find your ball, Build an AI practice plan, Train your mental game, or Get every app and cover all five.

For deeper dives

• What is a good golf handicap? The real numbers
• Average golf score: what most golfers really shoot
• Strokes gained explained, and where to see yours
• Best golf scorecard app: which scores count
• Best golf handicap app: official USGA index or estimate?

Key takeaways

• Par is the score a scratch golfer is expected to make on a hole, including two putts, and most 18-hole courses total 70, 71 or 72.
• Appendix F sets par by length first (par 4 runs 240 to 490 yards for men), then by difficulty, which is why the same hole can be a par 4 at one course and a par 5 at another.
• A 15 handicap averages 5.3 pars and 0.5 birdies per round, so bogey is the normal result for a mid-handicap round.
• Between a 20 and a 5 handicap, birdies rise by less than one per round while doubles fall by more than five.
• For handicap posting, every hole caps at net double bogey (par plus 2 plus your strokes), or par plus 5 before you have an index.