What is a good spin rate for a driver?

For most amateurs, 2,600–3,200 rpm off the driver under 85 mph, 2,200–2,800 rpm at 90 mph, 2,200–2,600 rpm at 100 mph, and 1,800–2,200 rpm above 105 mph. TrackMan's own optimizer puts a 94 mph swing with a level attack angle at 2,772 rpm for optimized carry, which sits right in that first band. The PGA Tour average is 2,545 rpm at 115 mph club speed. TrackMan's Combine average for a male amateur is 3,275 rpm at 94 mph, about 500 rpm above the optimizer's number for the same speed.

What is the average 7-iron spin rate?

TrackMan's published tour averages put the PGA Tour 7-iron at 7,124 rpm from 92 mph of club speed and the LPGA Tour at 6,630 rpm from 78 mph. Amateur 7-iron spin generally runs lower than tour because club speed is lower and strikes are less centered; the Combine averages TrackMan publishes cover the driver only. As a rough anchor, TrackMan says a 7-iron should spin around 7,000 rpm, give or take.

How much more does a urethane ball spin than an ionomer ball?

In 2026 robot testing, urethane balls averaged 5,382 rpm on a 35-yard pitch against 4,118 rpm for ionomer — a 1,264 rpm gap. On a full dry wedge the averages were 10,332 rpm versus 7,717 rpm. The gap widens when the ball is wet: urethane gave up about a tenth of its dry full-wedge spin and ionomer nearly a third, which left a 3,818 rpm difference in wet conditions.

Does a golf ball change driver spin much?

Far less than it changes wedge spin. In the 2026 robot test, urethane balls averaged about 260 rpm more driver spin than ionomer balls at 116 mph, against a gap of about 2,600 rpm on a full wedge. Driver spin is dominated by spin loft, strike location and attack angle — all swing variables — while the ball's core and mantle do the fine tuning. Wedge spin is where the ball itself moves the number by thousands of rpm.

Can one golf ball give low driver spin and high wedge spin?

Partly. The 2026 robot test compared the lowest 25 percent for average driver spin against the highest 25 percent for average wedge spin and found no ball in both groups. You can get relatively low driver spin with relatively high wedge spin. The Srixon Q-Star Tour and Bridgestone Tour B RXS both did it at all three test speeds.

Why is my wedge spin lower on the course than in a chart?

Robot charts are hit with clean grooves, a clean ball and a perfect strike. Moisture is the variable a chart hides, and the 2026 robot test measured it. In the 2026 robot wet test, ionomer balls fell from an average of 7,717 rpm to 5,410 rpm — nearly a third of their spin — while urethane balls gave up about a tenth. The test didn't include shots from rough, but grass trapped between the face and the ball interrupts the same groove contact that moisture does. Groove wear, ball age and strike location account for the rest.

Golf Ball Spin Rate Chart (Just Updated): Driver, Iron and Wedge RPM

Q: Is there a legal limit on golf ball spin?

No. The USGA and R&A set no maximum rpm. The Equipment Rules constrain weight, size, symmetry, initial velocity and the Overall Distance Standard, which caps tested distance at 317 yards plus a 3-yard tolerance. Spin appears only as a test condition: balls are tested at 120 mph clubhead speed, a 10-degree launch angle and 2,520 rpm. A revision to 125 mph, 11 degrees and 2,200 rpm was announced for January 2028, but a June 2026 joint statement confirmed no change until January 2030 at the earliest, with the testing approach back under review.

Quick answer

Spin rate climbs as loft climbs: the PGA Tour averages 2,545 rpm with a driver, 7,124 rpm with a 7-iron and 9,316 rpm with a pitching wedge. TrackMan’s Combine average for a male amateur is 3,275 rpm at 94 mph, about 500 rpm above TrackMan’s optimizer number for that speed. In 2026 robot testing, cover material moved the full-wedge average by about 2,600 rpm and the driver average by about 260.

Spin rate chart by club (TrackMan tour averages)

Club	PGA Tour spin	PGA club speed	LPGA Tour spin	LPGA club speed
Driver	2,545 rpm	115 mph	2,506 rpm	96 mph
3-wood	3,663 rpm	110 mph	2,595 rpm	92 mph
5-wood	4,322 rpm	106 mph	4,320 rpm	90 mph
Hybrid	4,587 rpm	102 mph	4,504 rpm	87 mph
3-iron	4,404 rpm	100 mph	—	—
4-iron	4,782 rpm	98 mph	4,608 rpm	82 mph
5-iron	5,280 rpm	96 mph	4,966 rpm	81 mph
6-iron	6,204 rpm	94 mph	5,904 rpm	80 mph
7-iron	7,124 rpm	92 mph	6,630 rpm	78 mph
8-iron	8,078 rpm	89 mph	7,413 rpm	76 mph
9-iron	8,793 rpm	87 mph	7,605 rpm	74 mph
Pitching wedge	9,316 rpm	84 mph	8,465 rpm	72 mph

Source: TrackMan’s 2023 PGA and LPGA Tour Averages, gathered across 40-plus men’s events and 30-plus women’s events.

How to read a spin chart without being misled

Spin rate comes out of the collision between face and ball, and the loft on the club in your hands accounts for most of it.

The controlling variable is spin loft — roughly the dynamic loft at impact minus the angle of attack. A driver delivered at 10 degrees with a level strike has very little spin loft, so it spins in the low thousands. A pitching wedge delivered at 45-plus degrees with a descending blow has a lot, so it spins near 9,000. Each row above spins more than the last because each row is a different club with more loft.

Cover material starts to matter when spin loft is high and speed is low. The ball has to grip the grooves, and a soft urethane cover deforms into them in a way a hard ionomer cover can’t. Off the driver the collision is short, fast and dominated by elasticity, so the cover does far less. In the 2026 field, the urethane and ionomer averages sat about 2,600 rpm apart on a full wedge and about 260 rpm apart off the tee at 116 mph.

Amateur driver spin chart by handicap

TrackMan’s Combine data covers recreational golfers, and TrackMan publishes those spin numbers for the driver only.

Player	Driver spin
Male, scratch or better	2,896 rpm
Male, 5 handicap	2,987 rpm
Male, 10 handicap	3,192 rpm
Male, average golfer (14.5)	3,275 rpm
Male, bogey golfer	3,127 rpm
Female, scratch or better	2,831 rpm
Female, 5 handicap	3,027 rpm
Female, 10 handicap	3,207 rpm
Female, 15 handicap	3,287 rpm

Source: TrackMan Combine averages.

Amateurs in each Combine bracket spin the driver more than the PGA and LPGA averages, by 286 to 781 rpm. The average golfer also spins it more than the bogey golfer, so read these as population averages that don’t trace a smooth skill curve.

Driver spin targets by swing speed

TrackMan publishes one anchor number for this: run its optimizer at 94 mph club speed with a 0-degree attack angle for optimized carry and you get 2,772 rpm. Work outward from there and the practical fitting windows look like this.

Driver swing speed	Target spin window	Why the band moves
Under 85 mph	2,600–3,200 rpm	Spin helps hold carry when ball speed is low
90 mph	2,200–2,800 rpm	Near TrackMan’s 94 mph optimizer output of 2,772 rpm
100 mph	2,200–2,600 rpm	Higher ball speed carries the same height on less spin
105+ mph	1,800–2,200 rpm	Excess spin balloons the flight and costs carry

These are fitting rules of thumb. TrackMan’s optimizer output is the only figure here sourced directly, and the bands shift with attack angle, strike height and delivered loft. BallCaddie’s fitting engine scores low, mid and high spin categories rather than rpm windows. A golfer who hits up on the ball needs less spin than one who hits down on it at the same speed.

Why high driver spin costs carry, and the specific balls that bring it down, are covered in best low-spin golf ball.

Golf ball spin rate chart (2026 robot test)

The numbers below are for named balls, all hit by the same robot in the same test window. They come from MyGolfSpy’s 2026 ball test, which hit 48 balls with a driver at three speeds plus a 35-yard pitch and a full wedge in dry and wet conditions.

The test calibrates to 85, 100 and 115 mph targets; the robot delivered 86, 102 and 116 mph. Those are the conditions the field figures below belong to.

Test condition	Delivered swing speed	Field spin
Low-speed driver	86 mph	3,092 rpm (median)
Mid-speed driver	102 mph	2,770 rpm (median)
High-speed driver	116 mph	2,311 rpm (median)
35-yard pitch	43 mph ball speed	5,390 rpm (median)

All four are medians of the 48-ball field. No club speed is published for the 35-yard pitch, so that row shows the average ball speed.

Driver and wedge spin compared for five urethane balls

Ball	Driver spin	35-yard spin	Full wedge, dry	Full wedge, wet
Srixon Q-Star Tour (~70)	2,157 rpm (116 mph)	5,702 rpm	10,169 rpm	9,647 rpm
Bridgestone Tour B RXS (~72)	2,180 rpm (116 mph)	5,848 rpm	10,207 rpm	9,572 rpm
Maxfli Tour X (~102)	2,294 rpm (116 mph)	5,850 rpm	10,723 rpm	9,286 rpm
Maxfli Tour (~94)	2,742 rpm (102 mph)	5,630 rpm	10,518 rpm	10,297 rpm
Maxfli Tour S (~80)	2,889 rpm (86 mph)	5,513 rpm	10,343 rpm	9,249 rpm

All five combine below-median driver spin with above-median 35-yard spin at the listed test speeds. The Maxfli Tour is the closest call — its 2,742 rpm driver spin sits 28 rpm under the 102 mph field median of 2,770 rpm.

The greenside spin leaders, and the urethane balls that trail them

Ball	Cover	35-yard spin
Callaway Chrome Tour X (~99)	Urethane	5,992 rpm
Titleist Pro V1x (~102)	Urethane	5,967 rpm
Srixon Z-Star Diamond (~93)	Urethane	5,953 rpm
PXG Xtreme Tour (~94)	Urethane	4,329 rpm
Kirkland Signature Performance+ (~95), white	Urethane	4,324 rpm
Snell PR3 (~93)	Urethane	4,184 rpm

Every ball in that table has a urethane cover, and 1,808 rpm separates the top from the bottom. Knowing a ball is urethane narrows your search, and you still have to look up its number.

The overlap runs both ways. On the full dry wedge, the ionomer Vice Tour (~98) posted 9,409 rpm and the ionomer Titleist TruFeel (~70) posted 9,154 rpm — both ahead of the urethane Snell PR3 at 8,956 rpm.

Wedge spin by cover material

Across the whole field, the average urethane ball out-spun the average ionomer ball on every wedge shot.

Test	Urethane average	Ionomer average	Gap
35-yard pitch	5,382 rpm	4,118 rpm	1,264 rpm
Full wedge, dry	10,332 rpm	7,717 rpm	2,615 rpm
Full wedge, wet	9,228 rpm	5,410 rpm	3,818 rpm

Source: MyGolfSpy 2026 test data, averaged across the 38 urethane and 10 ionomer balls. Surlyn is a brand of ionomer, so balls our catalog lists as surlyn — the Bridgestone e6 Soft (~45), Vice Drive (~95) — belong in the ionomer column.

The wet row is the one a dewy 8am tee time or a lie in damp rough plays off.

The urethane balls gave up about a tenth of their dry full-wedge spin once wet. The ionomer balls gave up nearly a third.

Within urethane, retention varies more than the average suggests:

Urethane ball	Dry wedge	Wet wedge	Retained
Bridgestone Tour B RX (~89)	10,275 rpm	10,273 rpm	100.0%
Srixon Z-Star (~81)	10,512 rpm	10,436 rpm	99.3%
Bridgestone Tour B X (~100)	10,307 rpm	10,095 rpm	97.9%
Vice Pro Air (~72)	10,201 rpm	8,391 rpm	82.3%
TaylorMade Tour Response (~74)	10,179 rpm	7,859 rpm	77.2%
Snell PR4 (~91)	10,267 rpm	6,947 rpm	67.7%

What the data says about “low driver spin, high wedge spin”

MyGolfSpy ran the obvious check on that promise in the 2026 test: take the lowest 25 percent of the field for average driver spin, take the highest 25 percent for average wedge spin, and see which balls appear in both.

None did. Count the 35-yard pitch alone and one ball makes both lists, the Srixon Q-Star Tour.

The three greenside leaders from the table above — Chrome Tour X, Pro V1x and Z-Star Diamond — all spun above the driver median at all three speeds tested. Push the other way and the TaylorMade Tour Response was among the lower-spinning urethane balls off the tee at all three speeds, but its wet full-wedge spin fell to 7,859 rpm — 77 percent retention, third-lowest of the 38 urethane balls.

Isolate the 38 urethane balls and driver spin had very little relationship with 35-yard wedge spin. Manufacturers can tune the two ends of the bag separately with a firm mantle and a soft cover. What none of the 48 balls managed was sitting at both extremes at once.

Where BallCaddie’s catalog sits on spin

Our 72-ball catalog tags each ball’s overall spin profile as low, mid or high, and the fitting engine weighs that tag against your swing speed and short-game priorities.

High-spin group (19 balls) — all urethane, from the Srixon Q-Star Tour (~70) at the soft end to the Titleist Pro V1x (~102) and Wilson Staff Model X (~102) at the firm end.
Mid-spin group (19 balls) — mostly three- and four-piece urethane: Callaway Chrome Soft (~77), Kirkland Signature Performance+ (~95), Titleist Pro V1 Left Dot (~85).
Low-spin group (34 balls) — two lanes that share a label and behave nothing alike: firm-mantle urethane like the Titleist AVX (~81), and two-piece ionomer distance balls like the Titleist Velocity (~90).

The Maxfli Tour S shows how far a category label can sit from a measured number. Its driver spin was 12th or 13th lowest of 48 at all three speeds, a low-spin number, while the robot put its 35-yard spin at 5,513 rpm, above the test median. Our catalog splits the difference and calls it mid spin.

Is there a spin limit in the rules?

No rule caps spin. The USGA and R&A Equipment Rules cover a ball’s weight, size, symmetry, initial velocity and the Overall Distance Standard, which caps tested distance at 317 yards with a 3-yard tolerance.

Spin appears only as a test condition. Balls are tested at 120 mph clubhead speed, a 10-degree launch angle and 2,520 rpm. In December 2023 the governing bodies announced a revision to 125 mph, 11 degrees and 2,200 rpm starting January 2028 — the change golf media named the ball rollback.

That date isn’t live any more. A joint statement from the USGA, R&A, PGA Tour and DP World Tour on 17 June 2026 confirmed there will be no change to the ODS testing approach until January 2030, after industry feedback favored a single implementation date and the tours raised concern that the revised test may not achieve what it was meant to. The governing bodies are now evaluating alternative approaches, so the eventual conditions aren’t settled. Nothing about the ball in your bag changes this season.

Find the spin profile that fits you

Which row you belong in depends on your driver swing speed, how much greenside spin your short game can use, and whether you play in wet grass often enough for the retention column to matter.

BallCaddie’s ball fitting quiz takes about 90 seconds and scores all 72 balls in the catalog against your answers. Your fitting report is free; your #1 ball is paid.

For deeper dives

Golf ball compression chart — the companion reference for the other number on every ball, with compression tiers mapped to swing speed.
How to choose a golf ball for your swing speed — the fitting pillar that turns these numbers into a purchase decision.
Best golf ball for spin — the recommendation post: high-spin picks by club, and when you want less spin instead.
Best low-spin golf ball — the driver-spin picks by swing speed, with the rpm data behind each.
Urethane vs ionomer golf balls — when the cover upgrade earns its price, and when it doesn’t.

Key takeaways

Spin climbs with loft: 2,545 rpm driver, 7,124 rpm 7-iron, 9,316 rpm pitching wedge on the PGA Tour.
Amateurs spin the driver more than tour players at every handicap bracket TrackMan publishes, by 286 to 781 rpm.
Cover material moved the full-wedge average by about 2,600 rpm and the driver average by about 260 rpm at 116 mph. Individual balls still differ off the tee (137 rpm separated the Q-Star Tour from the Maxfli Tour X at 116 mph). The short game is where ball choice moves the number by thousands.
“Urethane” is a filter that still leaves a wide range. The urethane balls cited here span 1,808 rpm on a 35-yard pitch (5,992 for Chrome Tour X against 4,184 for Snell PR3), and two ionomer balls out-spun a urethane one on the full wedge.
Wet spin is the row to check: urethane gave up about a tenth of its dry wedge spin, ionomer nearly a third.
None of the 48 balls tested sat in both the lowest quartile for average driver spin and the highest quartile for average wedge spin. Pick which end of the bag matters more to you.

Sources

MyGolfSpy, 2026 golf ball test