Golf Scoring Explained: Par, Birdie, Bogey, and Beyond

Golf has a scoring vocabulary that can sound cryptic to anyone new to the game — commentators talking about “eagles” and “bogeys” as if they’re describing wildlife rather than a score. It’s actually a simple, consistent system once you know the reference point it’s built around: par.

Par is the baseline

Every hole on a golf course is assigned a par — the number of strokes an expert golfer is expected to need to complete it. Par is based mainly on the hole’s length, with a rough assumption of two putts once you reach the green: a par 3 expects you to reach the green in one shot, a par 4 in two shots, and a par 5 in three shots, each followed by two putts. Most courses are a mix of par 3s, 4s, and 5s adding up to a total course par, commonly somewhere around 70 to 72 for a full 18 holes, though this varies by course.

Scoring relative to par

Once par is set, every score on a hole gets described relative to it:

• Eagle — two strokes under par
• Birdie — one stroke under par
• Par — exactly the expected number of strokes
• Bogey — one stroke over par
• Double bogey — two strokes over par (and so on: triple bogey, quadruple bogey)

A rarer term you’ll sometimes hear is albatross (also called a double eagle) — three strokes under par, extremely uncommon since it usually requires holing out from well off the green. A hole-in-one (or “ace”) is exactly what it sounds like: the ball goes in the hole on the very first shot, most often on a par 3.

Adding it all up: gross score

Your gross score for a round is simply the total number of strokes across all 18 holes, with no adjustment. If you shoot four-over-par across a round, your gross score is four strokes higher than the course’s total par. This is the number used in most professional stroke-play tournaments, reported relative to par (for example, “-4” or “+2”).

Net score, and why it exists

Net score takes your gross score and subtracts strokes based on your handicap, producing a number meant to be comparable across players of different skill levels. It’s what makes handicapped events — the kind most club golfers actually play in — fair between a beginner and a low-handicap player. See our companion piece on how golf handicaps work for the full mechanics.

Match play changes the math

Everything above assumes stroke play, where the running total is what matters. In match play, individual hole scores only matter in that they determine who wins the hole — a birdie beats a par, a par beats a bogey, and the actual number of strokes above that doesn’t affect the outcome of the match. A player can lose a hole by one stroke or by five and it counts exactly the same in the match.

Putting it together

None of this vocabulary is complicated once the reference point — par — clicks into place. Everything else is just a shorthand for “how far above or below the expected score” a given hole or round turned out to be, which is exactly why it translates so cleanly to TV commentary and casual golf conversation alike.