In a big win for women’s golf, the LPGA Tour will see substantially more linear television exposure during the upcoming season.
On Tuesday, the LPGA Tour announced a partnership with commercial property insurer FM that will bring forth a number of broadcast enhancements for the tour, including ensuring that every round of every event on the schedule will air live on television for the first time since 1995. Two Versant properties, Golf Channel and CNBC, will broadcast most of the additional rounds.
“2026 will be a great year for LPGA Tour viewers as we will televise every single LPGA Tour event and coverage of every round will be live across the country, which is a direct result of Golf Channel and CNBC both being a part of the Versant portfolio,” Tom Knapp, EVP and general manager of Golf Channel said in a press release. “Additionally, we’ve worked together with the LPGA Tour and our partners at FM and Trackman to enhance our production, adding more technology to our telecasts as we continue to be the proud home of the LPGA Tour and showcase the best women’s golfers on the planet every single week.”
Those broadcast enhancements include a 50% increase in the number of cameras utilized compared to the 2025 season, more slow-motion cameras, three times more microphones versus 2025, and additional drone coverage.
Along with the partnership with FM, the LPGA Tour also announced a new partnership with Trackman. As a result, LPGA Tour broadcasts will quadruple the amount of shot-tracing shots compared to 2025.
The partnership with FM is certainly a unique setup for the LPGA Tour. The commercial property insurer seems to be fronting the investment for these broadcast improvements, rather than the tour or its broadcast partners. It’s not exactly clear if FM played a direct role in expanding the linear TV windows for the LPGA Tour — that could have simply been part of Golf Channel’s post-spinoff strategy — but announcing the enhancements and the expanded TV schedule in the same press release would suggest the two are connected in some way.
FM has been the title sponsor of an LPGA Tour event since 2024. The FM Championship boasts the largest non-major purse on tour, so the company’s investment into women’s golf is nothing new.
Regardless of how these arrangements came together, it’s a big win for the LPGA Tour and fans of women’s golf.
About Drew Lerner
Drew Lerner is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and an aspiring cable subscriber. He previously covered sports media for Sports Media Watch. Future beat writer for the Oasis reunion tour.