The British Open: How to watch, betting odds for golf's final major of 2026

SOUTHPORT, England (AP) — The oldest championship in golf is now the last major of the year.

The British Open dates to 1860 and returns this year to Royal Birkdale, and it’s already different from anything the world’s best players have seen this year. The links course along the Lancashire coast of England is yellow and brown, the sure sign of a fast and firm test.

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Tommy Fleetwood of England plays out of a bunker on the 4th green during the first day of the British Open Golf championships at Royal Birkdale golf club, in Southport, England, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Jon Super)

Bryson DeChambeau of the United States gestures as he walks the 7th hole during the first day of the British Open Golf championships at Royal Birkdale golf club, in Southport, England, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Peter Morrison)

Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland looks at his club after putting on the 9th green during the first day of the British Open Golf championships at Royal Birkdale golf club, in Southport, England, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/David Goldman)

Jackson Suber of the United States putts win the 18th green during the first day of the British Open Golf championships at Royal Birkdale golf club, in Southport, England, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Peter Morrison)

Bryson DeChambeau of the United States, right and Scottie Scheffler of the United States walks off the 18th green after completing their round, during the first day of the British Open Golf championships at Royal Birkdale golf club, in Southport, England, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Jon Super)

Scottie Scheffler is trying to become the first repeat winner of the British Open since Padraig Harrington won in 2007 and 2008 — the second one also was at Royal Birkdale. He also can become only the third player in the last 20 years to go three straight years winning a major.

There are favorites and there are inspirations, such as David Howard, the 27-year-old Irish amateur who didn’t even expect to be alive at this stage in his career, much less playing in the Open. There’s also West Point grad Marcus Plunkett.

Even though Royal Birkdale did not join the British Open rotation until 1954, this is the 11th time it has hosted golf’s oldest major. And its roll call of champions rivals any other links course. All but one champion at Birkdale is either in the World Golf Hall of Fame or will be.

Here’s what to know about the 154th edition of the British Open:

Jackson Suber had never played in the British Open. He had never been to Europe until he arrived on Sunday, and his first taste of links golf was Monday. And then he shot a 65 in only his seventh round of a major and leads by one shot. The highlight was choking down on a 4-iron from 233 yards and hitting it to 6 feet for eagle.

Sungjae Im and Dan Brown were at 66, and the group of players at 67 ranged from Bryson DeChambeau and Cameron Young to M.J. Daffue and Pierceson Coody.

This will be the 10th year for NBC Sports to be the lead broadcast network in the United States, and it will be wall-to-wall coverage. For Friday’s round in Eastern Daylight Time, Peacock will carry The Open from 1:30 a.m. to 4 a.m., with USA Network taking over from 4 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. USA Network will broadcast it from 5 a.m. to 7 a.m. on Saturday, followed by NBC from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. The final round will be an hour earlier. USA Network will start at 4 a.m. to 7 a.m., with NBC picking it up from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Not since Padraig Harrington in 2007-08 has there been a repeat winner in the British Open, and Scheffler is off to a satisfying start. He birdied four of the first six holes and was leading early, but then he went the final 12 holes without a birdie and shot 68.

Scheffler knows all that went wrong, including a bogey on the par-5 17th and a few missed putts. But the way he struck the ball left him confident about his chance.

Bryson DeChambeau is among three players this year who have missed the cut in every major. That streak looks like it will end. DeChambeau was tied for the early lead until a bogey on the final hole gave him a 67. That leaves him in a tie for fourth and just two shots behind.

DeChambeau was slapping hands with spectators going to just about every tee box. But he kept one streak alive: He chose not to speak to the media for the fifth straight round dating to Friday at the Masters.

Rory McIlroy is the most popular player in the UK and he had a rough start with a 72. McIlroy made six bogeys. He also missed three 4-foot putts in a four-hole stretch around the turn.

Dan Brown of England (66), Robert MacIntyre of Scotland (67) and Jordan Smith of England (68) did well for the UK. But the biggest stars for England are Tommy Fleetwood and Matt Fitzpatrick. Fleetwood birdied two of the last four holes for a 69. Fitzpatrick made only one birdie for 72. The disappointment was 45-year-old Justin Rose. He shot a 75.

Based on the results of the first day, not much. Five of the leading 12 players are making their first appearance in the British Open. That starts with Suber and his 65. The group at 67 includes Daffue, Coody, Alex Smalley and Ryan Gerard, who already has won on the PGA Tour.

Also at 67 was two-time U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau and Francesco Molinari, who won the Open at Carnoustie in 2018. Worth nothing? It was warm, yellow, fast and fiery that year.

Scheffler started at +750 according to the BetMGM Sportsbook, and after one round of 68 his odds have improved to +500. He is followed by Cameron Young and Robert MacIntyre at +1200. They both shot 67. Bryson DeChambeau and Collin Morikawa are at +1400, while Tommy Fleetwood checks in at +1600.

Look no further than David Howard, an Irish amateur who came through qualifying to get into his first major. A trained mechanic, Howard was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis — a rare condition for which there is no cure — when he was 7. It’s only because of recent medical advances that the life expectancy for those with the disease is longer than their mid-20s. He shot 74.

Marcus Plunkett is a West Point grad and was a captain in the Army when he got the golf bug. Instead of staying in the Army, he chose to pursue golf again. He shot 72 in his Open debut.

The winner is introduced as the “Champion Golfer of the Year” and receives the silver claret jug, the oldest trophy in golf. Scheffler had to officially return the claret jug to the R&A on Tuesday. The winner is exempt to the British Open through his 55th birthday, and he is exempt into the other three majors for the next five years.

Bad weather can dog the British Open, but not this week. It has been warm and sunny all week and those should be the conditions the rest of the way with the forecast for temperatures of up to 25 degrees Celsius (77 Fahrenheit) for Friday.

It gets slightly cooler over the weekend, but there should still be plenty of sun.

Scottie Scheffler won by four shots in the British Open’s second visit to Royal Portrush in six years to capture his second major of 2025 — after the PGA Championship — and the third leg of the career Grand Slam.

Royal Birkdale joined the British Open rotation in 1954, the last addition among courses in England. But it’s regarded as the best in England, and in 72 years this is the 11th time hosting the championship. But it’s not quite the same course as when Jordan Spieth won in 2017. The par-3 14th hole is gone. No. 14 is now a par 5 that used to be the 15th hole. And it’s followed by an entirely new par-3 15th that can play as long as 241 yards.

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TOKYO (AP) — Japan’s parliament enacted Friday a historic revision to the 19th-century Imperial House Law by insisting only paternal-lineage men can become emperor, sparking fear that it could doom the already shrinking imperial family.

The revisions include adoption of distant male relatives to father future heirs and allowing princesses to keep their royal status after marrying commoners.

Royal watchers and experts fear the new measures could doom the 1,500-year-old hereditary institution by insisting that only men can be emperor, sparking worry about the shrinking, fast-aging imperial family.

Emperor Naruhito ’s 24-year-old daughter is hugely popular, and many Japanese want her to be his successor, but Princess Aiko is ineligible because she is a woman. Japan’s male-only succession rule means the line must move to the emperor’s younger brother, then to his 19-year-old nephew Prince Hisahito. Next in line after him is the emperor’s 90-year-old uncle.

In an imperial family that places a premium on male royal babies, Hisahito is the first such boy to be born in four decades. Only five of the 16 adults in the imperial family — there are no children — are men.

This matters, as Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and other conservatives insist the male bloodline is “the only source of the emperor’s authority and legitimacy,” which will be the basis for the upcoming measures.

While an emperor’s mother can be a commoner, as is the case with the current one, only boys born to men with royal blood can be heirs to the throne, according to the Imperial House Law.

On Friday, the parliament was to pass a revision to the antiquated law meant to solidify the principle of that crucial bloodline by allowing the adoption of distant royal male relatives to father future heirs.

The new measures would also allow princesses to keep their royal status if they marry a commoner.

“It’s a declaration to prevent female monarchs … and to defend the male-lineage at all costs,” said Hideya Kawanishi, a Nagoya University expert on monarchy. “They cannot say it’s male chauvinism, so they call it tradition.”

There have been eight female monarchs. The last was Empress Gosakuramachi, who ruled from 1762 to 1770.

The paternal-line male succession was stipulated for the first time in the 1890 Imperial House Law, when Japan promoted patriarchal systems. That law was largely carried over to the current 1947 version.

Friday’s proposal has led to protests from Japanese who see the government efforts as meant to eliminate Aiko from ruling and to justify discrimination against women and a patriarchal system.

“It’s very ironic that the first female prime minister herself is the leading proponent of the obsession with male-succession,” Chizuko Ueno, a prominent feminist scholar, wrote recently referring to Takaichi.

Ueno said the new measures “treat male royals as stallions and put female royals under pressure as ‘childbearing machines’ to produce male offspring.”

After Aiko’s birth, her mother Empress Masako, a Harvard-educated former diplomat and a commoner, developed a stress-induced mental condition, apparently over criticism for not producing a male heir.

Because of the male-only succession rules and the dismissal of princesses who marry commoners, the monarchy after Hisahito is “extremely unstable,” former Imperial Household Agency chief Shingo Haketa told Kyodo News recently.

Historians say the male-only system is unworkable today, as Japan more broadly faces a fast-aging, dwindling population.

It only worked in the past because concubines produced half the emperors until about 100 years ago, when the practice ended under Naruhito’s great-grandfather, Emperor Taisho.

There was a government proposal in 2005 to allow female monarchs, but it was scrapped following Hisahito’s birth.

Naruhito’s two male heirs are his 60-year-old brother, Crown Prince Akishino, who is only six years younger than the emperor and has reportedly said he would be too old to serve, and Hisahito, Akishino’s 19-year-old son. Third in line is Naruhito’s uncle, Prince Hitachi, who is 90.

The more controversial of the two measures allows unmarried male descendants, aged 15 or older, of distant imperial relatives — but only of paternal lineage — to be adopted into the royal family.

Fifty-one members from 11 branch families renounced their royal status in 1947, mainly to ease the postwar financial burden on the monarchy, Imperial Household Agency official Yoshimi Ogata told a recent parliamentary session.

These people are at least 36 generations removed from Naruhito because they split from a common male-line ancestor 600 years ago, Ogata said.

There is criticism of what some see as the government’s extraordinary efforts to make sure that male royals are producing male emperors.

“Who wants the son of an adoptee who nobody knows to be emperor instead of Aiko?” asked Yoshinori Kobayashi, a cartoonist campaigning for Aiko’s succession.

It may also be unrealistic to ask former royals to reenter a very strict family known as “an enclave without human rights.” Royals cannot choose their jobs or homes, and must follow other serious constraints.

“I wonder if anyone would raise a hand,” 81-year-old Asahiro Kuni, whose family renounced its royal status when he was 3, told TBS television. “I imagine many people, by age 15, have some idea about their future. It’s cruel to tell them … to change the course of their life.”

Kuni, who worked as an engineer at a major Japanese company, said he would tell his family to decline if asked by the palace. “You are asked to sacrifice your life for the happiness of the people. I can’t tell my family to choose such a difficult life.”

He also expressed support for female monarchs in interviews with other Japanese media.

Aiko, known for her engaging smile, enthusiasm and witty conversation, is a public favorite.

Five single princesses, including Aiko and her popular cousin Kako, 31, may be affected by the other main revision to the Imperial House Law, which would allow them to keep their royal status and continue serving official duties if they marry commoners, although their spouse and children wouldn’t be accepted as royals.

Aiko’s elder cousin Mako renounced her royal status and moved to New York after marrying her college boyfriend, a commoner who now is a lawyer. The move was largely seen as her attempt to flee from the restrained imperial life.

Ueno calls the system inhumane and urges the princesses to follow Mako’s example and leave when they can.

Hisahito, possible adoptees and their future wives will face enormous pressure to produce male offspring, Kawanishi said.

“The emperor is a symbolic figure, and I don’t see why women cannot serve in the role,” said 78-year-old Junichiro Tsujimaru, a sushi chain founder.

Yoshio Iwase, also 78, says Aiko, as the daughter of the emperor, is the legitimate successor. “I think it’s fine because there used to be female emperors in the past.”

There is worry that the government’s push will upset former Emperor Akihito’s legacy, which included making amends for the victims of World War II, fought in his father’s name.

Akihito, who abdicated in 2019, also tried to bring what was seen as an aloof monarchy closer to the people, an example followed by his son, Naruhito, and his family.

Akihito reportedly supports Aiko’s succession. He avoided directly answering a question about the 2005 government proposal but said female royals served a major role in the monarchy and that its role was to work for the happiness of the people — a remark interpreted as his support for female monarchs.

Naruhito also said in June that he hoped discussions about the measures would reach a conclusion that “will gain understanding of the people,” a comment palace watchers said was his nuanced displeasure.

The British Open: How to watch, betting odds for golf’s final major of 2026

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