Stroke

Classic scoring — lowest total wins

⛳What is a stroke in golf?

A stroke is any swing you make intending to hit the ball — whether you hit it, top it, or miss it completely. A practice swing is not a stroke, and neither is a swing you deliberately stop before reaching the ball.

Penalty strokes are added on top: typically one stroke for taking relief from a penalty area (water), and stroke-and-distance for a ball out of bounds or lost — one penalty stroke plus replaying from where you last hit.

Stroke play simply counts every stroke, penalties included, over the round. Fewest total wins. Gross is that raw count; net is gross minus your course handicap.

“Getting a stroke” on a hole means something different: a handicap stroke. Each hole has a stroke index from 1 (hardest) to 18 (easiest), and a player with a course handicap of 10 subtracts one shot on the holes ranked 1 through 10.

The basics

Everyone plays their own ball; lowest total over the round wins. Works with one to four players — solo Stroke is you against the course.

Net scoring applies each player's full course handicap, computed from their index and the tees they actually play. Gross is raw. Or show both at once.

⚡How to actually win it

Play to your miss, not your best. Stroke play punishes the blow-up hole more than it rewards the great one. One double bogey costs exactly what one birdie gains, but you will make more doubles than birdies — so the player who eliminates the disaster wins the money.

Know your real number. Take the tee that gives you a course handicap you can actually play to. Playing the back tees to look tough is the most expensive ego decision in golf, and net scoring exposes it immediately.

Par 5s and short par 4s are where the round is won. Everyone survives the hard holes roughly the same way. The separation comes from converting the easy ones, so take on the risk where the reward is real.

Use the what-if tabs. Mid-round, the Standings screen replays your same scores as Stableford, Quota, Match or 9's. If you're getting buried in stroke play, you can see instantly whether you're actually playing badly or just having one catastrophic hole.

🔥Why it never gets old

Stroke play is the format the entire sport is scored in, and there's a reason it survives: the number at the end is the truth. No partner to blame, no format to hide behind, no lucky pairing. Just you and the course.

It's also the most portable game here — it works solo, it works with two, and it works when your group can't agree on anything else. When somebody says "let's just play," this is what they mean.

And with net scoring live on every phone, it's the format where a 20-handicap can genuinely beat a 5 and have it mean something to both of them.

💰The wager

Stroke play settles on strokes of difference — you pay for each shot you finished behind, and collect for each one you finished ahead.

Friendly · $0.50 / strokeStandard · $1 / strokeGrown folks · $2–5 / stroke

A typical net spread between the best and worst player in a foursome is 8–18 strokes, so a dollar a stroke is a $10–20 round. Because it's difference-based, the middle players usually break close to even and the money moves between the extremes.

Mixed handicaps? Play it net.Stroke play applies each player's full course handicap — not strokes off the low man — so net stroke play is the truest head-to-head test between a scratch and a 20 that golf has. Battle Tees computes every player's course handicap from their index and the tees they actually played, then keeps gross and net side by side, live, on every phone — so the scratch sees their real number while everyone bets the one that decides the money. It is the difference between a group that bets and a group that talks about betting.

Battle Tees never touches the money. The app scores it, applies your handicaps, and shows exactly who owes whom at the end — one clean list, no arguing on the tailgate. You settle it in the parking lot, the way golfers always have.

In Battle Tees

Your group, your point structure.Every group has its own house rules, and the app bends to them instead of the other way round. In Stroke that means how many players (one to four), your scoring lens — gross, net, or both side by side — and the handicap allowance percentage. Change any of it in setup before the round — the scoring, the standings and the settle math all follow automatically, and the numbers ride along to every phone in the group.

Settlement pays by strokes of difference. Want more on the line? Stack Stableford, Skins, Nassau or any other game on the same scorecard with Choose Game(s) — one card, many games.

The scorecard view shows every hole, and past rounds are saved for reviewing (or fixing) later.

If you like Stroke, try these

⚔️ Play Stroke in Battle Tees — request beta access Battle Tees — fourteen golf games, one scorecard, settled before the parking lot