Understanding the 2025 US Open Golf Schedule
The 2025 United States Open Championship is being held at Chicago Golf Club in Wheaton, Illinois. This is the oldest and most grueling major of the year, and it runs from Thursday, June 12 through Sunday, June 15, 2025. That four-day window is the core of everything you need to know before you start making plans. Here is the breakdown of what to expect each day. The USGA sets the tee times and they are not flexible. If you want to watch a specific group, you need to know when they are on the course and plan your viewing accordingly. There is no second-guessing the schedule once it is published, and it changes very rarely due to weather unless there is a full cancellation or an extended rain delay. Thursday, June 12, 2025 — First Round
Play begins at approximately 8:00 AM local time at Chicago Golf Club. The first groups will be out early, which is standard for Thursday. You can expect roughly 8 to 10 groups on the course simultaneously throughout the day. The feature group tees off somewhere between 11:30 AM and 12:30 PM, but this varies slightly every year depending on how many players are in the field and how the USGA seeds the pairings. Thursday rounds typically finish by early evening, though heavy groups playing with slower players can push things later into the day. Friday, June 13, 2025 — Second Round Second round starts slightly earlier, usually around 7:45 AM. The field cuts after 36 holes. The cut line for the US Open is typically top 60 plus ties, which means more players continue into the weekend than in most other majors. The top groups remain on course throughout the day. Feature groups generally tee off between 12:00 PM and 1:00 PM on Friday.
Saturday, June 14, 2025 — Third Round Third round begins around 8:00 AM again. Only the players who made the cut are left, so you are watching a thinner but much tighter field. The tournament typically starts working its way back to the 18th hole later in the day, meaning the final groups will finish near closing time. This is when the pressure really shows. I have seen players collapse under it and I have seen them rise. The Saturday schedule is where the story of the tournament takes shape. Sunday, June 15, 2025 — Final Round
Get the Full Details
Final round starts at 10:00 AM local time. This is the only day with a fixed start time. You will see co-leader groups teeing off first, followed by the rest of the field. The winning score is almost always within two strokes entering Sunday, which means the lead changes hands multiple times across those final seven hours. The tournament ends when the last group holes out, which is usually between 5:00 PM and 6:30 PM depending on pace.
How to Actually Watch It
Golf Channel and CBS carry the US Open in the United States. Golf Channel has coverage from Thursday through Saturday, starting around 1:00 PM each day with their standard pre-game show. CBS picks up on Sunday with full coverage beginning at 11:00 AM ET / 10:00 AM CT. If you are following a specific group, you can also check the live scoring app or the USGA website for real-time group status updates. Those are more reliable than the broadcast because the TV coverage follows the leaders while the actual leader group may not be on screen for extended stretches. I learned this the hard way during the 2022 Open Championship, not the US Open, but the lesson applies equally here. I was watching the broadcast on a portable TV in the parking lot, convinced the player I was following was up a shot. He was not. He had been stuck in a four-ball that was moving slowly while the broadcast cut away to another leader. I ended up watching the entire back nine from the car. Now I pull up the group tracker on my phone instead and check it every fifteen minutes. It takes about twenty seconds per check and it prevents that kind of disappointment entirely.
Practical Viewing Strategy
Chicago Golf Club is a mature links-style course that has hosted the US Open before, so the layout will be long and firm. Expect the pars to play as par-5s on some holes and as demanding par-4s on others. The rough will be thick. The greens will be fast. Your viewing strategy should account for the fact that many birdies will be scarce and bogeys will be common for the field. This means the leaderboard moves slowly, sometimes frustratingly so. If you want to maximize what you see, follow two groups instead of one. Pick a leader group and a chase group. The narrative of the tournament is built between those two. When they finish a round, check the gap. That gap is the story for the next day.
A Word on the Broadcast Windows
The live broadcast windows are generous on the US Open but they are not all-encompassing. Golf Channel and CBS both show the featured groups for large blocks of the day, but they do not show every hole of every group. If you want complete coverage, you need the USGA streaming pass or the Golf Channel app with authentication. Those cost money but they deliver every group on every hole. It is worth the price if you are serious about following your players across all four rounds. Another detail people miss: the US Open schedule sometimes shifts tee times between rounds due to daylight or weather adjustments. The Thursday schedule is the least likely to shift because it is the widest open window. The Sunday schedule can move by fifteen or twenty minutes if there is a morning delay. Always check the official USGA app the evening before the final round for any last-minute changes. I have wasted time showing up at the course for a broadcast that ended up starting an hour earlier than I expected because of an overnight delay adjustment. Checking the app saved me from that twice now.
What to Expect at Chicago Golf Club
Chicago Golf Club is one of the oldest golf clubs in the United States, and the course is long. You should expect the course to stretch past 7,400 yards for the championship setup. The fairways are tight. The bunkers are deep. The greens are undulating and fast enough that a three-putt is a realistic outcome for most amateurs and some professionals. This is not a course where you expect 65s. A winning score in the low 60s or even par would be surprising. Most years the winning score sits between +2 and +5. That affects your viewing too. When scores are negative, the tournament feels dramatic because birdies are flying everywhere. When scores are positive, like they usually are at the US Open, the drama comes from the tension of avoiding disaster rather than the spectacle of low scoring. The final round often goes down to the last hole because the leaders are holding on by a single stroke instead of pulling away. That is why Sunday afternoon is the must-watch window.
Streaming and Broadcasting Notes
If you are watching from outside the Chicago area, you have a few options. The USGA streaming service gives you global access but it requires a subscription and a stable internet connection. If you are in the US, Golf Channel and CBS are your primary routes. International viewers should check their local broadcaster through the USGA partner listing before the tournament starts. Sometimes the broadcast rights shift from year to year and the information on older websites becomes stale. I also recommend downloading the group tracker offline if you are planning to be at the course. The signal at Chicago Golf Club is unreliable in certain areas between the 4th and 6th holes, and having the schedule available without cell service means you are not scrambling for a signal every time you want to check which group is on the 9th. It is a small thing that matters more than you think when you are walking around a 7,400-yard venue with thousands of other fans.
