Golf With Arthritis: The Equipment Side

Arthritis doesn’t have to end your golf. A handful of equipment changes can take a lot of strain off aching hands, wrists and joints — and rather than tell you which ones matter in our own voice, we’ll point you to who actually says so. The Arthritis Foundation publishes a guide, “Golfing With Arthritis,” with named contributors including a director of golf and a physical therapist. It names concrete gear changes, and this page gathers them in one place with links to the specific products and tools that fit each one.

Build up your grips

Among its equipment suggestions, the Arthritis Foundation lists building up the size of your grips so you can hold the club with a looser, less painful grip. That is the single change most senior golfers feel first: a larger, softer grip fills the hand so you stop clamping down. How far to size up is a personal thing — our grip size guide lays out the tiers, and the best grips for arthritis roundup ranks the soft and oversize options. You can also build up the diameter with extra wraps of tape, which costs almost nothing.

Lighter shafts and forgiving heads

The Arthritis Foundation also points toward lightweight graphite shafts and perimeter-weighted, more forgiving clubheads for players with arthritis. A lighter graphite shaft asks less of the hands and wrists through the swing, and a forgiving head means off-center hits punish the joints less. If you are weighing that change, our graphite vs steel shafts guide walks through the trade-offs, and the best clubs for seniors roundup collects sets built around exactly this idea.

A softer, lower-compression ball

For the ball, the Arthritis Foundation suggests a lower-compression ball. As it happens, that is the right ball for a slower swing on its own merits — a soft, low-compression ball is easier to compress and can feel gentler at impact. Match one to your swing with our ball compression chart, then see the best golf balls for seniors for the picks. It is one of the cheapest changes on this list.

Gloves — and maybe two of them

The Arthritis Foundation notes that wearing a glove on each hand can help golfers with arthritis hold the club more comfortably. A padded relief glove goes a step further, cushioning the palm and fingers so the hand meets the club more gently. If your hands are the sorest part of your game, the best gloves for arthritis covers the relief gloves worth trying — and buying a second one to wear on both hands is a cheap experiment.

Longer tees, and let the cart carry the bag

Two more suggestions from the Arthritis Foundation are worth flagging because they cost so little. Longer tees mean less bending to tee up the ball, which spares the back and knees over 18 holes. And rather than carrying, it points toward using a wheeled push cart so your shoulders, back and hands aren’t loaded with the weight of the bag between shots. A good push cart is one of the highest-relief, lowest-effort changes a senior can make — see the best push carts for seniors.

How you play matters too

Beyond gear, the Arthritis Foundation’s guide talks about warming up, staying loose, and playing within what your body allows on a given day — the kind of advice best taken from them and your own care team rather than from a gear site. We stick to the equipment, which is what we can honestly help with; for anything about your body, joints or medication, read the guide itself and talk to your doctor or physical therapist.

Where to start

If you do just one thing, change your grips — it is the cheapest change and usually the most immediately felt. From there, a lighter set, a softer ball, a relief glove and a push cart each take a little more strain off. None of it is a cure, and none of it is medical advice; it is the equipment side of a bigger picture that the Arthritis Foundation’s guide and your care team are the right people to complete.