The concept of the World Ranking was born in the early 1980s when a decade of dominance by Jack Nicklaus, Tom Watson and other United States golfers was being challenged by the emergence of a number of international players including Seve Ballesteros, Nick Faldo, Bernhard Langer, Sandy Lyle, Greg Norman, Jose Maria Olazabal, Tommy Nakajima and Ian Woosnam.  In addition the Championship Committee of the Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews, which had prided itself on having the best exemption system for maintaining a strong international field for the Open Championship, found that its categorised criteria for the separate Tours were becoming less relevant. Some leading golfers, who were now playing on several of the world's circuits without dominating any one, were not being recognised and a new format for guaranteeing the participation of leading International players was needed.

After a great measure of research, the first issue of the “Sony Ranking” was launched prior to the 1986 Masters Tournament, overseen by an International Advisory Committee chaired by Mark H McCormack, sanctioned by the Championship Committee of the Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews, sponsored by the Sony Corporation and managed at IMG by Tony Greer.  The first No.1 was Bernhard Langer, the defending Masters Champion, with No.2 Seve Ballesteros, who had already won four of his five Major titles, followed by No.3 Sandy Lyle, the current Open Champion who the previous week had won the Greater Greensbor Open. Tom Watson was at No.4, Mark O’Meara at No.5 and Greg Norman No.6.

The basics of the ranking system remain unchanged – initially a “rolling” three-year system weighted in favour of the most recent results with points awarded according to the quality of the event based primarily on the strength of the field parti with only the Major Championships weighted separately to reflect their higher status.

However, the Advisory Committee, and latterly the Board, have always been mindful of improving the ranking system, and a number of adjustments have been made over the years to keep up with changes in the world of professional golf and opinions voiced by the players. Initially a grading system of tournaments was required to establish the Ranking, but now all ranking points are determined by the strength of the participating field.  In addition the Ranking is now based on "average" points rather than "total" points to be fairer to those players who do not play as many events, and at the end of 1995, the three-year “rolling” period was changed to a two-year system. Other improvements such as a more graduated decline of player’s ranking points and the “rating value” of events based on the Top-200, rather than Top-100, have been introduced to improve the strength of field calculation. Also more recently a “Maximum Divisor” has been introduced so that players are not penalised for playing a high number of tournaments.

At first only the Championship Committee of the R&A, the sanctioning body, used the Ranking as a criterion for exempting players from qualifying for the Open Championship – initially the Top-40 ranked players and then the Top-50. However over the years all the other Major Championships have come to use the World Ranking as an exemption to their Championships. The PGA TOUR formally endorsed the Sony Ranking in 1990, and at an historic meeting at Turnberry during The Open at Royal Troon in July 1997 representatives from  all the professional Tours and all the Major Championships agreed to form a new Governing Board of the now named “Official World Golf Ranking” under the chairmanship of Mark H McCormack.  After McCormack’s death in 2003 Sir Michael Bonallack became the new Chairman of the Official World Golf Ranking Board who in turn was succeeded by Peter Dawson in 2016. Also in 2003 IMG handed over the proprietary interest of the Ranking which was transferred to a new incorporated company.  This new company, Official World Golf Ranking Ltd, operates from its offices in Virginia Water, Surrey, UK with the day to day management of the Ranking carried out by Ian Barker and Sasha Forster with Tony Greer, who retired in April 2016 after thirty years of being associated with the Ranking since its inception, as a Consultant.

As well as being used as an eligibility criterion for all the Major Championships, the Official World Golf Ranking is also used for player qualification for all the World Golf Championships and more recently the Olympic Games. In addition, it is used to determine the International Team for the Presidents Cup, as part of the qualification for the European Ryder Cup team and as a qualification by a number of official Tour events throughout the world including the Players Championship for its foreign exemptions.

Some of the statistics built up as the Ranking reached 35 years are as follows:  In that time only twenty four players, who have won 62 Major Championships between them, have joined the elite No.1 Club – after Bernhard Langer’s initial weeks as No.1, Seve Ballesteros and Greg Norman vied for the No.1 spot, then Nick Faldo took over as Greg Norman’s rival.  IanWoosnam and Fred Couples held the position through 1991 and 1992 before Nick Faldo was No.1 again through to 1994, then Nick Price’s burst of Majors took him to No.1. After a single week at No.1 by Tom Lehman,Tiger Woods dominated the position from 1997 with brief interruptions from Ernie Els, David Duval and Vijay Singh. However, between 2010 and 2012 first Lee Westwood, then Martin Kaymer and finally Luke Donald took over the No.1 poisition.  Rory McIlroy dominated the next two years before AdamScott  made the No.1 spot for a few weeks. In 2016 Jordan Spieth and Jason Day joined Rory McIlroy in a close contest for the top position.Since 2017 the current No.1 Dustin Johnson has dominated the top of the Ranking with Justin Thomas, Justin Rose (the Olympic Champion), Brooks Koepka (who won four Majors in two years) and more recently Jon Rahm taking the No.1 position at various times. In this very competitiveperiod, between 12 July 2020 and 23 August 2020 the Ranking had record five different No.1’s in the space of seven consecutive weeks (McIlroy 1, Rahm 2, Thomas,1, Rahm 2 and Johnson 1). This followed a unique suspension of the Ranking for twelve weeks from week ending 22 March 2020 to week ending 7 June 2020 with professional golf inactive due to the global threat posed by Coronavirus (COVID-19).

Tiger Woods became the youngest No.1 when he was only 21 years and 24 weeks just 42 weeks after turning professionsl and Vijay Singh was the oldest player to make No.1 at the age of 41 years and 28 weeks. Tiger Woods has the most weeks at No.1 - 683 weeks (also a record 281 cnsecutive weeks at No.1 between 2002 and 2010), followed by Greg Norman 331 weeks, the current No.1 DustinJohnson 123weeks, Rory McIlroy 106 weeks and Nick Faldo 97 weeks.

One hundred and nine players have reached a Top-10 position since the Ranking began including 54 United States players, 28 from Europe and 27 from the Rest of the World. In addition the Top-200 in the Official World Golf Ranking includes players from 32 different nations; 85 players from the United States, 60 from Europe including 18 different nations, and the 55 from the Rest of the World with 13 different nations represented. Also  there are a record eight players under the age of  25 in the OWGR Top-50 replacing the older gereration and many past Major Champions including Phil Mickelson who, although he never quite made the No.1 position in the Tiger Woods era, completed a record uninterrupted 25 years in the Top-50 in 2018.

The Mark H McCormack Award was inaugurated in 1998 recognising the player who had been in the No.1 position for the most weeks in each calendar year. Tiger Woods has won the award fourteen times (1998 to 2010 and 2013), Rory McIlroy three times (2012, 2014 & 2015), LukeDonald once in 2011, Jason Day once in 2016, Brooks Koepka once in 2019 and Dustin Johnson the current No.1 three times in 2017, 2018 and 2020.