Penalty areas: red, yellow and your options.

This page summarises Rule 17 of the 2023 Rules of Golf, in effect from 1 January 2023. The R&A says the next edition of the Rules is due on 1 January 2028, so check for changes after that date.

What a penalty area is

Rule 17 describes penalty areas as bodies of water, or other areas the Committee defines, where a ball is often lost or cannot be played. Since the 2019 modernisation, when "water hazards" were renamed, Committees can also mark areas such as desert, jungle or lava rock as penalty areas, according to the USGA's summary of the 2019 changes.

Penalty areas are marked either red or yellow. The colour matters, because it changes which relief options you have. The 2019 changes also let Committees mark every penalty area red, so that sideways (lateral) relief is always available.

When your ball is in one

Under Rule 17.1a, a ball is in a penalty area when any part of it lies on or touches the ground or anything else inside the edge, or sits above the edge or any other part of the area. Rule 2.2c adds that a ball touching both a penalty area and another specific area (a bunker or the putting green) counts as in the penalty area.

Judging where the ball last crossed the edge is often a matter of estimate. Rule 1.3b says a player's reasonable judgment of a location like this stands, even if video later shows it was wrong, as long as the player did what could reasonably be expected.

Option one: play it as it lies

Rule 17.1b lets you play the ball as it lies, without penalty, under the same Rules that apply in the general area. Since 2019 there has been no penalty for moving loose impediments, touching the ground or grounding your club in a penalty area.

Option two: take penalty relief

Every relief option under Rule 17.1d costs one penalty stroke. A yellow penalty area gives two options; a red one gives three.

The back-on-the-line procedure was simplified in the 2023 edition: the ball is dropped on the line and must come to rest within one club-length of where it was dropped. A player using a wheeled mobility device gets a lateral relief area of four club-lengths instead of two, under Rules 17.1d(3) and 25.4m.

If you cannot find the ball

Rule 17.1c lets you take penalty area relief for a ball you have not found only if it is known or virtually certain that the ball came to rest in the penalty area. If that is not the case, the ball is simply lost, and you must take stroke-and-distance relief under Rule 18. See lost ball and out of bounds.

Special cases

• No play zones (Rule 17.1e): if the ball is in a no play zone inside a penalty area, you must not play it and must take penalty relief.
• Playing from one penalty area into another (Rule 17.2): after a stroke from a penalty area that ends in the same or another penalty area, you have an extra option of playing again from where you made your last stroke from outside a penalty area.
• No other relief (Rule 17.3): a ball in a penalty area does not get relief under the abnormal course condition, embedded ball or unplayable ball Rules. The one exception is a dangerous animal condition.

Opposite-side relief and Local Rules

Before 2019 a red penalty area also offered relief on the opposite side. The 2019 Rules removed that option. Model Local Rule B-2 can allow opposite-side relief from a red penalty area, but it applies only when the Committee has adopted it, so check the course's Local Rules before using it.

The Model Local Rules page lists other options a Committee may adopt, and relief and dropping explains how to measure club-lengths and drop correctly.