Arnold Palmer Invitational 2018 purse: Winner’s payout is $1.6 million in prize money

The Arnold Palmer Invitational leaderboard is tasty. Many of the top ranked players this week are in contention with Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy, Justin Rose, Rickie Fowler, Henrik Stenson, and Bryson DeChambeau, among others, all with late Sunday tee times. They’re all in the hunt late in the day at Bay Hill and could use a nice pre-Masters win. That’s also a group that’s not exactly hurting for cash or status, but they’re in line for a nice fat check again on Sunday.

A few years ago, the PGA Tour sought to protect and preserve the status of some of the tournaments hosted by their legends. They also wanted to enhance the appeal of them, specifically this Arnold Palmer Invitational and Jack Nicklaus’ Memorial Tournament in early June. The quickest and easiest way to do that was to jack the purse up and sweeten the exemption pot. So both events now have purses that far exceed those of “regular season” PGA Tour events. The WGCs, the Playoffs, The Players, and the majors all have bigger purses. But those also all hold a special distinction of some sort. Prior to this move, Bay Hill and Memorial did not, even with the imprimatur of the two legends that hosted them.

Winning a PGA Tour event usually triggers a two-year exemption. You’re safe and have a PGA Tour card for two years — an invaluable commodity and peace of mind for many who are grinding to stay on the most competitive tour in the world. At Bay Hill, the exemption is now three years, a massive bonus that sets it apart from the other events on the rota.

The purse is now also $8.9 million, which is much more lucrative than your standard event on the schedule. Those usually fall somewhere in the $6 to $7 million range. The API purse in 2016 was $6.3 million and winner Jason Day took home $1,134,000. Last year was the first year of this enhanced status, and Marc Leishman banked $1,566,000 million of an $8.7 million purse. This year, it’s up another $200,000.

Every player on the leaderboard has piled up millions in both on-course and off-course earnings, to varying degrees. Tiger is obviously the leader in all categories and will be for a long time. They’re all in line for at least a nice six-figure payday. The top 21 should all be in six figures, another measurement of just how big this purse has grown.

Here’s the full payout table for the top 70 at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. We’ll obviously update this when results go final as some amounts will be impacted by ties.

Update: It was Rory, in a runaway, at Bay Hill. Your final results and payout totals.