TaylorMade wants you to know that the reason your golf ball is flying offline may not be entirely your fault.
OK, maybe it is, but we’ve all hit golf shots that come up in the air and then do something unexpected. Maybe it cuts when you thought it would draw. Or maybe it’s a touch flustered and comes up short. TaylorMade thinks that’s because of the consistent paint, which means that each golf ball you use may be slightly different than the last.
That’s why, for the new TP5 and TP5x golf balls, TaylorMade is revamping its painting process with a new method called “Microcoating” that applies an even coat of paint to the golf ball, avoiding traditional dripping and blending methods.
“Golf balls are the only piece of equipment we hit all the time, but they’re also the only piece of equipment we change during the round,” said TaylorMade’s Mike Fox, Senior Director of Industry, Golf Balls, in a statement. “Making sure we produce a consistent product from ball to ball and shot to shot is as important as anything we do. Until now, putting paint on a golf ball has been to protect its appearance that has the potential to negatively impact ball flight. Now, with microcoating, we have a process that solves what was once an invisible problem, and allows golfers to play their best.”
Rory McIlroy and Collin Morikawa have already switched to the new TP5, which has a new, larger core pattern and dimple to improve ball speed and produce a sharper flight. The TP5x has new mantle layers to help increase ball speed further while keeping spin low.
Continue reading below for more on the TaylorMade 2026 and TP5x golf balls, including my take on the release.
What’s really new about the TaylorMade TP5 and TP5X golf balls – and why you should care
Even (small coats), even flying
So I know what you’re thinking… “Does paint matter that much?” I wouldn’t have thought about it either. But it’s also not hard to imagine how drawing a golf ball can lead to bumps and drips or compound dimples, leaving some parts thicker than others.
TaylorMade has only been able to detect flight variations due to the advanced technology at Kingdom, where they can track golf balls within three inches of their flight. The company has invested $100 million over the past five years in golf ball production and R&D.
They saw golf balls with the same structure fly differently when presented under the same conditions as the robot.
Taylor Made
“These golf balls look exactly the same to the naked eye, but they can fly 20 yards differently,” Fox told GOLF. “Even three meters is too much when you’re trying to make a golf ball for the best players in the world.
“Injection molding is a precision process. Urethane coating is a precision process. Milling is a precision process. Painting was not a precision process.”
It doesn’t matter to Tour players either. Novices will lose confidence when they hit what they thought was a good shot and watch it spin out of control.
To solve this, TaylorMade invested in its painting process to come up with microcoating, which means changing the paint guns, how the paint flows through those guns, the curing temperature and even the paint itself. Fox said TaylorMade even controls the atomization of the paint as it dries.
“We control the paint at a level that no one has ever controlled before,” said Fox.
It opens up more speed
Part of TaylorMade’s heavy investment in golf balls has also led to success. The company now has the data and software to digitally simulate the construction of a golf ball and simulate how it will perform.
Instead of producing a few hundred prototypes in the past, TaylorMade has created more than 100,000 prototypes of the new TP5 and TP5x to find the best combination of materials for each ball.
The new TP5 has a bigger, faster core.
TaylorMade.
“This is not AI,” Fox said. “These three years of proven data are put into finite element analysis, and they tell us what we’ve already proven to be true.”
For the TP5, that meant increasing the core size, which reduces the time the ball spends on the face, increasing energy retention while maintaining the soft feel the ball is known for. Basically, TaylorMade tightens the spring to make it faster.
Fox said they saw a ball speed of 1 mph in testing.
The TP5’s dimple pattern has also been optimized for a low trajectory, high penetration dimple pattern.
With the TP5x, TaylorMade engineers focused on fine-tuning the mantle layers around the hard core to increase ball speed beyond the 2024 model.
TaylorMade 2026 TP5 and TP5x lineup
Both the TP5 and TP5x will be available in white, yellow, pix, 360˚ and officially licensed NFL designs and collections. The TP5 and TP5x Stripe have been redesigned this year with stronger feedback lines and a new dot sighting that players should focus on during the stroke.
TaylorMade also brings back the TRKR monitoring-enabled balls for more accuracy with in-house, radar-based launch monitors.
Complete list of TP5 and TP5x alignment aids.
TaylorMade
TP5
What’s going on: A soft and high-spinning ball with a new, large core to drive speed gains. The new dimple pattern also improves the lift-to-drag ratio in low flight and reduces turbulence.
Whose: Players looking for a low flight, high spin and soft feel.
TP5x
What’s going on: TaylorMade’s lowest and fastest ball.
Whose: Players who want high speed and scrub excess spin.
My take: Solving an unknown problem
It’s really not hard to understand how much of a difference a drop of paint can make when it comes to golf ball flight.
Golf balls are very complex aerodynamic creations, and if there is a subtle difference with the outermost layer – the one that interacts with the wind – it makes sense that that would be enough to send it offline.
If I gave you the choice between a ball that has 20 yards of variation in distance versus one that does the same thing all the time, you would take the same one without seeing the evidence. The boost in self-confidence alone should be enough to impact your performance.
Hidden here is the speed gain with the TP5, a ball I’ve played with a soft feel and need to test more because I saw some pretty quick upticks in ball speed when I first tried it at Kingdom.
I always sacrifice a little speed to play soft golf balls, but with the new TP5, I may not have that problem anymore.
Price, Specifications and Availability
The new TaylorMade golf balls and TP5x are available for pre-order February 2 and will arrive at retail locations by February 12.
White, striped, yellow and pix balls will be expensive $57.99 at twelve. The TP5 and TP5x TRKR, officially licensed by the NFL and many collectibles, will sell $64.99while the MySymbol customization system returns, for each cost $62.99.
Want to find the best golf ball for your game in 2026? Find a club fit near you at True Spec Golf.
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