Equipment

Best irons in golf of 2022: Easiest to launch

Published

1 year ago

Apr 4, 2022

A new set of irons is the single biggest investment you can make into your set of golf clubs. At GolfWRX, to determine the 2022 best irons, we have compiled an expert panel of fitters to help you find out which of 2022 irons is best for your game.

OEMs have again continued to push the engineering envelope of iron design by utilizing new technology and manufacturing methods to create clubs that offer forgiveness, along with faster, more consistent club faces and launch windows. We are also seeing more segmentation of models to help you determine your best set and/or set combination.

RELATED: Best driver 2022

Ultimately the best way to find your personal iron set is to work with a professional fitter using a launch monitor. The difficult part is a lot of people don’t have easy access to fitters, launch monitors, and club builders—so at GolfWRX, we have done a lot of the work for you.

We are in the era of not just maximizing distance but also minimizing the penalty of common misses for each player—this applies to irons just as much as it does with any other club in the bag. This is why, now more than ever, custom fitting is essential to help you see results on every swing you make.

Join the discussion about best irons 2022 in the forums!

We want to give you the tools and information to go out and find what works best for you by offering recommendations for your individual iron set wants and needs with insight and feedback from the people who work every single day to help golfers get peak performance out of their equipment.

Best irons of 2022: How we did it

Before starting the process of building our best iron survey, we reached out to our trusted fitters to discuss how they sort through the endless number of iron options available to golfers. The consensus was clear—the best fitters in the world see all the options available in the marketplace, analyze their performance traits, and pull from that internal database of knowledge and experience like a supercomputer when they are working with a golfer.

It’s essentially a huge decision tree derived from experience and boiled down to a starting point of options—and it has nothing to do with a handicap!

Modern iron sets are designed into player categories that overlap the outdated “what’s your handicap?” model, and at GolfWRX we believe it was important to go beyond handicap and ask specific questions about the most crucial performance elements fitters are looking at to help golfers find the best set of irons for them. From overall performance to shotmaking, to helping players achieve better trajectories and speed, we strived to ask the right questions.

These are the best iron categories we have developed to help you the reader determine what rankings are most important for your swing and game.

Best irons of 2022: The categories

Overall performance
Easiest to launch
Pure enjoyment
Shotmakers
Most technology-packed
Best blade

Best irons of 2022: Meet the fitters

Nick Sherburne: Founder, Club Champion
Clare Cornelius: Fitter, Cool Clubs
Eric Johnson: Fitter, True Spec Golf
Shaun Fagan: Fitter, True Spec Golf
Kirk Oguri: PGA Professional/ Club Specialist, Pete’s Golf
Sue O’Connor: Fitter, Cool Clubs
Scott Felix: Owner, Felix Club Works
Mark Knapp: Fitter, Carls Golfland
Ryan Johnson: Fitter, Carl’s Golfland
Eric Hensler: Manager & Fitter, Miles of Golf
Brad Coffield: Fitter Carl’s Golfland
Nick Waterworth: Fitter,Haggin Oaks Golf Super Shop
Scott Anderson: VP of Sales, Fitter, True Spec Golf
Matthew Sim: Director of Operations, Modern Golf
Shawn Zawodni: Fitter, Miles of Golf
Ben Giunta: Owner,The Tour Van
Matt Decker: Head Fitter and Builder, The Fitting Lab – Baltimore
Jason Bodey: Head Fitter and Builder, The Fitting Lab Pittsburgh
Bradley Harrelson: Fitter, 2nd Swing Golf
Alex Dice: Fitter, Carl’s Golfland
Matt Mora: Director of Club Fitting, Urban Golf Performance
Jordan Patrick: Fitter, True Spec Golf
Gus Alzate: Fitter, True Spec Golf
Carmen Corvino: Fitter, True Spec Golf
Blake Smith: Fitter, True Spec Golf
Marc Roybal: Fitter, True Spec Golf
Shaun Fagan: Fitter, True Spec Golf

2022 Best irons: Easy to launch

This category of irons is aimed to help players who need height. With today’s modern golf ball, creating proper flight widows and spin can be difficult for some players—especially those at lower speeds, and this is where technology can really help. All of these irons do everything they can to create shot-stopping trajectories, regardless of clubhead speed.

Titleist T300

Their story: The T300 is the hottest and most forgiving Titleist iron ever made. Just like its smaller brother, the T200, it uses the same Max Impact Technology to both add rebound and improve overall feel. The unsupported face is stretched across a larger area thanks to the bigger face size, wider sole, and undercut perimeter to push the COG low and away from the face—if the T200 launches, then the T300 REALLY Launches! This deep COG and thin fast face is what makes this club launch so high, it’s also the reason stronger lofts are necessary. If it wasn’t for strong lofts, then with the speed and spin they would create at “standard” lofts, ball flight would end up uncontrollable. Basically the exact opposite of what you want in an iron.

From the fitters

“The Titleist t300 series is the ultimate game improvement iron. This iron isn’t as big and bulky as some of the other irons in the game improvement category. Players who tend to gravitate toward this iron have seen an increase in ball speed. This iron is a lighter weight iron to help reduce the swing weight, and allow players who tend to not swing it as fast create a little bit more club head speed.”

For more photos/info, read our launch piece and check out this forum thread.

Callaway Rogue ST Max OS Lite

Their story: Callaway’s most forgiving iron with high launch, increased lofts, and wide soles in a lightweight package. The Lite version has lighter shafts and lighter swingweights to make them easier to swing. In an industry-first, Callaway combined high strength 450 steel with A.I. designed Flash Face Cup for more ball speed and better ball speed consistency, according to the company.

From the fitters

“This club allows players to get height on their shots. The lofts on this iron is weaker than the lofts of the standard Rogue st max iron. Players who need help with hitting the ball higher tend to swing the club slower and don’t tend to spin the ball. This iron helps to create a little bit more spin to help increase launch on iron shots.”
“The Rogue ST Max OS Lite has been a great iron. Fits the profile of being super forgiving, easy to hit, easy to launch, and you can hit it anywhere on the face and get good results. It is a little larger and a little stronger lofted to help those players who need height get the ball up in the air.”

For more photos/info, read our launch piece and check out this forum thread.

Cleveland Launcher XL Halo

Their story: The new additions feature an XL Head design which increases MOI (17% increase compared to predecessors) in design for improved forgiveness and higher launch Designed using Artificial Intelligence, the MainFrame variable face technology on the XL Halo irons aims to increase ball speed, while unique weight pad designs seek to provide maximum forgiveness across the face.

From the fitters

“It’s awesome. I’ve fit a ton of the Halo or hybrid iron because I think a ton of people like the idea of a transitional hybrid set…as they go down in iron, it looks more like an iron. Higher up it looks more like a hybrid. The thing is so good…because of that hybrid shape, you just can’t beat it. It gets up in the air, it’s easy to hit to where you don’t have to worry about stubbing it because of the wide sole. It’s awesome for that 70+ year old golfer who comes in with their blades from the 90s and says, ‘I don’t hit it anywhere.’ The aging golfer may not like it because it’s not traditional, but once they see the benefit of getting the ball in the air and the control you get, it’s so good.”

For more photos/info, read our launch piece.

Ping G425

Their story: The Ping G425 iron builds off the success of the G410 by packing more forgiveness into a smaller package designed to add distance and give golfers the ability to reduce dispersions and land the ball softer into greens.

The most important design feature of the G425 irons is the new metal wood style VFT (variable face thickness), used to increase ball speed, consistency, and launch. The new VFT is possible thanks to the Hyper 17-4 stainless steel material, which allows engineers to go thinner while still maintaining structural integrity and feel. This new VFT is not symmetrical and is instead a more sideways egg-shaped oval. This allows the G425 iron to have more face deflection than Ping has ever been able to create with a cast design. When you add in the new face with an improved hinge (notice the small notch on the toe to also increase deflection) you get a diving board-like effect to send the ball higher to stop sooner.

From the fitters:

“The G425 iron is easily the number 1 iron I fit players to in the fitting bays. A lot of players come in are high handicaps and need forgiveness. The Power spec allows us to decrease the loft by 2 degrees for those players who need to lower ball flight and reduce spin. The retro spec lofts allow us to add 2 degrees of loft for those players who need to add spin and height to their shots.”

For more photos/info, read our launch piece and check out this forum thread.

XXIO 12

Their story: The XXIO 12 irons are a super lightweight family of clubs featuring a specialized suite of technologies that are designed to amplify performance for the moderate swing speed golfer. a thinner face allows the entire face to flex more extensively while grooves etched deep into the interior of the iron body further aim to enhance flexibility. Progressive variable face thickness and a tungsten-nickel weight in the toe optimize speed, stability and launch for every loft. A lower center of gravity for long irons creates more carry, according to the company.

From the fitters:

“With its weight, similar customer profile to Cleveland but a different price point. For the golfer who’s sub 85 mph club head speed, they’re going to generate lots more club head speed because of the weight. And low CG helps pop the ball up in the air, particularly with seniors and ladies. It’s not uncommon for us to see a 15 or 20 yard difference with that product between an iron from another category. As price points have gone up in the industry, XXIO isn’t as far reaching as it used to be.”

For more photos/info, read our launch piece.

Join the discussion about best irons 2022 in the forums!

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Equipment

Voting is live: 2023 GolfWRX Members Choice presented by 2nd Swing!

Published

2 hours ago

Jul 10, 2023

GolfWRX Staff

We’re proud to partner with 2nd Swing Golf to bring you GolfWRX Members Choice 2023! 2nd Swing has more than 100,000 new and pre-swung golf clubs available in six store locations and online. Check them out here.

The bedrock of GolfWRX.com is the community of passionate and knowledgable golfers in our forums, and we put endless trust in the opinions of our GolfWRX members — the most knowledgeable community of golfers on the internet. No other group of golfers in the world tests golf clubs as frequently or as extensively, or is armed with such in-depth information about the latest technology and gear.

On that note, we just launched our 2023 GolfWRX Members Choice awards, and the polls are now open.

We want to hear from you, not just with a vote but with your comments too!

Please vote in the Members Choice categories below!

And don’t forget to comment with the reasoning for your choice!

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Equipment

GolfWRXers put the Full Swing KIT’s accuracy to the test

Published

5 hours ago

Jul 10, 2023

GolfWRX Staff

Last month, four GolfWRX forum members traveled to The Grand Golf Club at the Fairmont Grand Del Mar in San Diego, California, to test the Full Swing KIT launch monitor and to see how it stacks up against other launch monitors. If you’re not familiar with the Full Swing KIT, development began when Tiger Woods requested a launch monitor he could trust on the range as much as he trusted his Full Swing simulator in his own home. Later, the KIT earned Tiger’s seal of approval and has been seen with him at every tournament he’s played in since its release.

Check out the video below to see if the KIT can earn the seal of approval from our four WRXers — @zap311, @double or triple?, @hatrick11, and @SwingBlues — just like it did from Tiger Woods himself.

GolfWRX members on the KIT’s accuracy

zap311: “The Full Swing team seems obsessed with accuracy when it comes to the KIT – The team talked about how this product officially shipped about 18 months ago and they are already on firmware release #20. They said they are regularly releasing updates (overnight via WiFi) to continuously improve accuracy and performance. That is pretty awesome and it’s nice to hear that they are not a company that “ships it” and moves to the next thing. I think they are on the right track since I saw virtually no differences in the data when testing vs. GCQuad and Trackman today.”

double or triple?: “In some cases the difference was less than half a degree on launch and less than 50 rpms on spin.”

hatrick11: “The differences were statistically nonexistent. I think it’s hard to believe for a lot of people when you think about the huge price disparity, but I can’t state enough how close the Full Swing was to trackman every single time, for each of us.”

“Outside, the data is just really really accurate. I know my numbers and know this particular range very well and the KIT was spot on all day. I also had some very variable quality golf balls in the bucket I hit and there was really only one spin rate in the whole session that had me raising my eyebrows at all.”

SwingBlues: “The GolfWRX Full Swing/WRX Experience showed Full Swing KIT produce numbers the same as the GC Quad (GC4) and the Trackman4. Dollar wise, both LMs are easily north of KIT, so this is HUGE to stand up there with the bigger boys on the Podium. For me, it seems more “apples to apples” to compare KIT to GC3. My own testing validates what we saw at the Experience. It shows critical data points like spin, carry, ball speeds are dead on or almost dead on for 40 yards and up on both GC3 and KIT.”

More on the Full Swing KIT

zap311: “The versatility of viewing data is impressive – Depending on usage, everyone has different preferences for viewing data. You have on-device, phone, tablet, monitor, smartwatch, or audio/headphones. I’m pleased to say that Full Swing covers all of these. You can use the app on iOS devices (they said Android is planned for the future). This includes viewing your last shot on the Apple Watch with a few options and turning on audio playback of your preferred metrics following each shot. I’ll post screenshots of this later. You can also choose between 4 data points or 1 data point on the device itself. It was easy to use the app to customize the top 4. For example, I was able to quickly change from launch angle on irons to swing path on driver.

“The KIT was very easy to use – Once you spend a few minutes learning the app and settings, it is very simple to select a club, line up the target line, and fire away. You don’t have to use a level or a laser to line up. KIT uses the built-in camera to tell you where to line up within the app or on-device screen. I was also able to boot up the KIT in less than a minute and drop it down on the tee box for our on-course trial today. Because of this simplicity, I can see it being more practical to bring to the course…

“The Full Swing team really thought through usability for the KIT. You can see up to four data points on the device’s OLED screen. You can see all 16 data points on your iPhone/iPad along with a video replay of the shot, you can view one primary metric from your Apple Watch, and you can enable audio playback for any of the 16 data points. For me, this was a dream as a full iOS user. One other feature I like is that you can star a particular shot to save it. You can also send shot data + the video recording to your coach if you want.”

double or triple?: “I was able to meet the teaching pro at the range I’m using for testing – PGA teacher/member Ryan Kolk. He and his team have 4 units amongst themselves and use them both personally and with their students during lessons. Ryan spent time dialing in his knowledge of the range balls vs proV1x (gamer) to better understand the FSK and he believes the consistency is there with the FSK and within trackman and GC/Foresight models. His preference is to use FSK while testing shafts and new product before using them in his personal playing bag which as a GolfWRX member is 100% appreciated. For his better students, he believes the information like Face to Path and Club Path that FullSwing Kit offers is great to help them understand what their swing is doing and use that information to better themselves.”

hatrick11: “It’s nice to know I can get super useful practice sessions in at my house, and can do in in ~20 min stints; with two little kids at home I can’t just go out for frequent or lengthy range sessions, so this is super valuable and I think will help me keep my game from degrading and allow me to spend my limited free time enjoying the occasional round with friends. In particular with the KIT, as opposed to the cheaper monitors or the other “mid tiers” like GC3, seeing path and face-to-path data is the key item that makes my practice sessions useful…when I am grooving it my path is almost always between 0-2* out to in, with face control being the main thing I need to work on. When my game goes sideways I start coming more in to out, and combined with face consistency being an ongoing issue, that brings the bad left miss into play. Previously I have struggled getting real use out of net practice, because the feels don’t always match reality. This data and video evidence really helps keep me honest, so it was great to see that I was eventually able to get that piece dialed in with KIT.”

SwingBlues: “One feature I am really starting to like is how easy to see the video of each shot. My buddy was not hitting it well, we went to the video and we could see the takeway was too far to the outside.”

“Using the app, it will display all 16 data points. Below is an example of one of my iron shots. Pretty impressive data captured by KIT. On KIT itself, the launch monitor display can be configured to show a single data point, or it can show a grid of 4 data points where the golfer choose which ones to display!”

Head over to the thread for more comments, reviews, and future updates as our members continue to test the Full Swing KIT. Don’t forget to become a member today for future opportunities like this, plus product member testing and giveaways!

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