The short answer: go by your child's height, not their age. Two eight-year-olds can be 15cm apart, and the taller one will need a completely different set. Age ranges on the box are a rough guide at best. Height is what actually determines whether your child can swing the club properly.
Here's how to work it out, and what to look for when you're buying.
Why height matters more than age
A golf club that's too long forces a child to stand too far from the ball and swing around themselves. Too short and they hunch over it. Either way, they're learning a compensation before they've learned a swing.
Junior clubs are built around length, and the good brands make this obvious. U.S. Kids sizes its sets by the actual club length in inches, starting at 39" and running up through 42", 45", 48", 51" and into the Tour Series. That's not marketing, it's the whole system.
Weight matters just as much. Junior clubs use lighter heads and much lighter shafts, because a child swinging something too heavy will drag it through impact and lose all the speed they had. This is the single biggest problem with cut-down adult clubs, which I'll come back to.
How to measure your child
Two measurements, and you can do both at home in a minute.
Height. Shoes off, back against a wall, standing straight. Write down the number in centimetres.
Wrist-to-floor. Have them stand naturally with arms hanging loose at their sides. Measure from the crease of the wrist to the ground. This one matters because kids grow at different rates in the legs and torso, and two children the same height can need different lengths.
Bring both numbers with you and we can size a set in a couple of minutes.
A rough height guide
Every brand sets its bands slightly differently, so treat this as a starting point rather than gospel.
Around 100 to 115cm is genuine first-club territory. Think three or four clubs at most: a driver, an iron, a putter. The Brosnan Little Mate sets in this range are built for exactly this stage.
115 to 135cm is where most kids are when they start swinging with real intent. A five or six-club set makes sense here. Callaway's XJ-1 and Mizuno's JM01 120 both sit around this stage.
135 to 155cm is the point where a child starts playing proper rounds rather than just hitting balls. Seven clubs or so, including a fairway wood or hybrid they can actually get airborne.
155cm and up is the bridge to adult equipment. Callaway's XT set is built for roughly 147 to 175cm, which covers a lot of teenagers. Some kids at the top of this range are better off in a lightweight adult set than a junior one. It depends on their strength and swing speed, not just their height.
Full set, or just a few clubs?
For a child under about eight, three or four clubs is plenty. A putter, a mid iron and something to hit off the tee will keep them busy for a year or two, and a lighter bag is one less reason to give up halfway round.
Once they're playing full rounds and keeping score, a proper set starts earning its keep, mainly because they'll want a wedge and something that goes a long way off the tee.
If you're weighing up a complete set against building one piece by piece, the same logic applies as it does for adults. Our guide on package sets versus individual golf clubs walks through that in more detail.
What about cut-down adult clubs?
I understand the appeal. Grandad's old irons are sitting in the garage and the shaft can be shortened for very little money.
The problem is weight. Cutting an adult club down makes it shorter but it's still heavy, and shortening the shaft actually makes it stiffer and the swing weight worse. A child ends up hauling a club they can't accelerate. They hit it nowhere, and they conclude they're no good at golf.
Second-hand junior clubs are a different story entirely. Kids outgrow sets in a year or two, so used junior gear is often barely worn. That's a genuinely good way to keep costs down.
Left-handed juniors
If your child is left-handed, buy them left-handed clubs. It sounds obvious, but plenty of parents get talked into starting a lefty right-handed because the gear is easier to find.
Options are more limited, but they exist. Brosnan does the Little Mate in left-handed, and U.S. Kids makes left-handed single clubs. It's worth the extra hunting. There's more on this in our guide to buying left-handed golf clubs in New Zealand.
Gloves and shoes
A junior glove costs very little and makes a real difference to grip, especially for smaller hands that struggle to hold on. They come in junior XS through XL, and remember a right-handed golfer wears the glove on the left hand.
Golf shoes aren't essential at the start. Trainers are fine on the range and on most courses. Once they're playing regularly on wet Bay of Plenty mornings, proper shoes stop a lot of slipping.
Allowing a little room to grow
Here's where we'll often differ slightly from a strict sizing chart. Kids grow, sometimes alarmingly fast, and a set that fits perfectly today can be too short within a year. So when a child sits between two sizes, we'll usually lean towards the longer one.
There's a limit to that. A club a touch long is fine and the child will grow into it inside a season. A club well beyond their size forces them to stand too far away and swing around themselves, and that habit takes far longer to unteach than the set costs to replace. The aim is a set that suits them now with a bit of room in it, not one they'll spend a year fighting.
Getting that balance right is really a judgement call, and it depends on how fast the child is growing and how much they're playing. It's one of the reasons we like to see the child in person rather than work off numbers alone.
When to upgrade
Watch for the signs rather than the calendar. If your child is standing noticeably upright at address, or the club looks short in their hands, they've outgrown it. Most kids need a new size every 12 to 24 months through the growth years.
Not sure? Get in touch
The best thing you can do for a child starting golf is give them clubs they can actually swing.
If you're local, bring them into the shop. We measure kids up properly and work out the right sizing with them, and five minutes with a tape measure and a few swings tells us more than any chart.
If you're not in the Bay of Plenty, get in touch anyway. Send us your child's height and wrist-to-floor measurement and we can work out the right size from there. We're always happy to help, and we'd far rather you asked than guessed off a website.
You can browse our Junior Golf range online, or come and see us at Golf 360 in Mount Maunganui. If your child is brand new to the game, our guide on getting your child started in golf is a good next read.
Happy golfing,
Scott Pickett
PGA Professional
Founder – Golf 360
Mount Maunganui
