Winners of the US Open receive the US Open Golf Trophy, a monetary award, and various opportunities for advancement and safety within a golf career, such as:

• automatic invitations to participate in the other three majors during the next five years: Masters Tournament, British Open and PGA Championship

• automatic invitation to participate in the Players Championship for the next five years

• ten-year exemption to qualify for the US Open

• for regular members, five-year exemption on the PGA Tour; For non-PGA Tour members, the option to join the PGA Tour within 60 days of their victory or before the start of the next five-tour season.

• Automatic invitations to three out of five major majors upon their 50th birthday: US Open Senior for five years, PGA Senior Championship for life and British Open Senior for life

There are several notable records from the US Open:

• The record for most US Open wins is tied between four golfers, each with a total of four wins: Willie Anderson, Bobby Jones, Ben Hogan and Jack Nicklaus.

• The youngest US Open qualifier in tournament history has been Tadd Fujikawa, a 15-year-old from Hawaii, qualified for the 2006 tournament.

• The record for the youngest winner in US Open history has not been broken since 1911, when John McDermott won at age nineteen.

• In 1990, 45-year-old Hale Irwin set the record for the largest US Open winner to date, winning the third and final US Open of his career.

• The record for the lowest score on 72 holes is tied between Jack Nicklaus, Lee Janzen, Tiger Woods and Jim Furyk, with a low score of 272.

• The record for most shots under par in 72 holes is held by Tiger Woods, who won in 2000 with 12 shots under par.

The terrain these notable golfers have had to conquer to win their sporting awards has not been smooth. The US Open golf championship takes place on a variety of courses arranged in a way that makes scoring very difficult and demands precision in driving. Accommodation courses are typically long, comprised of rugged, hilly greens and fairways cut into areas that lead to holes that would otherwise be considered simpler and more direct. For this reason, the score is usually tight between the leading players, and the winner does not usually win by an extreme difference. Along with these requirements for a chosen US Open golf course are the surrounding venue infrastructure and the space available along and around the course for the media and other spectators.

Many golf courses that aspire to be part of the US Open rotation among the hosts have been renovated to offer these desired landscaping features. Throughout its history, US Open tournament venues that have met the rigid qualifications have included: Pebble Beach Golf Links, in Pebble Beach, California; Pinehurst Resort, in Pinehurst, North Carolina; Olympic Club, in San Francisco, California; Shinnecock Hills Golf Country Club, in Shinnecock Hills, New York; The Oakland Hills Country Club, in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan; and Canterbury Golf Club, in Beachwood, Ohio, who have proudly hosted the event for several years, along with a few others.