It’s no big secret. The new TaylorMade driver for 2026 is theQi4D. We have all seen them on Tour and all three main heads have already made a splash on global tours since their release on the conforming list two months ago to let Rory game it in Dubai. All three of the world’s top players — Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood — have made instant switches to the new driver, something that was a struggle last year.
Today, TaylorMade is unveiling its new Qi4D line of drivers, fairways and rescues with a renewed focus on creating the fastest and most fittable clubs possible. Yes, speed. Forgiveness is a given!
TaylorMade is returning to what it has been a market leader at for decades: an all-out speed war. With its new fitting philosophy, TaylorMade knows you’ll be fastest when your driver is the best fit for you.
“Today, more than ever, golfers are looking for a driver that’s fit for them and gives them speed off the tee. The Qi4D family of drivers has been engineered to deliver on both those fronts. From finely tuned aerodynamic heads, to faces with improved roll radii and the use of the lightest weight materials in construction, we’ve created our fastest family of drivers. Coupled with cutting-edge REAX™ shafts and our industry-leading fitting capabilities that allow fitters and everyday golfers alike to quickly find the perfect head and shaft combination for their unique swing, Qi4D drivers allow golfers to realise their full potential off the tee.” said Brian Bazzel, Vice President of Product Creation at TaylorMade.
The name Qi4D continues TaylorMade’s Qi “Quest for Inertia” naming convention, but the “4D” represents the infusion of speed with the four dimensions of distance.
Qi4D: The four dimensions of distance
Face: The Qi4D is now the fifth generation of TaylorMade’s carbon face technology, and it’s been refined with a tighter roll radius to achieve more consistent spin when you miss up and down the face. The makeup of the 60 layers of carbon fibre was also tweaked, allowing the Qi4D to have more than 50 per cent of the face be high COR (where the fastest ball speeds come from) for the first time. This was also aided by a new and improved Speed Pocket design to help with low strikes on the face.
Shaft: While TaylorMade doesn’t believe the shaft is the engine of the club, they do believe the shaft plays a major role in steering the club head to the ball. So TaylorMade is reinventing its stock shaft program in partnership with Mitsubishi and three new REAX shaft profiles. The three profiles — Red, Blue and White — correspond to the shaft’s tip stiffness and TaylorMade’s fitting philosophy, which was first utilised with last year’s Qi35, to match tip stiffness with a player’s swing profile. A player with late release and face rotation gets matched to the REAX Red, an early release and low rotation to White, and Blue players fall in the middle. TaylorMade also reorganised its aftermarket shaft matrix into the same categories to help players maximise speed with their Qi4D driver.
Head: One thing Bazzel mentioned is that while TaylorMade must keep their drivers within USGA limits, they don’t regulate how fast a player can swing. They saw aerodynamics as an opportunity. Each shape of the Qi4D driver models was carefully crafted to be faster through the air. All three shapes are new, the LS getting the edges softened and the inertia generator tucked in to promote better aerodynamics and the Max taking on a slightly more pear-shaped look. The most notable shape change is with the core model, which adopts the “Plus 4” shape profile sported by the Tour-only (Dot) heads used by Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler.
Fitting: There’s more to this dimension, but with Qi4D, TaylorMade isn’t just trying to give you a driver; they’re trying to give you your driver, custom fit to you in every way possible. From shaft to loft sleeve, all the way to weights. The core Qi4D model features four TAS ports, the same weighting system as the R7 Quad Mini driver, and original R7 Quad drivers to help players dial in optimal CG location either front-to-back or heel-to-toe. For the first time, both the LS and Max heads each have two, front-to-back TAS weight ports to adjust vertical CG location, while the Max Lite head has a single forward TAS port to adjust swingweight.
Fastest and most fittable drivers
The Qi4D launch is as much a driver launch as it is a refresh of TaylorMade’s fitting philosophy, which they started to break out last year. In the past, shafts were fit based on speed, launch and spin. Now, TaylorMade is leveraging more than 11 million captured data points and found that golfers perform best when the shaft profile, or tip stiffness, matches their swing profiles. They’re fitting shafts to get you to hit it straight, not to get ball flight to go up and down.
Players with late releases and high rates of rotation do better with softer and more active tip sections. Early releases and low rotation do better with stiffer tips and mid releases go somewhere in between. Their data showed that about 60% of golfers fall into the middle of the bell curve, while 20% on each side were low or high rotators.
“We’re really trying to move away from talking about shafts in terms of high launch and low launch,” Matthew Simone, the director of TaylorMade’s custom program, said. “You don’t hold onto the clubhead; you hold onto the shaft. The shaft allows you to deliver the head. When the profile matches the swing, you get much more consistent delivery, consistent impact location and a consistent start line. Even higher-handicap golfers are actually pretty consistent path-wise; what gets wonky is face delivery.”
TaylorMade has developed an algorithm that can take all of these data points into account, namely rotation rate, and compare it with the shafts they have in their matrix and get a REAX shaft recommendation that puts the golfer nearly to a final fit.
Once you have a shaft to test with, you can start fine-tuning which head to use and then eventually pulling the levers offered by the adjustable weights and loft sleeve. “With movable weight and loft sleeve adjustments, you can take 300 RPMs off spin, change curvature or eliminate a miss,” said Andrew Oldknow, TaylorMade’s director of product creation. “And the key for us is that when we make an adjustment, the consumer actually sees the ball flight change — it’s not subtle. They know immediately that something is working.”
With so many different settings combinations — 128 in the Qi4D core driver alone — it’s more important than ever that when you buy a Qi4D driver, you work with a fitter to dial in the proper setting and shaft for you so you can get the most out of it.
The TaylorMade Qi4D lineup
Qi4D (Core) Driver
What is it: The core head has adopted TaylorMade’s “Plus4” shape through extensive Tour feedback and aerodynamic simulations to make it move faster through the air. This is the first TaylorMade driver since 2007’s R7 SuperQuad (unless you count last year’s R7 Mini driver) to have four movable weights. The stock configuration has two 9 g weights in the rear and two 4 g weights forward. Available lofts: 8.0° (RH only), 9.0°, 10.5°, 12.0°
Who it’s for: The Qi4D core model is going to be the catch-all driver that will fit the most players. No longer will better players shy away from a wider, more game-improvement shape thanks to the new pear shape.
Qi4D LS Driver
What is it: The LS retains a lot of the same DNA from the Qi35, but lots of aerodynamic work was done to make this driver cut through the air quicker to help you gain clubhead speed. This is the longest driver in the lineup, and, in testing conducted by our partners at True Spec Golf, fitters found this model cut spin by 200-400 RPMs across all three fitters’ swing speeds (92 mph, 103 and 115.6). It also has the flattest lie angle and will be the most fade-biased. The LS has two TAS weight ports with the stock 15 g weight forward and 4 g weight in the rear. Available lofts: 8.0° (RH only), 9.0°, 10.5°
Who it’s for: This is for players who want absolute speed and distance or players who need to cut spin because of a negative attack angle, out-to-in club path or other factors.
Qi4D Max Driver
What is it: While the Max head is no longer at the 10k inertia threshold, TaylorMade says finding the appropriate fit will more than make up for a slight decrease in MOI. “A perfectly fit driver can showcase more performance gains than a slight increase in inertia or a small year-on-year head improvement,” Bazzel said. The collar of the Qi4D Max is made of forged and machined aircraft-grade 7075 aluminum, lighter than titanium, which allows the addition of forward and rear TAS weight ports for the first time. The stock position has a 13 g in the rear (which helps produce a slight draw bias) and 4 g in the front. It is the first modern TaylorMade driver to include no titanium. Available lofts: 9.0°, 10.5°, 12.0°
Who it’s for: As the name implies, the Max driver is best for players who struggle to find the center of the face or need more help generating launch and spin.
Qi4D Max Lite Driver
What is it: A lightweight version of the Max head for players who need a little boost for clubhead speed. It comes stock with a REAX 40 g shaft, the lightest available, to complete the lightweight components package. There’s also a Max Lite Women’s version. Available lofts: 10.5°, 12.0°
Who is for: Slower and potentially senior and female golfers who need help to generate speed and launch.
Early Tour Adoption
Qi4D drivers have seen early adoption on the world’s professional tours. The current top three in the Official World Golf Rankings — Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood — played Qi4D in competition to close out 2025. Additionally, Nelly Korda, Charley Hull and Brooke Henderson all gamed Qi4D in their final two events of the year. On the DP World Tour, Jayden Schaper collected the first two wins with Qi4D LS in back-to-back fashion at the Alfred Dunhill Championship and the AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open. Below is what Team TaylorMade is anticipated to play to start 2026:
Scottie Scheffler: Qi4D 8.0° (Ventus Black 7X)
Rory McIlroy: Qi4D 9.0° (Ventus Black 6X)
Tommy Fleetwood: Qi4D LS 9.0° (Ventus TR Blue 6X)
Collin Morikawa: Qi4D LS 8.0° (Diamana WB 63X)
Nelly Korda: Qi4D 10.5° (Tour AD FI 6-S)
Charley Hull: Qi4D LS 8.0° (Attas 6 Star 6X)
Brooke Henderson: Qi4D 9.0° (Tour AD FI 5-S)
Jayden Schaper: Qi4D LS 9.0° (Ventus Velocore+ 6X Red)
Luke Clanton: Qi4D 8.0° (Kai’li White 70TX)
Karl Vilips: Qi4D LS 10.5° (Ventus TR Blue 6X)
Michael Thorbjornsen: Qi4D LS 9.0° (Ventus Black Velocore+ 7X)
The Takeaway
It was always going to be hard fro me to replace my trusty Qi35 core head, i loved the shape, looks and feel of it. After making a trip to TaylorMade’s Kingom in December i quickly realised, The best Qi4D driver is the one you’re fit for … and it’s going to be really fast. I picked up 4mph ball speed instantly, which is a huge gain for me, only swinging it at 100mph on average with my driver.
Forget everything you think you know about stock shafts and buing bracketed. What TaylorMade has done here is not just create a club head that helps you hit the golf ball farther, but they’re treating the whole golf club as a system with each component needing to be dialled in to help you play your best.
With all the fitting technology baked into the Qi4D line, it’s more important than ever that you go get fit for one so you can unlock everything it’s truly meant to do — and to see how far you can really hit it. I love that TaylorMade is also making its reflective fitting heads available to consumers this year. These heads were previously limited to fitters only. They are legal for play and allow golfers with access to Foresight launch monitors to collect clubhead data along with ball data. This is a great benefit to players with access to a launch monitor.
The adjustability on all of these products is as good as it gets. With just one shaft option in the Qi4D core head alone, there are 128 possible configurations between the loft sleeve and the quad TAS weight system. The visual standout for most good players so far (Rory for example) is the new shape of the core model. This was the shape most TaylorMade Tour players begged for, and it’s a welcome sight
Overall, TaylorMade has created a comprehensive lineup that is going to dominate the 2026 driver category both on Tour and in the bags of weekend warriors. With all manufacturers now in launch season, consider Qi4D the first shot fired of a major speed war on tee boxes around the globe in 2026!
TaylorMade’s new Qi4D drivers are available for pre-order starting today and will arrive at retail locations on Jan. 29th. The four driver models are priced at €699. New this year, customers can purchase launch monitor-enabled drivers, with reflective fitting markers built into the face for €719. All driver models are available with stock REAX shafts in three profiles (HR/Red, MR/Blue, LR/White) in 40 to 60 g weights.
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