50 Words or Less
The 2026 Bridgestone Tour B golf balls use a new technology – VeloSurge – to deliver enhanced ball speed. REACTIV iQ cover continues to offer high wedge spin with low long game spin. Still the most complete family of Tour balls in golf.
Introduction
For the better part of a decade, the Bridgestone Tour B golf balls have been held in the highest esteem by golfers across the playing spectrum. However, there hadn’t been a substantial change since 2020. That’s all changed with the 2026 Bridgestone Tour B lineup. The new VeloSurge technology is leading to eye-popping claims about distance gains like 8.7 more yards off the tee. Matt Meeker and I tested the new line to see if it could help us get longer.
Feel
The four golf balls in the 2026 Bridgestone Tour B family fall into a familiar pattern for sound and feel. Firmest of all is the Tour B X, the one in the black box. Off the putter, it produces a solid feel that’s toward the firmer side of the Tour ball spectrum. The sound is a clear “tock” that’s very consistent from short to long putts. I compared the 2026 version to the 2024 version and found no significant feel difference.
Like the Tour B X, the 2026 Tour B XS – the blue box – feels almost identical to the 2024 version. At short range, its “tock” is quieter and lower pitched than that of the Tour B X. The feel is noticeably softer, but it’s not mushy or unresponsive. At longer range, you get a slight feeling of compression, which I really enjoy.
Turning to the Tour B RX (red) and Tour B RXS (green), they have a similar dynamic to the Tour B XS and Tour B XS. The Tour B RX is the firmer of the two, though it softens up at distance more than the Tour B X. Of all four balls, the Tour B RXS is the softest, though the gap between it and the Tour B XS is not very big.
Finally, with the wedges and irons the 2026 Bridgestone Tour B X stands out even more as the firmest. There’s a slight “click” off the club face and a firmer feel. None of the other three has that clear, pronounced impact sound with a wedge – they all produce a “thud” and have a soft feeling of compression. With wedges and irons, the Tour B RXS stands out as having the softest feel.
Short Game
In 2020, Bridgestone revealed their REACTIV iQ urethane cover, a material meant to steepen the spin slope for their Tour B golf balls. That’s carried forward to the 2026 Bridgestone Tour B golf balls, and it continues to provide very impressive performance, particularly in the short game. But, for better or worse (mainly better), not much has changed with the wedge performance.
As in previous years, the Tour B X is billed as the lowest spinning ball, and that was born out in my testing. Compared to other Tour balls, it was just a hair below average – measurable, but not a difference I think anyone would notice on the course. The Tour B XS spun several hundred RPM more across a variety of wedge shots and was very close to the Tour B RX. Interestingly, the Tour B RXS, which is billed as the highest spinning, was the second lowest spinning for me. Matt Meeker also found more spin in the Tour B RX than the Tour B RXS.
As much as I love the minutiae, I’ll close by restating that all four of these golf balls produce strong wedge spin. While there are differences in their short game performance, playing the “wrong” Tour B will not be the difference between a shot spinning back into the cup or running through the green.
Something else that has carried forward from the 2024 Tour B line up [review HERE] is Mindset. This is the graphic, seen above, that was developed with Jason Day and his mental coach, Jason Goldsmith. The three circles are meant to remind you to follow a three step process: identify your target, visualize the shot path, and focus on the dot.
As was stated when this was unveiled, this design is most useful on tee shots and putts – you can’t control which part of the ball you see the rest of the time. That said, if it helps you improve your mental game on over half your shots, it’s a great thing.
Long Game
Now we get to the big question surrounding the 2026 Bridgestone Tour B golf ball: is it faster and longer? Bridgestone claims that testing with their Tour staff and “amateur players of varying swing speeds” showed average gains of 2.3 MPH of ball speed and 8.7 yards of distance. I want to emphasize “average” because that means some players saw more, some saw less.
In my testing, I saw small but consistent ball speed gains in the 2026 Bridgestone Tour B balls versus the previous model. With the driver, I was seeing an extra 1 MPH with the Tour B X and Tour B XS. Across all four models, Matt Meeker did not see any additional ball speed. For reference, Matt Meeker fits into the “sub 105 MPH” group for driver swing speed, and I am just over that threshold. As I have in the past, I did achieve more ball speed (~2 MPH) with the Tour B X and Tour B XS than the RX or RXS.
Turning to spin, the VeloSurge technology does not seem to have done anything to impact the performance of these balls. The 2026 Bridgestone Tour B golf balls fall in line with previous years where the X and RX spun slightly less than average with the irons and long game clubs and the XS and RXS spun slightly more than average. I’m a fairly low spin player, so the gaps I saw may be on the smaller side. Higher spin players may see more difference between the models.
Rimac Compression Data
2026 Bridgestone Tour B X – 36 balls tested
Average Compression: 96.17
Median Compression: 96.5
Maximum Compression: 101
Minimum Compression: 91
2026 Bridgestone Tour B XS – 36 balls tested
Average Compression: 83.17
Median Compression: 83
Maximum Compression: 88
Minimum Compression: 77
2026 Bridgestone Tour B RX – 12 balls tested
Average Compression: 84.58
Median Compression: 84
Maximum Compression: 81
Minimum Compression: 91
2026 Bridgestone Tour B RXS – 12 balls tested
Average Compression: 70.58
Median Compression: 71
Maximum Compression: 68
Minimum Compression: 73
Conclusion
The 2026 Bridgestone Tour B golf balls keep everything that golfers have loved for the last several years and makes them – potentially – faster. Given the rules limiting equipment, that’s no small feat. Does that make the new ball “ridiculous” or on “a whole new level” as Jason Day and Tiger Woods have said? Not to me, but they’re absolutely worth a try on the chance that you gain the promised 8.7 yards off the tee.
Buy 2026 Bridgestone Tour B Golf Balls HERE
He founded Plugged In Golf in 2013 with the goal of helping all golfers play better and enjoy the game more.
Matt lives in the northwest suburbs of Chicago with his wife and two daughters.
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