Chipping golf tips 8 Jun 2026 10 min read

Golf Chipping Tips For Cleaner Contact

If your chipping feels good for six or seven shots and then one fat or thin strike appears from nowhere, the problem is probably not effort. It is usually your low point moving to the wrong place.

For a clean chip, the club needs to brush the ground in a predictable spot. When the body drops back, the head works down, or the club disappears too far behind you, the bottom of the swing moves behind the ball. That is when the club hits the turf early, or you react to that fear and catch the ball thin.

The fix is not to freeze everything. The fix is to get your setup and movement working more forward, more open, and more through the shot.

Quick Answer

To chip better, stop the body moving down and back through the strike. Flare your lead foot, open your chest slightly, keep your weight forward, and feel your head, eyes and chest moving up and toward the target. For longer or higher chip shots, keep the clubhead more in front of you instead of letting it work around behind your body.

Why Good Chip Shots Suddenly Turn Into Duffs

A lot of golfers are not bad chippers all the time. That is what makes the problem so frustrating.

You can hit several decent shots, then one heavy strike appears and it feels as though the technique has vanished. Often, the fear is the fat shot. Once you are worried about hitting the ground before the ball, the thin shot comes into play as well.

That pattern usually points to low point. If the club is arriving too early into the ground, the ball either gets caught heavy or you start pulling the club up and catch it thin.

The question to ask is simple: what moved the low point behind the ball?

The Three Chipping Movements To Avoid

There are three movements that can damage chipping contact:

• Moving back
• Dropping down
• Moving closer toward the ball

On a full swing, you might sometimes get away with unwanted movement because there is more speed and more rotation. On a small chip, there is not much time to recover. If your head and body move down and back, the club is very likely to hit the ground before the ball.

This is why the old advice to “keep your head still” can be risky. If you try to lock your head down, you may actually keep your eyes stuck on the ground and encourage the same down-and-back pattern.

You do not need a frozen head. You need a better direction of movement.

Use A Shadow Check To Improve Contact

A simple way to check this is to use your shadow.

Set up to a basic chip and look at where your head shadow sits. As you swing through, feel as though your head and eyes work up and toward the target. It might feel as if you are looking up earlier than normal, but the real movement will often be much smaller than the feel.

Try this:

1. Make a few practice swings without a ball.
2. Watch your shadow as the club swings through.
3. Feel your head and chest moving up and slightly toward the target.
4. Let your eyes release with the shot instead of staying buried down.

The aim is not to lift out of the shot. The aim is to stop the head dropping back and down.

Open The Chest And Flare The Lead Foot

Once you have the right movement feel, build it into your setup.

Start with these checkpoints:

• Flare your lead foot toward the target.
• Open your chest slightly.
• Keep a little more pressure on your lead side.
• Let your chest turn through the strike.

That lead-foot flare gives your body somewhere to go. The open chest helps the club work through the ball without the low point getting stuck too far back.

A useful feel is to get your “heart to the sky” a little sooner through the hitting area. For many golfers, that gets the chest opening, the eyes releasing and the strike moving forward without needing to jab at the ball.

If you keep struggling to work out why your contact changes from shot to shot, use the Me And My Golf Swing Coach path here:

How To Chip From A Bad Lie

A ball sitting down needs a slightly different plan. You still want clean contact, but you may need to create a little more steepness so the club can find the ball.

Use these adjustments:

• Move the ball slightly farther back.
• Keep your weight forward.
• Keep the lead foot flared.
• Keep the chest slightly open.
• Stay soft with the hands and body.

If the ball is farther back, it can start more to the right for a right-handed golfer because you are contacting it earlier in the arc. If that happens, aim or open your body a little farther left.

The big mistake from a bad lie is to get aggressive. You do not need to smash down on it. You need better contact. Stay soft, keep moving through, and let the setup create the strike.

One caveat: if you are already very steep and digging the leading edge, do not blindly exaggerate ball-back or handle-forward feels. The point is to move the low point forward enough, not to chop down.

Short-Sided Over A Bunker: Pick The Smart Miss First

When the shot gets harder, choose the smart miss before you choose the technique.

If you are short-sided over a bunker, leaving it short can be the worst result. In that situation, 15 or 20 feet past the hole might be a good outcome compared with catching the bunker.

To create more height, you can open the face and move the ball a little farther forward. But the contact rules do not change. If the head drops back or the club gets too far behind you, the club will still hit the ground early.

So the order is:

1. Pick the safe landing and miss.
2. Add loft only as much as you need.
3. Keep the body open and moving through.
4. Preserve clean contact before chasing spin.

Keep The Club In Front On Longer Chip Shots

The longer the shot gets, the easier it is for the club to work around your body.

That can feel powerful, but it often makes the club too shallow. When the club gets behind you, it has to travel a long way back to the ball, and you are more likely to hit the ground before the ball.

Use this feel instead:

• Keep your hands relatively close to you.
• Let the clubhead work more out and up in front of you.
• Open the face if the shot needs height.
• Let the club drop back down with soft hands.

The cue is hands close, clubhead out. You are not dragging the handle around your body. You are letting the club stay in front, then fall back to the ball.

Control Spin With Soft Hands, Not Force

Clean strike and spin do not come from grabbing the club tighter.

A useful feel is grip pressure around two out of ten. Soft arms and soft hands make it easier to let the club fall, brush the grass and keep moving through.

If the shot comes up short but the strike is good, do not automatically hit harder. First, change one of these:

• Make the backswing a little longer.
• Use a little less loft.
• Adjust the face slightly.

That keeps the strike pattern intact. You are controlling distance with swing length and face, not a late hit with the hands.

Wedge condition can also affect how much spin and control you see, especially if the grooves are worn, but it should stay secondary. The first priority is still contact.

Clean Chipping Contact Checklist

If the club is hitting the ground too early, run through this checklist:

• Is your head dropping down and back?
• Is your weight falling onto the trail foot?
• Is your chest staying closed too long?
• Is the club getting behind your body?
• Can you flare the lead foot and open the chest slightly?
• Can you feel the head, eyes and chest moving up and toward the target?
• Can you keep the hands soft and the clubhead in front?

The clean-contact pattern is simple: get forward, open out, keep the club in front, and move through the target.

For more help diagnosing what is changing in your swing and short game, use the Swing Coach link below:

FAQs

What are the most common chipping mistakes?

For this type of strike problem, the common mistakes are moving back, dropping down, or moving closer toward the ball through the strike. Those moves can shift low point behind the ball and cause fat or thin contact.

How do I stop duffing chip shots?

Start by moving the low point forward. Flare the lead foot, open the chest slightly, keep pressure forward, and let the head, eyes and chest release through the shot.

Should I keep my head still when chipping?

Do not lock it down. If your head is dropping back and down, a better feel may be that it works up and toward the target. The real movement will usually be smaller than the feel.

Where should the ball be in my stance for a bad lie?

For a ball sitting down, you can experiment with moving it slightly farther back while keeping weight forward and the body open. If you start digging too much, soften the adjustment.

How do I chip over a bunker without hitting the ground first?

Pick the smart miss first, then add only the loft you need. Keep the body open, keep moving through, and avoid letting the club get stuck behind you.