Zero Torque Putters: Game-Changing Tech With One Big Catch

Rather than eliminating torque, OEMs have traditionally offered putters with the whole spectrum of toe hang – the amount the toe of a putter hangs down when the putter rests parallel to the ground – and left it up to the individual player to find the one that works best for them.

Players with some arc in their stroke should use a putter with some toe hang. Players with lots of arc in their stroke should use a putter with lots of toe hang. Players with no arc in their stroke should use a face-balanced putter with no toe hang. 

“If that toe hang doesn't move with your path and your opening and closing, you're fighting it,” said Nick Sherburne, founder of Club Champion, one of the top brand-agnostic club-fitting operations in the United States. “That's a torque you're fighting. We've always been about fitting you for the proper toe hang using SAM PuttLab.”

Finding that ideal toe hang for your stroke determines whether your putter works with your stroke, or against it. The problem is, not everybody gets fit for a putter, can properly identify how much arc is in their putting stroke, or even knows there is such a thing as toe hang in putters.

“Without some kind of diagnostics, understanding which putter toe hang to marriage with your stroke is pretty hard to do,” Sherburne said.

A putter with zero torque doesn’t try to open or close during the putting stroke. Instead, it stays square to the stroke, which is why zero torque putters fit any putting stroke and make it easier to start putts on the intended line.

Late in the 2023 PGA Tour season, Lucas Glover won back-to-back events – in large part because of his putting – using a L.A.B Mezz.1 putter that simply cannot be mistaken for any other putter on the planet. That's partly because to achieve a zero torque profile, the shaft of the putter must align with the center of gravity (CG), so a traditional-looking heel-shafted putter won't cut it. 

Relative to the other putter giants out there – the Odysseys, Scotty Camerons, and PINGs of the world – L.A.B is in its infancy. L.A.B was officially founded in 2018 and the company was only predated by its first putter, a model called the Reno under the brand DirectedForce, by about four years.

So, what exactly did Glover’s success do for L.A.B?

“To the best of my memory in 2023 from January 1st to July 31st, we had sold, I think it was just under 100 long putters,” L.A.B Golf CEO Sam Hahn ballparked. “And then I think we sold 2,700 in the month of August after he won. Certainly, for the long putter category, it was a massive, massive moment. As far as quantifying it, I can definitely confirm that business was never the same after that.”

Until then, the validation of zero torque putters never matched the merit. Once that changed, it was game on. 

In August 2024, just 374 days after the second of Glover’s back-to-back wins, PXG released the Allan Putter, its self-proclaimed zero torque offering.

That release was followed the next month by Evnroll’s ZERO line of zero torque putters. In November, Odyssey and Bettinardi launched their own zero torque options. 

“L.A.B came out and made a truly – it doesn't have opening-closing abilities – a straight no torque putter,” said Sherburne, who had a L.A.B DF3 putter in the bag when he spoke with GolfLink. “It's a great product. They've done a good job and so now everybody's going to attack it.”

The rest of the pack is undoubtedly close behind, at least when it comes to launch dates. When it comes to truly offering zero torque putters, Hahn insists the competition is actually not that close.

Here's the catch. There’s no industry standard for measuring torque or proving a putter’s absolute lack of torque. Instead, companies that release zero torque putters come up with their own methods to illustrate their product’s merit while calling into question that of their competitors.

L.A.B uses its revealer. PXG uses its zero torque spotter. Axis1 has even used a digital torque meter to measure the torque of various putters in a static address position.

“L.A.B has their revealer and it's a little different than ours,” said PXG design engineer Matt Andrews. “Our zero torque spotter is designed to show the differences between our traditional putters and the Allan putter. And it's pretty eye-opening when you do that.”

With every company using its own way of defining, measuring, and demonstrating torque, there’s not much accountability for manufacturers who put the “zero torque” label on new putters. Just because a putter balances toe up, or face forward, and carries the zero torque label, does not necessarily mean it’s a zero torque putter.

“At this point now I've counted on a mass production scale, there are 17 different low torque options,” Hahn said. “Three of them are actually zero torque. There's literally an epidemic of false advertising going on around this category.”

Just because OEMs are caught up arguing over which putters are truly zero torque and which aren’t, doesn’t mean consumers should be. 

Remember, the purpose of zero torque is to create a putter that stays square – and more importantly, consistently returns to impact square – during the putting stroke. 

Zero torque putters are certainly built to make that task easier, but what about a putter that has almost zero torque? How about one that calls itself zero torque, but actually isn’t even low torque? Do those putters still help your game?

There are devices that measure exactly what a putter does during the stroke, including how much the face rotates, with precision. One of them is the aforementioned SAM PuttLab. That’s what Club Champion – again, a brand-agnostic fitter – uses for its putter fittings. 

So, what putter do players buy after seeing data on how various putters behave during the stroke, including face rotation and how consistently they return it to square at impact?

More often than not, L.A.B, according to Sherburne.

“It was our number one selling putter the last two years in a row,” Sherburne said of L.A.B putters. “Our fitters don't have a reason to sell it any more than any other putter. It's just a good product.”

The zero torque label will be slapped on putters liberally over the coming years. It’s fair to take that label with a bit of skepticism.

What companies are really trying to sell you is a putter that’s easy to square up at impact. Unlike torque itself, that’s something you can, and should, measure for yourself before buying a putter.