Johnson turned professional in 1998 and played on the developmental tour circuit, including the now-defunct Prairie Golf Tour, Buy.com Tour (now
Korn Ferry Tour), and
Hooters Tour, where he won the final three regular-season events in 2001. In 2003, he topped the money list on the
Nationwide Tour with then record earnings of $494,882, earning an automatic promotion to the
PGA Tour. Johnson won his first
PGA Tour event in
2004 at the
BellSouth Classic outside of
Atlanta, one stroke ahead of runner-up
Mark Hensby. In
2006, Johnson recorded a number of impressive results, with two runner-ups and a third at the
WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship. As a result, he qualified for the U.S.
Ryder Cup team for the first time in
2006, finishing ninth on the U.S. points list. In April
2007, Johnson won his first major title at the
Masters Tournament in
Augusta, Georgia, two strokes ahead of runners-up
Tiger Woods,
Retief Goosen, and
Rory Sabbatini. His score of 289 (+1) tied
Sam Snead (
1954) and
Jack Burke Jr. (
1956) for the highest winning score at the Masters. His victory took Johnson from #56 to #15 in the
world rankings; he was the first outside the top 50 in the
world rankings to win the
Masters in the history of the rankings (introduced
1986). After winning, he mentioned his Christian faith and thanked God, saying: "This being
Easter, I cannot help but believe my Lord and Savior,
Jesus Christ was walking with me. I owe this to Him." Six weeks after winning the Masters, Johnson won for the third time on tour at the
AT&T Classic in a playoff over
Ryuji Imada. Following the win, Johnson moved to 13th in the world rankings. His next PGA Tour victory, and first outside the state of
Georgia, came at the
Valero Texas Open in October
2008, where he finished with weekend rounds of 62 and 64 to finish two strokes ahead of a chasing pack of players. Johnson won the
Sony Open in Hawaii in January
2009 for his fifth victory on the PGA Tour, and successfully defended his title at the Valero Texas Open in May with a playoff victory over
James Driscoll. With a third-round 60, Johnson became the first player to shoot 60 twice on the PGA Tour, having done so previously at the 2007
Tour Championship. The win was Johnson's sixth on tour. Other highlights in 2009 include a tie for 2nd place at the
John Deere Classic and a solo 3rd-place finish at the
Arnold Palmer Invitational. He finished the season ranked a career best fourth on the money list. In 2010, Johnson started the season solidly on the PGA Tour, making ten of his first eleven cuts without any significant results. Then in June 2010, he won the
Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial, his seventh PGA Tour victory. Johnson only missed two cuts all year en route to qualifying for the season ending Tour Championship and the 2010 U.S. Ryder Cup team, his second appearance in the event. In 2012, Johnson won the
Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial for the second time in his career. He made a putt on the last hole for an apparent three-shot victory, but a ruling on the final hole resulted in a two-stroke penalty. It did not affect the outcome, with the only difference being Johnson signing for a double-bogey instead of a par on the final hole, and winning by a single stroke over
Jason Dufner. He jumped to 3rd in the FedEx Cup standings and returned to the world top 20 with this victory. Johnson moved to second in the FedEx Cup standings in
2012 with a playoff win on July 15 at the
John Deere Classic. Johnson defeated
Troy Matteson, who started the day up four shots on Johnson and had led the tournament since the first round, with a birdie on the second hole of their playoff. Johnson also started the day behind three-time defending champion
Steve Stricker, who was three shots behind Matteson. It was Johnson's second win on the year after winning at Colonial Country Club. Mike Bender, Johnson's swing coach, also caddied for the week while usual caddie Damon Green played in the
U.S. Senior Open. At the
2012 Open Championship, played at
Royal Lytham & St Annes Golf Club in Lancashire, England, Johnson finished at even par for the tournament (280), tied for ninth, seven shots behind winner
Ernie Els. In 2013, Johnson, in defense of his
John Deere Classic title, lost in a three-man sudden-death playoff to
Jordan Spieth at the fifth extra hole, after he bogeyed the final hole of regulation play with a one shot lead. In the playoff, all three players, Johnson, Spieth and
David Hearn, had chances to win with Johnson's coming at the second extra hole, but he failed to convert the putt. Spieth won with par at the fifth extra hole after Johnson hit his second shot into the water and could only make bogey. The following week, Johnson opened up the
2013 Open Championship at
Muirfield, with a five-under-par round of 66 to hold the lead by one stroke over
Rafa Cabrera-Bello and
Mark O'Meara. He finished the tournament in a tie for 6th place. He continued solid play for the rest of the summer, finishing in the top-10 in six of the next seven tournaments he would enter, including an 8th-place finish at the
PGA Championship, making it back to back top-10 finishes at major events. In September, Johnson captured the
BMW Championship for his tenth career victory and first
FedEx Cup victory of his career. In December 2013, Johnson attained a playoff victory over Tiger Woods at the
Northwestern Mutual World Challenge. This win moved him into the top ten of the
Official World Golf Ranking for the first time in his career. Johnson captured his 11th career victory in January 2014 with a win at the
Hyundai Tournament of Champions. With the win, Johnson moved up to 7th in the
Official World Golf Ranking, and claimed a career high 6th due to 8th place in the following week. at the
2014 Players Championship. Johnson finished tied for 26th. At the
2014 U.S. Open, Johnson had a
hole in one on the 172 yard par-3 9th hole. It was the 44th hole in one in U.S. Open history, and just the second at
Pinehurst No. 2. On July 20, 2015, Johnson beat
Louis Oosthuizen and
Marc Leishman in a
four-hole playoff to win the
Open Championship at
St Andrews for his 12th PGA Tour win and second major. He became only the sixth golfer to win majors at
Augusta and St. Andrews, the others being
Sam Snead,
Jack Nicklaus,
Nick Faldo,
Seve Ballesteros, and Woods. Johnson is one of only two players (with
Phil Mickelson) to have twice shot a round of 60 on the PGA Tour, though Jim Furyk shot rounds of 58 and 59. In July 2019, Johnson fell out of the Official World Golf Ranking top 100 players for the first time since April 2004, when his first tour victory at the 2004
BellSouth Classic vaulted him from 126th in the world to 49th. From 2004 to 2018, Johnson made at least $1.6 million every season, and he grabbed wins in all but one season between 2007 and 2015. The only year he didn't, 2011, Johnson still managed to finish T-6 or better in four events, and he also finished solo second at the
Hero World Challenge. In August 2019, Johnson failed to make the
FedEx Cup Playoffs for the first time since the playoffs were introduced in 2007. "Extreme disappointment. That's about all I've got at this point is just extreme disappointment," Johnson said. Once a fixture near the top of the rankings, Johnson slipped to 126th in the world. He remained fully exempt for the 2019–20 PGA Tour season in the final part of a five-year exemption for winning the
2015 Open Championship, an insurance that Johnson said allowed him to play with added "freedom" during a lean year. In July 2021, Johnson was forced to withdraw from
2021 Open Championship after testing positive for COVID-19, ending his streak at participating in 69 consecutive majors. ==Personal life==