Rory McIlroy admitted that a busy schedule had him crawling to the finish line in 2024 and said he might reduce his commitments in 2025 by as many as nine tournaments.
"I feel like the tournaments came thick and fast, and obviously with the Olympics thrown in there, as well, this year, it sort of condensed everything a bit," said McIlroy, who finished in a tie for ninth at the season-ending Tour Championship on Sunday at Atlanta.
Despite the admittedly exhausting season, McIlroy still closed with a flourish, shooting a 5-under-par 66 in the final round on Sunday.
The Northern Ireland native and fan favourite finished at 16 under for the tournament, tied with Japan's Hideki Matsuyama and Ireland's Shane Lowry.
"It's been a long season, and I'm going to just have to think about trying to build in a few extra breaks here and there next year and going forward because I felt like I hit a bit of a wall sort of post-US Open, and still feel a little bit of that hangover," McIlroy said.
McIlroy has won the Tour Championship three times, most recently in 2022 when he held off Scottie Scheffler and South Korea's Sungjae Im by a stroke.
Scheffler finished off the Tour Championship victory on Sunday at East Lake Golf Club, winning by four strokes over Collin Morikawa.
McIlroy said he still has five events planned for the fall and will look toward eliminating events for the 2025 season that begins on 2 January with The Sentry at Kapalua, Maui, Hawaii.
A 26-time winner on the PGA Tour, McIlroy won two PGA events this past season, the Zurich Classic of New Orleans with Lowry as his partner in April and the Wells Fargo Championship in Charlotte, North Carolina, by five strokes over Xander Schauffele the following month.
He also had one victory on the European Tour, taking the Dubai Desert Classic by a stroke in January.
McIlroy said he had 27 events scheduled in 2024, with 19 of those on the on the official PGA Tour schedule.
He also had a runner-up finish on the PGA Tour this season and seven top-10 finishes, while earning $10.9 million in official prize money.
After finishing a disappointing second at the US Open in June, McIlroy did have three top-10 finishes to close out the season but also missed the cut at The Open Championship in July and finished tied for 68th at the St. Jude Championship in August.
"I'm usually sort of like a 22 (tournament) sort of person," McIlroy said.
"But again, that was when I was sort of in my 20s and didn't have the responsibilities that I do now. I'm going to try to cut it back to like 18 or 20 a year going forward, I think."
Rory McIlroy says he wants to cut his schedule down to playing, "18 or 20 a year going forward."
— Chris McKee (@mrmckee) September 1, 2024
LIV schedule is 14 events, plus all 4 majors.
Just saying.... #FedExCup #LIVGolf pic.twitter.com/DILHov0s0K