In 2024, suddenly manufacturers seemed intrigued by the segment PING had carved out for itself. Known for its drivers that found more fairways than its competitors, PING led its own path, while other manufacturers focused on grabbing distance. PING, instead, sought a balance by potentially sacrificing some distance for better performance for the average player. Two years ago, with its G430, PING made a big play for distance, adding the G430 MAX 10K in 2024 to address the sudden rise of drivers offering high moment of inertia, the measurement of forgiveness.

The company’s latest, the G440, follows the trend of the G430 MAX 10K by balancing distance, improved sound, and forgiveness into a new package. “There’s not one specific thing in our driver we are focused on,” says Ryan Stokke, PING’s Director of Product Design. “What we are doing is so complex now that so many things work together as the whole system in order to produce the outcome. I think the big thing when you do look at 440 in particular with the driver, players are going seek distance gains, so it’s still very much a distance story. But a big part of that is from a continuation of how we optimize the face structure, with a slightly shallower face, pushing to the thinnest face that we’ve made today, and then also combining that with the weight savings.” The result? A hot, fast, great sounding and forgiving driver—golf’s Holy Grail.

What’s new?

Free Hosel Technology

In the past, PING’s drivers would have a hosel that secured through the head of the driver, adding stability, but also mass. Anyone who pays attention to driver technology knows any mass that can be optimized in a driver head is given careful consideration from engineers. That’s the case with the G440. “When we talk about the sophistication of G440, the total system weight and the choice of saving double digits in grams in the driver, we decided not to just load the extra weight in the back of the driver,” says Stokke. Instead, PING looked at advance simulations and full optimization of the driver. “We balanced weight savings from the face, weight savings from the crown, and weight savings from Free Hosel to lighten the system mass and to target each build to better resonate with each target consumer.” In essence, Free Hosel removed the section of the hosel that would have gone into the clubhead without sacrificing stability. The result was a driver with PING’s deepest center of gravity, which was then aligned with the force line for faster ball speed, better spin, and higher launching drives.

Thinner Face

A lower face height allows PING to make the face both thinner and hotter for more ball speed and consistency across the clubface, including the high heel region. But Stokke points out the new thinner face isn’t working on its own. By connecting a hotter face to an optimal center of gravity, PING has unlocked a way to maximize distance. “When you do make the face faster, you also need to optimize their trajectory and the lower CG for slightly higher launch and lower spin that our players are seeing,” Stokke says. The result is a gain of a mile of ball speed—usually around 2 to 3 yards of distance—but done in what Stokke says is “the right way.” “It’s coupled with high launch and lower spin,” he says. “This is really where we can push that player to maximize that distance potential and so that’s a big key to seeing overall gains.”

Lighter Overall, But With A Longer Shaft

Overall, PING reduced the weight of the club by 10 grams, while making the standard shaft a one-quarter of an inch longer to help with more speed. Surprisingly, PING’s engineers found the new longer shaft really didn’t impact dispersion. At the same time, the MAX and LST models have a 29-gram back weight that can be moved into three positions to influence shot shape.

CarbonFly Wrap Crown

Found on all three models, the CarbonFly Wrap crown saves weight and influences the CG. One of the other keys to the driver is the sound, which Stokke says has been lauded by players in testing.

Which one is for me?

G440 MAX

The main model of the three versions, the G440 MAX will work for a majority of golfers. With a three-position adjustable back weight to adjust flight, this is a driver that will work for low to mid-handicap golfers and beyond. It maintains PING’s focus on forgiveness but balances it against better launch conditions and improved ball speed.

G440 LST

This is aimed at players with faster swing speeds—105 miles and more—who occasionally struggle with excess spin hurting distance. Once again, the three-position weight allows fitters to lock in a flight and dial in launch conditions.

G440 SFT

For golfers who struggle with a slice off the tee, the G440 SFT (which stands for straight flight) is aimed at straightening that banana out. With two settings—draw and draw+—this is a forgiving driver designed to help you find more fairways with terrific launch conditions.