Srixon ZXi RKT LS vs ZXi LS: a taller face and a quieter head, or last year's low-spin driver at 38% less

Srixon's own US store is selling last year's Srixon ZXi LS at around $400, cut by about 27 per cent, while the Srixon ZXi RKT LS that replaces it reached shops on 16 October at around $650. That makes the old head roughly 38 per cent cheaper. On the spec sheet they are close relatives: 460cc, 8, 9 or 10.5 degrees of loft, a 59-degree lie, a published length of 45.75 inches, and two sole weights, one forward and one back, for moving spin.

What the extra money buys is a new face, a taller and more compact head, and a chassis Srixon rebuilt around the way the club sounds. What it does not buy is Ryan Fox's driver. Fox won the Open with a ZXi RKT LS+, a tour model. Srixon's retail line-up lists the standard RKT, the RKT LS, the RKT MAX and a women's MAX. The LS+ is not among them.

The face and the crown

Srixon calls the new face RKT Face, and it is a bundle rather than one idea. VR-Titanium is a new alloy with silicon added, which Srixon says lets more of the face and body flex for ball speed. The i-FLEX thickness pattern introduced on the first ZXi carries over in refined form. A new Variable Roll Design changes the curvature high in the toe, which Srixon says helps suppress hooks from high-toe strikes. Rebound Frame, the two-flex-zone structure behind the face, is common to both generations.

The other structural change is the crown. The first ZXi used Srixon's Star Frame, a latticework supporting an ultralight, thin titanium crown. Every RKT driver uses a carbon crown instead, which Srixon says positions mass low. GOLF.com's launch report adds the shaping detail: on tour feedback, the LS got a taller face, a deeper profile and a more compact pear shape than last year's head, and Srixon set up a dedicated tour prototyping team to build it.

The sound is the upgrade, if you hear it the same way

Srixon has been unusually candid about why the RKT exists. Patrick Ripp, its tour engineering manager, told GOLF.com that the last generation had good ball speed but problems with spin and, most of all, sound, and that the three heads looked too alike. The RKT heads carry a new ACOUSTICORE chassis with what Srixon describes as AI-optimised internal ribs, tuned per model. Ripp said the LS is the most muted of the three.

GOLF.com's Jack Hirsh wrote that the new LS sounded so different he checked the sole to make sure he had the right club, and called the old Srixon sound a non-starter for too many players. Golfalot reached the opposite verdict on the standard RKT head, calling it louder, higher-pitched and a bit tinny next to the old ZXi, which it preferred. Two testers, two models, two opinions. Sound is personal, and it is the one thing on this list a demo day settles in five swings.

Golfalot's numbers on that standard head are still the clearest independent data so far. Ball speed was flat, 154.3 mph on the old ZXi against 153.9 on the RKT, while spin fell from 3,073 to 2,423 rpm. That is one tester on the standard head rather than the LS, but it points at spin, not speed, as where this generation moved.

Weights, shafts and the spin window

Both LS heads put one weight forward and one back, and both follow the same logic: more weight forward lowers spin, more weight back raises launch and spin. Srixon publishes the RKT LS chart in rpm. The stock set-up is 10g forward and 4g back. Going to 16g forward and 2g back takes off about 100 rpm. Flipping to 2g forward and 16g back adds about 250 rpm, and 14g with 10g adds about 180. That is a window of roughly 350 rpm from one head before you touch the hosel, and both generations add an adjustable sleeve on top.

Two details on Srixon's own pages cut the other way. Its model chart rates the old ZXi LS spin as lowest and the new one as low. And the stock shafts differ: the ZXi LS ships on a Project X HZRDUS Black Gen 5, listed as low launch and low spin at 65 to 75g, while the RKT LS page lists a Mitsubishi Kai'li Dark Waves White 60, also low and low, at 65 to 69g. Left-handers get more choice from the new head: the RKT LS comes left-handed in 9 and 10.5 degrees, the old LS in 9 only.

What the tour bags say

Srixon drivers are in 4 of the 80 tour bags we track, and none of them is the retail RKT LS. Ryan Fox plays the RKT LS+. Hideki Matsuyama is in the first-generation ZXi LS on a Graphite Design Tour AD shaft, as of Today's Golfer's 7 September bag check. Miyu Yamashita plays the standard ZXi, not an LS. Shane Lowry had the ZXi LS in his last full bag check in July, but GOLF.com reported in September that he and Fox had both won in the previous two months with the RKT LS+. GOLF.com also names Lucas Glover and Sepp Straka, previously in other brands' drivers, as RKT converts. These are the bags we maintain and re-verify against named sources, not a census, and they change week to week.

So the tour story belongs to a head you cannot buy, and the shop LS is its nearest relative. That pattern, a tour-only variant winning before the retail model lands, is the one we laid out in tour gear is a year ahead of the shop.

Who should buy which

Buy the RKT LS if you swing fast, fight spin, and found the old Srixon sound off-putting, because that is the problem Srixon set out to fix. It is also the pick for left-handers who want 10.5 degrees, and for anyone who wants the more compact, taller-faced shape the tour staff asked for.

Buy the ZXi LS if you swing fast, already like how it sounds and feels, and would rather spend the saving on a fitting. The face technology is a generation older, but the weighting idea, the lofts and the size are the same, and Srixon's own store lists both heads as available to order with the same estimated ship date. This is the moment the model-year discount exists for.

Who should skip both

Srixon rates both LS heads for high swing speeds and mid forgiveness. If you are not quick, or your misses are spread across the face, the standard RKT or the RKT MAX is the better start, and the loft question probably matters more than the head: most golfers are in the wrong driver loft anyway. The wider field is in our best drivers guide.