Northern Irishman McIlroy, with 5164.5 points going into the DP World Tour Championship at Dubai this week, has now finished top of the European money list five times, first in 2012 and again in 2014, 2015 and last year.

McIlroy, who made more than 7 million euros ($A12 million) in prizemoney in nine Tour events this year, is 2083 points ahead of second-placed Jon Rahm, the Masters champion, with Adrian Meronk third in the Race to Dubai order of merit.

There are 2000 points available to the winner of the Tour Championship finale in Dubai.

Poland's Meronk played in this weekend's Nedbank Challenge at Sun City where he added 94.5 points after finishing 15th.

The tournament in South Africa was won by American Max Homa, who finished four shots ahead of Denmark's Nicolai Hojgaard.

The top-50 finishers in the Race to Dubai rankings will compete for a $US10 million ($A16 million) purse at Jumeirah Golf Estate from Thursday, including two Australians, Min Woo Lee (9th on the list) and Lucas Herbert (39th).