The Best Public Golf Courses in America
You vote here on the best public golf courses in America, ranking them by the round you'd most want to book. Two rankings set the field. One is Golf Digest's America's 100 Greatest Public Courses for 2025-26, published May 27, 2025; the other is GOLF's Top 100 Courses You Can Play for 2024-25, published November 19, 2024. Each entry is one facility whose own Wikipedia article opens by saying what it is, with a course on either list and tee times you can book without a membership, even where the booking comes only with a hotel stay. Sand Valley and Streamsong rank high on both lists and fail that article test. One owner holds at most two seats. Those tests settle membership, and the two groups are a rough sort: the first has a course printed 30th or better on both lists, the second holds other qualifiers, filled from those on both lists by the lowest total of their two positions, and within either group your votes set the order.
Pebble Beach Golf Links is #1 on “The Best Public Golf Courses in America”.
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Pebble Beach Golf Links
At the 1972 U.S. Open, Jack Nicklaus hit a 1-iron into the 17th that bounced once, struck the flagstick and stopped next to the cup for a tap-in birdie, and he took the title by 3 strokes. Tiger Woods won the 2000 Open here by 15 strokes, the largest margin in any major. It opened in 1919, and Golf Digest and GOLF each rank it 1st.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_Beach_Golf_Links - 2
Bandon Dunes Golf Resort
Pacific Dunes, the Tom Doak course that opened in 2001, carries the resort: Golf Digest ranks it 2nd and GOLF 3rd, with the original Bandon Dunes course 9th on both. Carts aren't allowed unless you need one for a medical reason, so you walk. The 2020 U.S. Amateur was the first held here, and Tyler Strafaci beat Ollie Osborne in a final played in thick fog.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bandon_Dunes_Golf_Resort - 3
Pinehurst Resort
Donald Ross completed No. 2 in 1907, and it's the course that puts the resort here, ranked 6th by Golf Digest and 2nd by GOLF. Behind its 18th hole there's a statue of Payne Stewart in the pose he struck after the putt that beat Phil Mickelson at the 1999 U.S. Open. In 2014 Martin Kaymer won the men's Open on No. 2, and Michelle Wie won the women's the following week.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinehurst_Resort - 4
Kiawah Island Golf Resort
Pete and Alice Dye's Ocean Course was added in 1991, the year it hosted the Ryder Cup that picked up the nickname War by the Shore. The Ocean measures more than 7,876 yards and ranks 5th with Golf Digest and 6th with GOLF, and PGA Championships came to it in 2012 and 2021. It was the fourth course to host a Ryder Cup, a Senior PGA Championship and a PGA Championship.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiawah_Island_Golf_Resort - 5
Bethpage Black Course
A sign at the first tee, put up in the 1960s, warns that the course is extremely difficult and recommended only for highly skilled golfers. It's a state park course on Long Island, open since 1936, which Golf Digest ranks 7th and GOLF 5th; Tiger Woods won the 2002 U.S. Open here by 3 over Phil Mickelson, and Europe took the 2025 Ryder Cup 15-13.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bethpage_Black_Course - 6
Whistling Straits
About 800,000 cubic yards of soil and sand went onto the site for Pete and Alice Dye's Straits Course, and eight of its holes run along Lake Michigan. Golf Digest ranks the Straits 4th, GOLF ranks it 10th, and PGA Championships came in 2004, 2010 and 2015. At the 2021 Ryder Cup the United States beat Europe 19-9.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistling_Straits - 7
TPC at Sawgrass
The 17th is 137 yards to an island green, and more than 100,000 balls get pulled out of the water around it every year. In 2019 Jhonattan Vegas holed a putt of 69 feet 7 inches there, the longest in the hole's history. The Players Championship has been played on the Stadium Course since 1982, and that course ranks 8th with both Golf Digest and GOLF.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TPC_at_Sawgrass - 8
Shadow Creek Golf Course
You can't simply call for a tee time. It started as Steve Wynn's private club and now takes a limited number of MGM hotel guests. Tom Fazio designed it in North Las Vegas for a reported $60 million, and Golf Digest ranks it 3rd while GOLF ranks it 14th. Phil Mickelson beat Tiger Woods there on the 22nd hole of The Match in 2018.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_Creek_Golf_Course - 9
Pasatiempo Golf Club
Marion Hollins hired Alister MacKenzie to build it, and his American home borders the sixth fairway. Bobby Jones was the first to play it, in a celebrity match on opening day, September 8, 1929. It's semi-private, though both rankings count it as a course you can play: Golf Digest ranks it 15th and GOLF 11th. Jim Urbina restored it between 2023 and 2024.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pasatiempo_Golf_Club - 10
Erin Hills
Bob Lang, a Wisconsin developer, paid for it himself, ran into money trouble and had to sell, and Andrew Ziegler bought it in 2009. It's been walking-only since 2010, with no paved cart paths; Brooks Koepka won the 2017 U.S. Open here and Maja Stark the 2025 U.S. Women's Open, while GOLF ranks it 21st against Golf Digest's 10th.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erin_Hills - 11
Spyglass Hill Golf Course
Every hole carries a name out of Treasure Island: Blind Pew is the 4th and Long John Silver the 14th. The first five holes look out at the Pacific, and the other thirteen go into the Del Monte Forest. Phil Mickelson shot 62 here during the 2005 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, and Luke Donald matched it in 2006. Robert Trent Jones Sr. designed the course; Golf Digest ranks it 13th, GOLF 23rd.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spyglass_Hill_Golf_Course - 12
Harbour Town Golf Links
Arnold Palmer won the first Heritage here in 1969 at 1 under, his 55th title on the PGA Tour, and the event has been held there ever since. Pete Dye designed it with help from Jack Nicklaus. Its greens average about 3,700 square feet against roughly 6,600 on tour, and the striped lighthouse is the target for approaches to the 18th. GOLF ranks the course 12th, a long way ahead of Golf Digest's 28th.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harbour_Town_Golf_Links - 13
Blackwolf Run
In an extended playoff in 1998, Se Ri Pak won the U.S. Women's Open here, on a layout set at par 71 and 6,412 yards. For the 2012 Open the same holes ran more than 500 yards longer, to 6,954. Pete Dye's River Course, with the Sheboygan River running through it, earns the place, ranked 17th by Golf Digest and 29th by GOLF. Kohler owns it, along with Whistling Straits.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwolf_Run - 14
Chambers Bay
Pierce County paid $33 million in 1992 for an old sand-and-gravel quarry on Puget Sound, which Robert Trent Jones Jr. turned into a course that opened in 2007; Jordan Spieth won the 2015 U.S. Open here, on greens Henrik Stenson likened to putting on broccoli. It's walking-only, county residents pay less, and it ranks 19th with Golf Digest but 31st with GOLF, one place outside that list's top 30.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chambers_Bay
How this list was ranked
Readers rank this list by voting items up and down. Items are ordered by reader votes.
