Best golf courses near Surfside Beach, SC

Its ocean-side dunes are mostly covered with turfgrass and mature trees now, but when Robert Trent Jones built The Dunes back in the late 1940s, the property was primarily windswept sand dotted with lagoons. Those lakes come in prominently on many holes, particularly on the 11th through 13th, dubbed Alligator Alley. (The boomerang-shaped par-5 13th is called Waterloo.) The home hole, with a pond in front of the green, started as a gambling par 5 but today is a daunting par 4. The course has hosted three USGA championships, including the 1962 U.S. Women's Open and most recently, the 2017 U.S. Women's Amateur Four-Ball.

A past member of our 100 Greatest Public list, King’s North is one of three layouts at Myrtle Beach National. The Arnold Palmer design features some of the Grand Strand’s most notable holes, including the par-5 sixth hole, aptly nicknamed “The Gambler.” Off the tee, players must choose one of the two fairways, either the island strip that shortens the hole, or the safer option to the right, making it a three-shotter. The par-3 12thfeatures an island green, and though it’s more generous than the famous TPC Sawgrass original, the wooden bulkheads lining the green provide similar intimidation.

Strantz returned to Pawley’s Island just a few years after Caledonia opened, nearly to the exact same place, in fact. True Blue is Caledonia’s sister course, located on an inland property that sits just across the street, though sequestered from any marsh views. But what it lacks in scenery it makes up for in volume. Everything at True Blue is bigger and more heroic. Greens erupt out of sand barrens, fairways are 60 to 90 yards wide and holes take on the form of ambling caterpillars. The abrupt, hi-contrast shaping, made possible by the sandy terrain, is a not so subtle nod in the direction of Pine Valley.

Caledonia was Strantz’s first solo design in 1994, and his creativity shines on this golf-only, oak-dotted, sand-dune parcel abutting the marshes and rice paddies of Pawley’s Island. The design is ordered and composed, twisting low through the heavy tree canopy while setting up classic hole strategies into angled greens. There are touches of Pete Dye and just enough quirk to suggest something more intense and experimental brewing under the surface. Subdued and rhythmic, Caledonia is currently ranked 85th on Golf Digest's latest 100 Greatest Public ranking (it’s been as high as 66th). Two musts: The chowder at the turn, and a drink on the porch behind the 18th hole.

The highest ranked of the four courses at Barefoot Resort, the Dye course features classic Dye bunker complexes with risk/reward opportunities for low-handicappers with playable options from forward tees for higher handicappers.

A Dan Maples design, The Heritage Club weaves along the Waccamaw River Trail and borders vast abandoned rice fields. This Pawleys Island course is complemented by lush native flowers along its rolling fairways as well as passerby boats on its riverside holes.

Grande Dunes reopened in September 2022 after a complete greens and bunker renovation over the summer. Spectacular views of the Intracoastal Waterway and Grande Dunes Marina make this links-style golf course well worth the visit. Designed by Roger Rulewich Group, the course was built on a high bluff—the ideal setting for a picturesque sunset round. Expansive fairways littered with penalty areas throughout define Grande Dunes as a difficult, yet enjoyable resort course.

Once the host of the Senior PGA Tour Championship and now home to Dustin Johnson’s annual World Junior Golf Championship, TPC Myrtle Beach is designed to challenge even the pros. Numerous water hazards, strategically placed trees, and forced carries make this track a tough, but enjoyable test.

This Jack Nicklaus design would contend not only for the best in Myrtle Beach but the best public courses in South Carolina. Pawleys Plantation lies among the natural saltwater marshes and boasts some strong par 3s. According to Nicklaus, each hole has a distinct intended strategy shaped by hazards, trees, bunkers, and even a double green shared by two holes.

A member of Golf Digest's 100 Greatest Public ranking from 2003 to 2007, the Love course is one of the best in Myrtle Beach and yet ranked as the third-best at golf-rich Barefoot Resort (just a few tenths of a point behind the Fazio course, according to our panelists). This is Love Golf Design's only work in Myrtle Beach, and it makes good use of the land with a good variety of holes—long, short and doglegs in each direction.

The Reserve Golf Club in Pawleys Island is one of the best courses in South Carolina. Discover our experts' reviews and where The Reserve ranks in our rankings

Fazio's entry at Barefoot Resort will challenge the best players—with the routing constantly changing direction to account for the seemingly ever-present wind—but is playable for the resort player. The par-5 fourth hole stands out—lined with bunkers and a sentinel pine up by the green. The 18th hole is a great finish, playing up to the clubhouse with a huge porch, perfect for watching players come in.

From Golf Digest Architecture Editor emeritus Ron Whitten: At the same time in 1989 when Tom Doak was constructing the Heathland Course at Legends Golf Resort in Myrtle Beach, Pete Dye's younger son, P.B. Dye, was on site concocting another 18, the Moorland Course. (I'm pretty sure Doak routed Moorland at the same time he prepared his plans for Heathland, because early press releases stated Doak was do three 18s at the resort. He ended up building just one of the three.) Moorland, like Heathland, opened in 1990, and I played both soon thereafter. As much as I enjoyed Heathland, I detested Moorland, for a number of reasons. First and foremost, it was clearly a young P.B. trying to outdo his famous father, which resulted in outlandish golf holes. Where Pete would create a boldly sloped green or two on his designs, P.B. went further at Moorland and created several greens that repelled shots into deep hollows or deeper bunkers. From many of those, you were probably playing out sideways or backward. On some designs, Pete would tuck the green on a short par 4 behind a high mound. At Moorland, P.B. tried to top him by hiding most of his 18th green behind a towering 12-foot-tall bunker and making the green 63 yards long. While Pete would use railroad ties along the edge of a water hazard or as a basket trap, at Moorland P.B. stuck railroad ties everywhere. There were a gazillion of them lining all the lakes on the course. There were railroad ties framing a square bunker that had a tree growing out of it. P.B. even slapped some railroad ties down as a stretch of cart path. (What a jolting experience that was.) I wrote at the time, "Moorland has more railroad ties than common sense." I should note that many of these old railroad ties have now been removed, particularly the cart path ones. So I suppose I should like the course more now. But I don't. I mostly dislike it because of its position right next to Doak's fluid, flowing, beautifully shaped Heathland Course. P.B.'s shaping seems extraordinarily harsh and artificial in comparison, his constant abrupt changes all the more unappealing. The fairway contours are as symmetrical as a washboard and just as grating, with lots of semi-blind approach shots from the bottoms of swales. I remember one critic wrote that Moorland had, "Drama at every turn." I felt it was more like melodrama, with exaggerations left and right. I was later told that P.B. was simply providing what owner Larry Young wanted, a course with the highest slope rating in the land. (This was the late '80s, remember, when being the toughest was all the rage.) For a short time after Moorland opened, Young got his wish, a course rating of 76.8 and a slope rating of 140, highest in the nation at the time. But within a year, Moorland was surpassed by Papa Pete's Ocean Course at Kiawah Island. Its course rating was only 76.7, but it boasted a slope rating of 145. I'm glad the days of slope-boasting are over.

The Heathland course at the Legends Golf Resort opened in 1990 and was one of Tom Doak’s earliest designs. The acclaimed Doak—who also designed Pacific Dunes, Tara Iti and Streamsong Blue, among many others—designed Heathland in a Scottish links-style, with open, rolling terrain. Shot options abound at Heathland, with well-placed bunkering, patches of dense native grasses and a meandering creek all demanding thoughtful strategy and proper execution.

The Founders Club at Pawleys Island opened in 2008 and was built over the existing Sea Gull golf course, which dated back the mid-1960s. Instead of rough, the fairways are lined with sandy waste areas, making the course feel older than it is. The scenic layout has nice variety, with tree-lined doglegs moving in each direction and some elevation changes.

The Norman course at Barefoot Resort is highlighted by the seven holes that play along the Intracoastal Waterway. As is typical of many Greg Norman designs, the fairways run off into sandy waste areas, which present a unique challenge. The greens have subtle movement and often give the player the option of hitting a low, bump-and-run shot.

As evidenced by its name, the Parkland course at Legends Golf Resort is tree-lined and relatively flat, with subtly contoured fairways. There are recently renovated bunkers and plenty of native fescue lining many fairways.