The best courses in the United Kingdom and Ireland
North Berwick is ranked 11th in our new list of the World's 100 Greatest Courses outside the U.S. and eighth on our list of the Best in the U.K. and Ireland.
David Cannon
St. Andrews in Scotland has long been known as the official “Home of Golf.” But from a macro perspective, the game is larger and owes its roots and growth to the entire region of the United Kingdom and Ireland. The top five courses in our new World 100 Greatest Courses ranking (those outside the U.S.) are each from Scotland or Northern Ireland, including the No. 1 course, Royal County Down, and 53 of the top 100 are in Scotland, England, Wales, Northern Ireland or Ireland.
From a selfish perspective we’re excited to see idiosyncratic courses like Cruden Bay (Scotland), Prestwick (Scotland) and Carne (Ireland) score highly in the Best Courses of the U.K. and Ireland list (all three are also on the World 100 Greatest Courses ranking), sitting alongside venerable tournament courses like Muirfield, Royal Saint Georges, Royal Portrush, Portmarnock and others. Other courses that appear on our Best Courses in the U.K. and Ireland ranking like Queenwood, Silloth-on-Solway in England and Hogs Head in Ireland, scored highly with our international panel but didn’t have enough votes to qualify for to official World 100 ranking.
We’re also curious to see where several new courses that have opened in 2025 and 2026, including Old Petty at Cabot Highlands in Scotland (site of No. 34 Castle Stuart) and the New Course at Trump International Scotland, might land in the next ranking. And there are also other intriguing new course developments and important remodels in the region we’ll be keeping our eye on. The U.K. and Ireland continue to be where the heart and soul of the world of golf courses are located.
More from Golf Digest
We urge you to click through to each individual course page for bonus photography, drone footage and expanded reviews. Plus, you can now leave your own ratings on the courses you’ve played … to make your case why your favorite should be ranked higher.
Editor's Note: Our Best Courses in the U.K. and Ireland ranking is part of our world-rankings rollout. Check back over the next few weeks for more of our rankings of the best golf around the world.
1 / 10
Gary Lisbon
2 / 10
Gary Lisbon
3 / 10
Gary Lisbon
4 / 10
Gary Lisbon
5 / 10
Gary Lisbon
6 / 10
Gary Lisbon
7 / 10
Gary Lisbon
8 / 10
Gary Lisbon
9 / 10
Gary Lisbon
10 / 10
Gary Lisbon
Although golf architect Willie Park Jr. did fiddle with a few holes in 1913, Portstewart’s Strand Course is mostly the result of amateur architects. A.W. Gow, the greenkeeper from nearby Portrush, staked out the original course by 1910. Eighty years later, math teacher Des Giffin, who was Portstewart’s green chairman, and Michael Moss, the club secretary, added seven new holes, the second through eighth, in dramatic dunes. Mike Stachura, Golf Digest’s longtime Senior Editor of Equipment and savvy course design buff, describes its dramatic setting: “The first tee at the Strand is set on high dunes, like you’re surveying the kingdom, with beach and waves down to your right and all of County Antrim in front. It’s no wonder the television series Game of Thrones used the nearby land as scene-stealers.”
View Course
1 / 6
Courtesy of the club/Steve Carr
2 / 6
Courtesy of the club
3 / 6
Courtesy of the club/Steve Carr
4 / 6
Courtesy of the club/Steve Carr
5 / 6
Courtesy of the club/Steve Carr
6 / 6
Courtesy of the club/Steve Carr
The walk from the clubhouse to the first tee—through a gate out to the beach—sets the scene for one of the most serene settings in golf. Royal West Norfolk Golf Club, along the picturesque Brancaster coastline about 120 miles from London, is accessible via a road bridge that goes underwater during high tide, Royal West Norfolk Golf Club. The rising tide also affects play at the eighth and ninth holes; the club even links to a schedule of the timing of the tides, surely one of the only places in golf like it.
View Course
1 / 7
Jacob Sjöman/Courtesy of the club
2 / 7
Jacob Sjöman/Courtesy of the club
3 / 7
Jacob Sjöman/Courtesy of the club
4 / 7
Jacob Sjöman/Courtesy of the club
5 / 7
Jacob Sjöman/Courtesy of the club
6 / 7
Jacob Sjöman/Courtesy of the club
7 / 7
Jacob Sjöman/Courtesy of the club
A departure from other great European courses that are accessible to the public, Hogs Head Golf Club has successfully implemented an American-style of private-club exclusivity in one of the most golf rich parts of the world. Not far from Waterville, Hogs Head is owned by highly successful American corporate restructurers Tony Alvarez II and Bryan Marsal, who also own and operate Paako Ridge in New Mexico. Hogs Head boasts a Robert Trent Jones Jr. design that gets its name from its location on the magnificent Hogs Head peninsula (a marine bearing point marking the opening to the Ballinskelligs Bay from the North Atlantic). It’s a unique routing with five par 3s and five par 5s, including a Biarritz green on the sixth hole, believed to be the only par-5 Biarritz green in Europe. After a few years of allowing outside play like other European courses, Hogs Head now only allows four unaccompanied rounds a day—which must be sponsored by one of their members, known as Hogs.
View Course
1 / 4
David Cannon
2 / 4
David Cannon
3 / 4
David Cannon
4 / 4
David Cannon
Constructed just after the First World War by James Braid, with the assistance of then-budding designer C.K. Hutchison, and studiously preserved for the last hundred years, the King’s Course at Gleneagles Hotel has been overshadowed in recent times by the emergence of the resort’s Jack Nicklaus-designed PGA Centenary Course, which hosted the 2014 Ryder Cup. But to golf architecture fans, and Golf Digest panelists, the King’s is still king, (Braid, by the way, always considered King’s to be his best work.) The course meanders along novel topography, full of odd elephant-shaped mounds, humps and abrupt gulches, lined with pine, fir, heather and bracken. It’s a pleasant stroll but a difficult test of golf. Over the decades, various publications have listed various Gleneagles holes as Best in the World, including the long, uphill par-4 fourth, the dinky “Denty Den” 14th, now a drivable par 4 thanks to advanced technology, and the short par-4 17th with its wasp-waist of a fairway. But the hole everyone must see to believe is the par-3 fifth, “Het Girdle,” its green a frying pan turned upside down with bunkers gouged into its sides.
View Course
1 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
2 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
3 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
4 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
5 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
6 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
7 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
8 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
9 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht
10 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht
11 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
12 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
13 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
14 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
15 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
16 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
17 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
18 / 18
Laurence Lambrecht/Courtesy of the club
Adare Manor was one of the last that Robert Trent Jones’ firm designed (he passed away, at age 93, in 2000). The course was laid out over an attractive country estate in County Limerick with holes that play on either side of the River Maigue. The property has been the site of a luxury hotel and was purchased a decade ago by an Irish billionaire who initiated a significant reinvestment, highlighted by Tom Fazio’s remodel of the course. Fazio works primarily domestically and only the most premium of commissions have motivated him to take on international work. Adare Manor fits the bill. The entire course was stripped and redesigned, including the installation of SubAir systems under the greens. The course has the reputation for being the finest conditioned in Ireland with a number of engaging holes that should produce excitement during the 2027 Ryder Cup. These include the par-3 16th with a 90-yard deep green (it can play to a four- or five-club difference depending on the tee) and the par-5 18th where players will have to hit long approaches over the river if they want to get to the green in two.
View Course
1 / 7
The Drone Guys
2 / 7
The Drone Guys
3 / 7
Mel Maclaine
4 / 7
Mel Maclaine
5 / 7
Mel Maclaine
6 / 7
Courtesy of the club
7 / 7
David Cannon
45. Brittas Bay Golf Club (formerly The European Club)
Brittas Bay, Co. Wicklow, Ireland
One of the newest courses to be built on genuine Irish linksland, Brittas Bay Golf Club (formerly The European Club) is the lifetime accomplishment of Pat Ruddy, a golf writer from the 1960s and a golf architect from 1975 onward. He mortgaged his home to buy the land and spent five years designing and building it before it opened in 1992. Hard against the Irish Sea's Arklow Bay, Brittas Bay rolls across an untamed landscape with pot bunkers lined in railroad ties and two extra par-3 holes. The routing explores the diverse coastal dunes with returning nines, a marsh off the seventh tee and a burn looping in front of the 18th green with not a single blind shot anywhere. Ruddy, who tinkered with the course the way Donald Ross groomed Pinehurst #2, says he was once offered to sell it for 22 million pounds and passed. His sense to hold on was a savvy one: he got 30 million pounds when he did finally sell the club in 2025 at age 80. Kyle Phillips is currently performing restoration work at the rebranded Brittas Bay for the new owners.
View Course
1 / 5
Jason Livy
2 / 5
Jason Livy
3 / 5
Jason Livy
4 / 5
Jason Livy
5 / 5
Jason Livy
Herbert Fowler’s earliest design, done in 1904, is an out-and-back routing with rippling fairways, tight turf, cross bunkers, ground-hugging greens and fields of heather, all borrowed from coastal links. One writer has suggested Walton Heath ranks with Pine Valley as the best neophyte design in golf. It opens with a par 3, closes with five stern holes, including the par-5 16th, which is played as a long 4 for tournaments. Donald Steel altered holes and added length early in this century.
View Course
1 / 2
Clive Barber/Courtesy of the club
2 / 2
David Cannon
Western Gailes is perhaps the least-known grand old Scottish links. It’s located north of Royal Troon, just off the Firth of Clyde, squeezed on the east by active railroad tracks (like Troon), and thus its north-south routing over and between rolling sand dunes seems far tighter than its neighbors. Holes one through four, all par 4s, head north, then five through 13 march due south along the beach, with fairways mostly aimed southeast or southwest. The closing five play due north and sport some of the most intense bunkering on the 18. The club insists Fred Morris, its first greenkeeper, laid out the course, but we say Willie Fernie, who expanded Troon to 18 holes in the 1880s, did it.
View Course
1 / 2
2 / 2
Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images
One of the least known of Scotland's great links, Royal Aberdeen offers an old world/new world contrast to its neighbor to the north, Trump International Golf Links, 125 years its junior. The first nine runs north through dramatic dunesland along the shoreline, with the inward nine backtracking inland along softer terrain to the clubhouse. Though the final stretch might be a bit underwhelming visually, its holes are just as testing. The links saw a few touchups by Martin Hawtree prior to the 2011 Walker Cup, which mostly included the addition of bunkers and a new green on the 15th hole. Royal Aberdeen also hosted the 2014 Scottish Open, won by Justin Rose.
View Course
1 / 10
Gary Lisbon
2 / 10
Gary Lisbon
3 / 10
Gary Lisbon
4 / 10
Gary Lisbon
5 / 10
Gary Lisbon
6 / 10
Gary Lisbon
7 / 10
Gary Lisbon
8 / 10
Gary Lisbon
9 / 10
Gary Lisbon
10 / 10
Gary Lisbon
Resting just three miles from Royal St. George's (No. 18), the Royal Cinque Ports links rolls over gentle oceanfront sand dunes with some holes playing off a single prominent ridge that runs the length of the property. Cinque (pronounced "sank") Ports hosted two British Opens, in 1909 won by J.H. Taylor, and 1920 won by George Duncan. It was slated to host three others, in 1915, 1938 and 1949, but a combination of a World War and ocean storms forced officials to move the championship elsewhere each time. The present course is far different than Tom Dunn’s original design. Before the 1920 Open, James Braid rearranged the layout, adding several new holes, including all four of the present par 3s. In the process, he abandoned the beloved, blind par-3 fourth, called “Sandy Parlour,” but his replacement fourth, playing off a dune toward the ocean, has become beloved as well.
View Course
1 / 1
Courtesy of the club
One of the most remote of the great courses of England, Silloth-on-Solway is located on the Solway Firth, established in 1892 by the North British Railway Company as it was developing the town as a port. Prominent amateur golfers of the time, Willie Park Jr. and Willie Fernie, consulted on the course’s layout—and right before World War II, the club hired Dr. Alister Mackenzie to make alterations. A tight budget only saw the club utilize a few of his proposals, but Silloth-on-Solway, with its blind shots and brilliant strategic design, remains one of the true hidden gems among the best United Kingdom courses.
View Course
1 / 1
Courtesy of the club
David McLay Kidd, best known for his work in creating the first course at Bandon Dunes, designed Queenwood in the early 2000s. The ultra-exclusive private club is situated about 30 miles outside central London. The course is a tumbling parkland layout with fescue-lipped bunkers and extensive heather. Both were intentional by Kidd, who wanted Queenwood to resemble a traditional heathland layout similar to nearby Sunningdale and Walton Heath.
View Course
1 / 4
Courtesy of the club
2 / 4
3 / 4
4 / 4
In the 1980s, the golf potential of this 220-acre swollen thumb of land poking into the Atlantic had many course architects excited. The job went to Ron Kirby, one-time design partner of Gary Player and former associate of Dick Wilson, Robert Trent Jones, and later, Jack Nicklaus. He consulted with Irish legends Paddy Merrigan, Eddie Hackett, Joe Carr and Liam Higgins. Kirby lived on the site for two years, determined to find an ideal routing that would maximize the rocky ocean cliffs that encircle the peninsula. It opened in 1996 with nine holes along ledges 300 feet above the surf. Kirby later returned to add a second nine, relocating the par-3 13th to cling along an ocean slope.
View Course
1 / 1
Courtesy of the club
St. Enodoc’s placed in our inaugural World’s 100 Greatest Courses ranking in 2014, when it came in at No. 99, then disappeared before a return in 2022. The layout, located in Cornwall in the extreme southwest corner of England, traverses some of the most ideal natural golf land in the UK, bumping through sand hills on the banks of the River Carmel estuary. The routing takes full advantage of the land, turning, twisting and crossing as it works out to far fields, having too much fun to be in any hurry home. One of the world’s most famous hazards is located here, the Himalaya bunker on the short, blind par-4 sixth, a massive crater carved into a dune that was once over 70-feet high, though less so now due to wind and erosion.
View Course
1 / 1
Jon Cavalier/@LinksGems
A great myth is that Rye hasn't changed in a century. In truth, during World War II the Royal Army built pillboxes and buried fuel storage tanks on the existing course. Architect Guy Campbell reclaimed the course in 1946, using a bulldozer to create new holes. To play such seemingly natural holes as the par-3 seventh on Rye's rolling links today, you'd never suspect it. Rye has long been considered the toughest par 68 on earth. This ranking confirms that.
View Course
More from Golf Digest
1 / 3
Courtesy of Ganton Golf Club
2 / 3
Courtesy of Ganton Golf Club
3 / 3
Courtesy of Ganton Golf Club
Not everyone has been enamored with Ganton, the great Harry Vardon's home club. Back in 1949, American Ryder Cupper Jimmy Demaret described the course, still recovering from WWII, as "a sort of Pennsylvania Turnpike with trees." It's matured greatly since then. Situated on a pocket of sand in an otherwise inland landscape of clay and rock, Ganton plays firm and fast with holes hemmed in by blooming gorse. Among the course's difficult hazards include more than 110 vertical-edged bunkers, many deep enough to require wooden steps. Bernard Darwin famously said golfers playing Ganton suffer either sandy or prickly disaster.
View Course
1 / 1
Photo by Stephen Szurlej
Once he completed Kingsbarns (No. 22), owner Mark Parsinen found another ideal venue farther north on the shores of the Moray Firth. Golf architect Gil Hanse and partner Jim Wagner hand-built Castle Stuart, with Parsinen, who passed away in 2019, involved in every step of the design. Each nine opens with holes framed by shore's edge on one side and a high bluff on the other. Then each nine moves to a mezzanine level where the views are spectacular and several "infinity greens" seem perched on cliffs directly over the sea. Castle Stuart, now part of the Cabot Highlands property, soon to be joined by a Tom Doak-designed course, has hosted several Scottish Opens. Parsinen's dream was to host The Open.
View Course
1 / 2
2 / 2
Courtesy of the club
Undisturbed mountainous dunes in the tiny town of Belmullet in County Mayo, a five-hour drive from Dublin, created a stunning pallet for Eddie Hackett to design what was once one of golf’s best hidden gems. Hackett employed local farmers with shovels and rakes to ensure the dunes wouldn’t be disturbed, and eight years later, the first nine holes opened. A year later, a second nine was added. Jim Engh, an American architect, discovered Carne several years after that and became a member. He routed nine new holes through the site’s enormous unused dunes, which Irish designer Ally McIntosh completed in 2020 with his own alterations. These new holes combine with the original Hackett holes to make the Wild Atlantic Dunes 18, a course so surreal it’s no longer a hidden gem but a destination of its own.
View Course
1 / 1
Mark Alexander
We should rejoice in the fact that the World’s 100 Greatest has room for at least one museum piece of golf architecture—an authentic relic from a time when golfers played cross-country without benefit of crisply mown turf and inviting targets. The third hole demands a forced carry over the notorious Cardinal bunker. There's a blind tee shot over a ridge dubbed the Himalayas into par-3 fifth green, a blind approach shot down an escarpment to the 15th green and another blind approach over dunes known as The Alps to reach green on the par-4 17th. Prestwick hosted 24 Open Championships but none since 1925. That doesn't matter. It's an anachronistic design worth preserving.
View Course
1 / 1
Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images
Hoylake is a layout of stark contrasts—a series of splendid natural holes within coastal sand dunes (holes attributed to a 1930s H.S. Colt remodeling), with a less scenic start and finish inland on dead flat land. Still, the first hole, a stern dogleg-right around an internal out-of-bounds, is considered one of the most testing opening holes in links golf. Almost 20 years ago, our architecture editor emeritus Ron Whitten suggested that Royal Liverpool, which hadn't seen an Open since 1967, was past its prime as a championship venue. It has hosted three Opens since then, including two won by a pair of the modern era’s greatest players, Tiger Woods in 2006 and Rory McIlroy in 2014. It has had an uncanny knack for crowning the game’s best player of any given time, though we’re not yet sure of what to make of Brian Harman’s six-stroke victory in 2023.
View Course
1 / 1
Clyde Johnson
It’s always been known that the dunes to the south of the original Rosapenna resort on Ireland’s northwest coast in County Donegal were some of the country’s most profound linksland, though the two original courses that had occupied them since the 1990s with slender, simple fairways running mostly in parallel directions never fulfilled that promise. It wasn’t until Tom Doak began reworking the land in 2019—eliminating most of the holes, maintaining the corridors of others and finding new territories of dunes and sand ridges to explore within the site’s 300 acres along Sheephaven Bay—that the land’s true potential was realized. Opened in 2021, the routing of each nine moves out through buffered channels toward the shore, utilizing broad, bouncy fairways that camber into greens that are either set in hollows or elevated on wind-battered bluffs. In buoyancy, variety and seaside topography, St. Patrick’s rivals the best of what Irish golf has to offer.
View Course
1 / 6
Courtesy of the club
2 / 6
Courtesy of the club
3 / 6
David Cannon/Getty Images
4 / 6
David Cannon/Getty Images
5 / 6
David Cannon/Getty Images
6 / 6
David Cannon/Getty Images
This par-73 layout is named for obscure architect S.V. Hotchkin, who purchased the club in the early 1920s and remodeled the course, which consisted of a 1905 nine by Harry Vardon and a 1912 nine by H.S. Colt. Hotchkin tinkered with the lovely, ground-hugging heathland layout until his death in 1953, producing what some call the most ferocious bunkers in Great Britain. Some are hidden from view, others are steep and deep and some are ringed with heather. American architect Tom Doak has recently been involved with restoration work.
View Course
1 / 1
Jon Cavalier/@LinksGems
In his classic 1925 book, The Links, Robert Hunter raved about H.S. Colt's "bold hazards, well designed" at St. George's Hill. And while, nearly 100 years later, some are now tamer, with less ragged, jagged edges, their placements are still ideal. Towering fir trees and patches of heather add additional challenge and charm to what many consider to be Colt's finest heathland design, more stirring even than Swinley Forest. St. George's Hill's main 18, now the Blue & Red 9s, opened in 1913 as one of the first residential golf projects in the world.
View Course
1 / 2
Courtesy of the club
2 / 2
Waterville has some superb dunes holes, next to the Ballinskelligs Bay, and several laid out in former potato fields. Original owner John Mulcahy and 1947 Masters champion Claude Harmon (Butch's dad) collaborated with Irish golf architect Eddie Hackett on the early 1970s design. A decade ago, Tom Fazio added the new par-3 sixth and par-4 seventh holes and altered 13 others, building new tees, greens and much-needed humps and bumps to the flattish front nine. The collection of par 3s is as strong as any in Ireland, highlighted by the “Mass” hole across a deep basin to a naked green and the 17th, “Mulcahy’s Peak,” playing toward a horizon along the bay.
View Course
1 / 11
Gary Lisbon
2 / 11
Gary Lisbon
3 / 11
Gary Lisbon
4 / 11
Gary Lisbon
5 / 11
Gary Lisbon
6 / 11
Gary Lisbon
7 / 11
Gary Lisbon
8 / 11
Gary Lisbon
9 / 11
Gary Lisbon
10 / 11
Gary Lisbon
11 / 11
Gary Lisbon
Jay Morrish and Tom Weiskopf were the first American architects to work in Scotland, not on the coast but west of Glasgow on the shore of Loch Lomond. The design is mostly the work of Weiskopf, who lived on site supervising construction while Morrish recovered from a heart attack at home. Opened in 1992, it's a graceful layout, the third, sixth, seventh and 18th holes touching the shoreline, others winding through inland hazards of oaks, sculptured bunkers, streams, marsh and a pond. There are a pair of reachable par 4s, the ninth and the 14th, the latter a favorite of Weiskopf's, who passed away in 2022.
View Course
1 / 8
David Cannon
2 / 8
David Cannon
3 / 8
David Cannon
4 / 8
David Cannon
5 / 8
David Cannon
6 / 8
David Cannon
7 / 8
David Cannon
8 / 8
David Cannon
The first bones of Turnberry’s King Robert the Bruce were laid out by Willie Fernie, the professional responsible for expanding Royal Troon to 18 holes. These and the holes from the championship Ailsa course were lost during the world wars when the land was converted to an air base but returned afterward in the form of the short Arran Course. In 2001, Donald Steel remade them once again, rebranded the Kintyre Course, with a layout that included the addition of several new holes along the property’s northwestern cliffs. In 2016, Martin Ebert, who also remodeled the Ailsa, revamped the course once more, making alterations to the interior of the site and reversing the direction and orientation of the seaside holes to enhance the dramatic vistas. The new name is in reference to the Scottish king who built Turnberry Castle that once stood where the famous lighthouse now does. The result is the debut of Turnberry’s second course on our World’s 100 Greatest ranking.
View Course
1 / 2
David Cannon
2 / 2
Stephen Szurlej
To reach Machrihanish, Old Tom Morris needed a train, a steamboat and a long carriage ride. Visitors today have to resort to much the same mode, so remote is Machrihanish, on the southern end of Scotland's Kintyre Peninsula. It's a journey rewarded, from one of the game’s greatest opening tee shots, which the bold will carry over a beach and Atlantic tide on the left, to the remainder of the links in some of the most rugged dunes known to links golf.
View Course
1 / 2
Kevin Murray
2 / 2
Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images
A true links on rolling ground with soft rather than dramatic dunes, Portmarnock, on a spit of land in the Irish Sea north of Dublin, is known for its routing, which hasn't been altered in over a hundred years and was revolutionary at the time for constantly changing wind direction with every shot. The links is also known for its fairness, as nearly every feature is plainly in view from tee to green, which makes its maze of bunkers and subtle greens all the more testing.
View Course
1 / 1
Courtesy of the club
Considered a seaside venue but not a true links, Royal Porthcawl, situated on the south coast of Wales, doesn't have returning nines, but it's not an out-and-back routing either. Instead, the front nine moves in a clockwise crescent-shaped manner, with the back nine running counterclockwise inside the crescent. Only the first three holes play adjacent to Bristol Channel, but there are ocean views and ocean winds on all the inland holes too, which are on higher ground. The 2017 Senior Open was contested at Royal Porthcawl, with Bernhard Langer winning a record 10th senior major, and Alex Cejka won the 2023 Senior Open here.
View Course
1 / 1
Jon Cavalier/@LinksGems
H.S. Colt, who was the club's secretary from 1901 to 1913, laid out the New Course in 1923, well after he'd established his reputation as a grand golf architect. It's considered by most to be tougher than No. 15 Sunningdale Old, mainly because Colt's greens are smaller, with subtle contours that nudge balls toward bunkers hard along the collars. It's a toss-up as to which course is prettier. Both have fields of heather, gorse, Scotch broom and clusters of pine, oak and silver birch.
View Course
More from Golf Digest
1 / 2
Courtesy of the club
2 / 2
Courtesy of the club
Sitting along the southern cliffs of the Island of Jura, which sits across from the Island of Islay with gems such as Machrihanish Golf Club and Machrihanish Dunes, Ardfin Estate has risen rapidly among Best in Scotland and international rankings. Australian hedgefund trader Wayne Coffey purchased the historic country estate sitting on 1,000-plus acres in 2010 and hired his countryman and former Greg Norman associate Bob Harrison, who carved out the routing along the jaw-dropping terrain across six years. The new course had a soft opening in late Summer 2019 then was delayed due to COVID-19 travel restrictions. Now that it’s opened, the estate has made full-day golf experiences available for over $1,500 a day, including luxury accommodations at the Quads, a former agricultural building. Though it’s unclear whether the estate will remain available to the public, any well-heeled travelers should put Ardfin Estate on their radar while it’s within reach.
View Course
1 / 1
Courtesy of the club
Perhaps the least dramatic-looking links in The Open rota, mainly because it's surrounded by houses and a rail line, with the seacoast hundreds of yards distant and never in sight. Lytham boasts more than 200 bunkers, most built a century ago, when the club was heralded as a pioneer of natural bunkering. Its par-3 first hole is unusual, while its finish, six straight par 4s, is a terrific challenge that was, in 2011, the downfall of Adam Scott and a triumph for Ernie Els. The club boasts one of the great rosters of champions including Bobby Jones, Bobby Locke, Peter Thomson, Gary Player and Seve Ballesteros (twice).
View Course
1 / 1
Dom Furore
The biggest mover in this year’s ranking, this Martin Hawtree design is set in sand dunes that are as dramatic as there is in golf, better than those at No. 19 Royal Birkdale and No. 20 Royal St. George's. Some dunes reach 100 feet above fairways. All are covered in deep marram grasses. Fairways pitch and tumble, often posing downhill lies to uphill targets. Every bunker is at least knee deep, encircled with stacked-sod faces. Greens are perched and edged by deep hollows. It’s a setting as grand as it gets, though some critics label it the most “American” of any links in the ranking for the elevated tees and “framing” of the greens and fairways.
View Course
1 / 2
David Alexander/Getty Images
2 / 2
Jon Cavalier
Due west of Sunningdale in London's heathland is Swinley Forest, which H.S. Colt described as the "least bad course" he ever designed. Much of its reputation is built around its five par 3s, each with its own personality and challenge. Colt supposedly located them first, then built around them, using an ideal balance of short and long par 4s on each nine. The par 3s are indeed outstanding; the 17th looks like it might have been the role model for A.W. Tillinghast's 10th at Winged Foot's West course.
View Course
1 / 7
David Cannon/R&A
2 / 7
Carlos Amoedo
3 / 7
David Cannon/R&A
4 / 7
David Cannon/R&A
5 / 7
David Cannon/R&A
6 / 7
David Cannon/R&A
7 / 7
Courtesy of the club
Looks are deceiving at Royal Troon. The links appear straightforward, almost docile, until the wind blows. Then, if it’s downwind out to the ninth hole, as it usually is, the homeward nine becomes a long march into a stiff breeze, if not an ocean gale. Troon dates from 1878 and was given its Royal title 100 years later. Few know its famed 123-yard 8th, the Postage Stamp, the shortest in British Open golf, was originally a blind par 3—the present green wasn't built until 1910. In 2016, Royal Troon was the site of one of the most dramatic duels in Open history, with Henrik Stenson prevailing over Phil Mickelson to win his first major title. Xander Schauffele won by two strokes when the Open returned in 2024, his second major win that season (the PGA Championship at Valhalla).
View Course
1 / 2
Mark Alexander
2 / 2
Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images
Cruden Bay is among the elite, marvelous Scottish links, stretched along the base of a high bluff with tall dunes to the immediate east blocking views of the North Sea shoreline. Within the course, holes lie among what have been described as "stumpy dunes." They may well be, compared to those at nearby Trump International, but the routing is excellent, looping north then south, crisscrossing at the eighth and 16th. There are many blind shots, including consecutive ones to hidden punchbowl greens on the par-4 14th and par-3 15th.
View Course
1 / 1
Courtesy of the club
Just down the coastline from the links at St. Andrews, Kingsbarns looks absolutely natural in its links setting. It’s a tribute to owner Art Dunkley and architect Kyle Phillips and Mark Parsinen (all Californians) who are responsible for what once was a lifeless farm field transformed into a magnificent course that fools even the most discerning eye. The routing is ingenious, crescent-shape along the Fife coast, with holes on three separate levels (130 feet of elevation change in all) to provide ocean views from every fairway. Six holes play right on the shoreline, and every hole offers genuine alternate angles of attack.
View Course
1 / 1
Photo by Stephen Szurlej
Considered by some to be the St. Andrews of Ireland, the splendid links at Lahinch reflects evolution in golf architecture. After Alister MacKenzie remodeled it in the 1920s, only a few of Old Tom Morris' original holes, like the Klondyke par-5 fourth, and Dell par-3 fifth, both with hidden greens, remained. In the 1980s, Donald Steel altered some of MacKenzie's holes and in the 2000s Martin Hawtree rebuilt everything and added four new holes. One classic MacKenzie par 3, the old 13th, is now a bye hole.
View Course
1 / 2
A view looking back to the tee of the par-3 sixth hole at Royal St. George's
David Cannon
2 / 2
Photo by Stephen Szurlej
Royal St. George's, in dunes along the English Channel, is what writer Adam Lawrence calls the ideal mix of championship golf and gentle quirks. Its quirks include a duo of massive bunkers that howl at tee shots on the par-5 fourth. Once as tall as a six-story building, they've eroded over the years, and have been stabilized the past 20 years by the addition of 93 railroad ties along their top edges. An Open Championship venue since 1894, Royal St. George's is the most unpredictable in the rota, often kicking balls in mysterious directions and alternating between legendary champions like J.H. Taylor, Harry Vardon, Walter Hagen and Bobby Locke and surprise victors like Reg Whitcombe, Bill Rogers and Ben Curtis. Collin Morikawa won his second major championship here in 2021.
View Course
1 / 1
Photo by Stephen Szurlej
Site of Jordan Spieth's remarkable Open victory in 2017 where he went on a birdie-eagle-birdie-birdie tear on holes 14-17 in the final round, Royal Birkdale has also been the venue for past Women's British Opens, Ryder Cups, Walker and Curtis Cups. Three generations of the Hawtree design firm, oldest in the world, are responsible for Royal Birkdale. Patriarch Frederic G. did the present design, with its surprisingly flat fairways and docile greens between towering dunes, in 1931. Thirty years later, son Fred W. remodeled it, adding the now-classic par-3 12th. Forty years after that, grandson Martin revised the course for its tenth Open Championship, the tournament Spieth won, but now the curatorship of the course has been turned over to Tom Mackenzie of the firm Mackenzie & Ebert, who remodeled it for the 2026 Open. That included building new tee clusters, altering bunkers, completely remodeling the short par-5 fifth and adding a new, long par 3, the 15th, to replace the old par-3 14th that was taken out of play and converted to a short game practice area.
View Course
1 / 1
Stephen Szurlej
Perhaps the homeliest, certainly the longest and toughest of Open venues, Carnoustie is a no-holds-barred layout intended to test the best. James Braid is usually credited with the present design, but it was green chairman James Wright who in 1931 created the stirring last three holes, with 17 and 18 harassed by twisting, turning Barry Burn. In the 1968 Open, Jack Nicklaus complained that a knob in the middle of the ninth fairway kicked his drives into the rough. When he returned for the 1975 Open, he found it had been converted to a pot bunker.
View Course
1 / 1
Jon Cavalier
A strong case can be made that Sunningdale’s Old Course was the first great inland design, and the course that was most successful in emulating the naturalness and strategies inherent in links courses when Willie Park Jr. built it in 1901. Chopped from a pine forest but routed like a links, with the ninth at the far end of the property, it plays like a links, too, for there's a sand base beneath the turf. The Old has big greens, as Park put a premium on approach putting, and artful bunkers, with both angled cross-bunkers and necklaces of sand hampering direct routes to some greens. Harry Colt’s remodel two decades later (he was Sunningdale's first club secretary) brought the Old into the new modern era and is responsible for the playability and ranking the course deserves today. To American visitors, the look of Sunningdale brings to mind Pine Valley or Pinehurst.
View Course
1 / 3
2 / 3
David Cannon
3 / 3
David Cannon/Getty Images
North Berwick must be played with good humor. To do otherwise is to not properly appreciate its outrageous topography (some terrain is like an elephant cemetery) and outlandish holes, like the sunken 13th green beyond a stone wall, the renowned Redan par-3 15th, blind from the tee, and the long, narrow 16th green with a gulch separating front and back plateaus, surely the model for the infamous Biarritz green, although purists say otherwise. The out-and-back routing that begins and ends in town is reminiscent of St. Andrews, and the four par 3s, all vastly different, comprise one of the best sets in the game of golf.
View Course
1 / 1
Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images
Ballybunion has always been great, but it wasn't until they relocated the clubhouse in 1971 to the southern end that it became thrilling. Tom Watson’s effusive praise for the course after his first visit in 1981 also helped put the relatively unknown Ballybunion on everyone’s mind. The clubhouse move turned the old finish of anticlimactic back-to-back par 5s into the fourth and fifth holes and shifted the new closing holes to ones in spectacular dunes just north of the intersection of the Shannon River and the Atlantic Ocean. By then an honorary member, Watson suggested modest design changes in the 1990s, and later Martin Hawtree added new tees atop dunes on several holes.
View Course
1 / 1
Courtesy of Trump Turnberry
A legendary links ravaged by World War II, architect Philip Mackenzie Ross re-established it to its present quality, tearing away the wartime concrete landing strips to create a dramatic back nine and building a set of varied greens, some receptive, other not so much. After Donald Trump purchased the course, Martin Ebert of the firm of Mackenzie & Ebert made notable changes, creating new par 3s at Nos. 6 and 11, converting the old par-4 ninth into an ocean-edge par 3, and turning the fifth, 10th and 14th into par 5s and the 17th into a long par 4. New tees on 18 eliminate its old dogleg tee shot. To complete the new look, Ebert replaced revetted bunkers with ragged-edged ones.
View Course
1 / 2
Mark Alexander
2 / 2
David Cannon/Getty Images
Portrush is still the only Irish course to host The Open. The Old Tom Morris design, made what it is today by H.S. Colt in the 1930s, was the Open site back in 1951. It was revived as a rota course for the 2019 Open, won by Irishman Shane Lowry, and so popular were the links it only had to wait six years for a return performance, when Scottie Scheffler won the third leg of his career Grand Slam. In preparation for the 2019 event, architect Martin Ebert added new seventh and eighth holes, fashioned from land on the club's Valley Course, to replace its weak 17th and 18th holes. That means the notorious Calamity Hole, an uphill 210-yard par 3, is now the 16th instead of the 14th, and the old dogleg-right par-4 16th is the closing hole, with a new back tee. Ebert retained most of Colt's greens, considered one of the best set of putting surfaces in the world, but remodeled others such as at the par-4 10th that were built after Colt left, better working them into the contours of the surrounding dunes.
View Course
1 / 3
J.D. Cuban
2 / 3
Kevin Markham
3 / 3
Herbert Warren Wind called it the most natural course in the world. Tom Watson called it the most fun he'd had playing golf. Donald Ross called it his home, having been born in the village and taught the game on the links. Tucked in an arc of dunes along the North Sea shoreline, Dornoch's greens, some by Old Tom Morris, others by John Sutherland or 1920 Open champion George Duncan, sit mostly on plateaus and don't really favor bounce-and-run golf. That's the challenge: hitting those greens in a Dornoch wind.
View Course
1 / 1
Photo by Stephen Szurlej
Muirfield is universally admired as a low-key, straightforward links with fairways seemingly containing a million traffic bumps. Except for a blind tee shot on the 11th, every shot is visible and well-defined. Greens are the correct size to fit the expected iron of approach. The routing changes direction on every hole to pose different wind conditions. The front runs clockwise, the back counterclockwise, but history mistakenly credits Old Tom Morris with Muirfield's returning nines. That was the result of H.S. Colt's 1925 redesign.
View Course
1 / 16
(Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images)
2 / 16
The fourth green at the Old Course.
Dom Furore
3 / 16
4 / 16
Dom Furore
5 / 16
David Cannon
6 / 16
7 / 16
David Cannon
8 / 16
David Cannon
9 / 16
David Cannon
10 / 16
AdShooter
11 / 16
Dom Furore
12 / 16
Tom Shaw/R&A
13 / 16
Dom Furore
14 / 16
David Cannon
15 / 16
David Cannon
16 / 16
David Cannon
The Old Course at St. Andrews is ground zero for all golf architecture. Every course designed since has either been in response to one or more of its features, or in reaction against it. Architects either favor the Old Course's blind shots or detest them, either embrace St. Andrews' enormous greens or consider them a waste of turf. Latest polarizing topic: design changes ahead of the 2015, 2022 and 2027 Opens—adding tees in awkward locations, shifting and restructuring historic bunkers—which many consider blasphemy. The angst is justifiably directed at the changes that compromise the integrity of golf’s greatest blueprint, but perhaps even more so at the sport’s governing bodies that failed to adequately regulate equipment that results in the gross distance gains threatening to make St. Andrews obsolete. After Zach Johnson's dramatic overtime victory in 2015, however, few mentioned the alterations, and the duel of the Cam’s in 2022, with Smith’s Sunday 64 nosing out Young’s 65, both surging ahead of overnight leader Rory McIlroy, put the focus on the race and not the architecture. It remains to be seen how much of a fight the Old Course can put up going forward in the absence of a stern 20 mph wind, but notwithstanding the games of a few thousand global players it remains the world’s most influential and fascinating merger of nature and architecture.
View Course
1 / 1
Nick Wall
On a clear spring day, with Dundrum Bay to the east, the Mountains of Mourne to the south and gorse-covered dunes in golden bloom, there is no lovelier place in golf. The design is attributed to Old Tom Morris but was refined by half a dozen architects in the past 120 years, most recently by Donald Steel. Though the greens are surprisingly flat, as if to compensate for the rugged terrain and numerous blind shots, bunkers are a definite highlight, most with arched eyebrows of dense marram grasses and impenetrable clumps of heather.
View Course
More from Golf Digest
• • •
Explore our brand-new course reviews experience with individual course pages for bonus photography, drone footage and expanded reviews of top international courses and all 17,000-plus courses in the United States. Post your own ratings for courses you’ve played … and tell us where it should be ranked.