The best golf courses in Scotland

Archerfield Links’ Fidra course is located in the golf-rich area of North Berwick, right between Muirfield and North Berwick. The Fidra course is a unique mix of Scottish golf among the pines and the traditional fast-running links one would expect. The Fidra course opened in 2004, right before the neighboring Renaissance Club, but it fits in among its other, more long-established neighbors.

The first six holes at Ladybank were designed by Old Tom Morris in 1879. The layout, now 18 holes, plays inland along heathland terrain, and unlike many of the nearby links courses, Ladybank features generally flat fairways and small greens. Ladybank has hosted final qualifying for the Open Championship ahead of past Opens at St. Andrews, most recently in 2010.

Machrihanish Dunes was built, with numerous conservation restrictions, on what the British call a Site of Special Scientific Interest. The design meant a lot to Scotsman David McLay Kidd, who grew up playing Machrihanish Golf Club, adjacent to this new links. The maintenance crew doesn't use fertilizer, and there's no irrigation system. Only a tiny fraction of the land was disturbed during construction.

One of two resort-style courses at the Fairmont St. Andrews, acquired by American Donald Panoz, the Torrance course has hosted Open Championship qualifying and the Scottish Championship on the DP World Tour. The Torrance course, designed by 21-time DP World Tour winner Sam Torrance, was reconfigured ahead of the 2010 Open and lost its previous 17th and 18th holes to its sister Kittocks course, taking the third and fourth from the Devlin course.

The Castle course at St. Andrews is the newest addition to the Home of Golf, having opened in 2008 after the St. Andrews Trust acquired land closeby to its Torrance and Devlin courses. David McLay Kidd was tasked with designing a new course on this sacred land along a rugged cliff-top with spectacular views over St. Andrews. McLay Kidd and his team shaped this land to appear like the rolling dunescapes have always draped this land, though it was mostly featureless and flat before the Castle course was created.

Set on a breathtaking peninsula with the Dornoch Firth to the south and the River and Loch Evelix to the north, Carnegie Links offers over 6,800 yards of championship-level golf. Skibo Castle, a lavish private golf club and sporting retreat near Dornoch was once part of the private club empire of Peter de Savary and probably best known for hosting Madonna's 2000 wedding to film director Guy Ritchie. The Carnegie Links is closeby to Royal Dornoch and Castle Stuart and within an hour of the golf-rich area of Inverness.

Though the Crail Golfing Society is one of the oldest clubs in the world, it boasts a course by one of golf’s greatest modern architects. Gil Hanse, before his prolific record of restoring the best, classic layouts around the world, had just started his own design firm and was given a chance to design one of his first solo designs with the Craighead course at Crail Golfing Society. The Craighead course joins the club’s Balcomie Links course, which was laid out by Old Tom Morris in the 1890s—which makes this destination 12 miles east of St. Andrews quite unique among the offerings in Scotland.

Jack Nicklaus’ only course in Scotland wouldn’t be confused for a classic links, with typical forced carries and big, bold risk-reward decisions asked of players, but it does add nice variety from the other more historic Gleneagles layouts. But the PGA Centenary course certainly won over European golf fans as the Nicklaus design has hosted two team victories over the Americans in recent years—a whopping European victory over the Americans in the 2014 Ryder Cup and a more tightly contested Solheim Cup in 2019. The Nicklaus design utilizes the rolling hills of Perthshire and a number of water features to deliver a stern test that’s also enjoyable to play.

To the unknowing, The Machrie looks as timeless as any Scottish links. Sheep often wander onto the fairways, and most of the holes are sequestered by the property’s rolling dunes and high fescue grasses. The par-72, 6,782-yard layout has many memorable holes, including a fantastic stretch from the sixth to the ninth. The 404-yard sixth has a green surrounded by dunes covered in fescue on three sides. On a windy day it looks like a gallery of wispy ghosts have come to watch you putt.

If the wind is behind you, the 303-yard seventh, which runs parallel along a pristine beach, is drivable for many. The par-4 eighth requires an approach over a steep drop in the fairway. And the 143-yard ninth is one of the most scenic par 3s in Scotland, with an elevated tee box overlooking a bay known as Loch Indaal. Perhaps the most interesting one-two punch on the course is the 12th and 13th. The first is a 509-yard par 5 easily reachable in two if it’s playing downwind. But you better make birdie, because the next hole is a 456-yard par 4 into the wind that can be unreachable without two of your healthiest blasts. Although the 526-yard 18th is a great finishing hole—straightforward, fair, and getable even in a headwind—the 17th might be the back nine’s most interesting. Head golf professional David Foley will tell you not to hit driver on the blind, dogleg right hole that finishes with another green surrounded by high dunes. But make a gentlemen’s agreement now: Everyone must hit driver on that hole. Then let the search begin. --Ron Kaspriske, senior editor. Read his full feature on the Isle of Islay and The Machrie here.

Regularly praised as one of the United Kingdom’s best inland courses, Blairgowrie’s Rosemount started as nine holes then completed as 18 holes by Dr. Alister MacKenzie, though the course’s opening was delayed thanks to World War I. Scotsman James Braid finished up the work before it opened, with MacKenzie’s work best seen at the club’s nine-hole Wee course, a charming 2,273-yard layout with four par 3s and two par 4s totaling less than 300 yards. The Rosemount course hosted a European Tour event in the 1970s won by Greg Norman, and though it has slipped from the top-15 or top-20 rankings in Scotland in the past, remains a must-see venue in Perthshire.

Back up north, across St. Andrews Bay and two miles west of Carnoustie, Panmure Links is an Old Tom Morris design worth seeking out. Ben Hogan famously spent two weeks at Panmure before the 1953 Open Championship at Carnoustie, where he went on to win his only Claret Jug. During Hogan's stay, he recommended to the club that a bunker be added in front of the sixth green. The club has named the 414-yard par 4 hole “Hogan” in honor of the legend. The course has also hosted Open Championship Final Qualifying a number of times.

Among a few gems like Crail and Leven in the east corner of Fife, Elie is a favorite of anyone lucky enough to discover it. Five-time Open champion Peter Thomson called Elie “the most enjoyable course I know,” and at just over 6,200 yards from the back tees, the James Braid layout is perfect for every level of player. One of the fun quirks of playing Elie is being called up by the starter after he has peered through the periscope, donated in the 1960s from the HMS Excalibur to give the starter a better view over the hill to confirm the group ahead is out of range for the next group to play away. The greens can be fiery and well-placed bunkers don’t make this former Open-qualifying course a pushover, and the views of the Fife countryside and the Firth of Forth add to the enjoyment of this historic links.

This is one of six courses arranged like canned sardines on the sandy spit of sacred golf ground known as the St. Andrews Links. (The others, in order of interest, are the Old, the New, the Eden, the Strathtyrum and the Balgove.) We were all prepared to be disappointed—especially as we drove past the first tee of the Old Course, which we were scheduled to play two days later—but ended up very pleasantly surprised. Two of our caddies claimed that the 15th, a deviously trashable short par 4, is the best golf hole in all of St. Andrews. --David Owen, Golf Digest contributing writer

It might be a surprise at first glance to find a par-68 course measuring less than 6,000 yards so high up on our Best Courses in Scotland list. But for those fortunate to have played the 1917 James Braid design, you get it. The Queen’s course at Gleneagles would be near the top of any ‘most fun’ ranking, with its distinctive, bold putting surfaces built into some rolling topography. It’s great to see the short course get recognition amongst some of the best courses in the world.

In golf-rich East Lothian, an American family, the Sarvadis, leased land featuring 300 acres of pine trees planted by Britain’s Forestry Commission after World War II and hired Tom Doak to design a links-style course. Though over 8,000 tons of wood was cleared from the site, Doak kept a number of trees on the site until a few years after the course’s opening when more trees were cleared. The Renaissance Club traded some of its land that neighbors Muirfield with the historic club, which Muirfield used to lengthen its ninth hole ahead of the 2013 Open Championship. Renaissance Club acquired some extra dunesland that Doak and his team incorporated into the current layout on its holes nine through 11 (holes 12 through 14). The land offers beautiful views of the Firth of Fourth, and the tumbling land provides a good links-like test ahead of The Open Championship each year.

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.

About 20 minutes south of St. Andrews, on the south coast of the Fife peninsula overlooking the Firth of Forth, Dumbarnie Links is one of the newest additions to links golf in the British Isles—opening in 2020. Fun is the name of the game: Twelve sets of tee boxes allow the course to be stretched to 7,600 yards, or played with a variety of setups, including up to three drivable par 4s, depending on the conditions.

Gullane Golf Club is home to three courses, two of which are must-plays. Gullane No. 1 is a Final Qualifying site for the Open and has hosted the Scottish Open. About 40 minutes east of Edinburgh, Gullane No. 1 overlooks the Firth of Forth. From an old Dan Jenkins piece on Scotland: "The view from the seventh tee, the highest point on the course, is worth a few minutes’ pause. On a clear day you can see the distant tracery of the great Forth bridges—rail and road versions—the southern coast of Fife, and behind you, far below, the links of Muirfield. One hole, the par-4 11th, plays along a cliff where stone gun placements still exist, a reminder that the Scots once feared a German invasion." 

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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.

Golfers might be temped to bypass Nairn on their way north to Royal Dornoch (ranked second on our list) or the expanding Cabot Highlands development, but if they do they’ll miss one of the country’s purest links. The holes run primarily east-west astride the Firth of Moray over ground that’s level but rumpled and studded with clumps of gorse and a mix of bunkers that are both revetted and artistically shaped with fescue edges under the recent direction of British architect Tom Mackenzie. Old Tom Morris expanded the course shortly after it was first built, but Nairn should equally be considered a Braid design—he remodeled the links twice, adding tees and new bunkers, and built the ninth, 10th and 11th holes in previously unused land on the west end of the course. Nairn hosted the 1999 Walker Cup, won by Great Britain & Ireland.

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.

A good debate can erupt about the second-best course at St. Andrews. Many would advocate for the Jubilee or Eden courses, but our panel prefers the New Course, which only seemed new when Old Tom Morris laid it out in 1895, predating the competition by several years. It begins on the far side of the Ladies Putting Course (also known as the Himalayas) and plays adjacent and to the right of the Old Course, closer to the sea. It has the same out-and-back routing with holes that touch the Eden estuary, though the ground is less naturally rumpled and the greens less enormously plateaued. The British golf writer Bernard Darwin predicted the New Course would always suffer as the “relief” course in comparison to the Old, and this is certainly true, but recent work by British designers Martin Ebert and Tom Mackenzie to create more of a sandy dunes appearance throughout has helped give it a more individualized personality and a boost to the aesthetic appeal.

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.

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.

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.

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, 123 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.

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.

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.

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.

Looks are deceiving at Royal Troon. It looks 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. Royal Troon hosts its tenth Open Championship in 2024.

Just down the coastline from the links at St. Andrews, Kingsbarns looks absolutely natural in its links setting. It's a tribute to owner Mark Parsinen and architect Kyle Phillips (both Californians), who collaborated on transforming a lifeless farm field into a course that fools even the most discerning eye. The routing is ingenious, crescent-shaped 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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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: Martin Hawtree's design changes in advance of the 2015 and 2022 Open Championships, which many considered blasphemy beforehand. After Zach Johnson's dramatic overtime victory in the former, 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. Actually, the topic du jour is no longer pre-championship modifications but technological supremacy as the tees have had to be stretched and extended to parts well beyond the course’s traditional boundaries due to the runaway distances top players hit the ball. It remains to be seen how much of a fight the Old Course can put up 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.

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.