What’s the ‘best’ course in the U.S.? Here’s what you said

Our expert course raters get their say in assessing the most sublime golf courses on American soil every two years, like they just did for our 2024-25 Top 100 Courses in the U.S. ranking. But our readers — you! — have opinions, experiences and dreams of playing Pine Valley, too. Here we’ll break out a few factoids and tee-time fantasies that emerged from GOLF’s 2024 Top 100 Courses in the U.S. Readers’ Survey.

As our course experts rolled out these latest Top 100 lists, one of the most interesting questions we asked you, our dear readers, was this: “Which course do you most associate with being ‘the best golf course in the U.S.’?”

Who’s the best is a question we ask constantly across sports. Who’s the best college football team? We’ll see at the national championship game in January. Who’s the world’s fastest man? We’ll see you at the 100-meter finish line at the next Olympics. Who’s the best golfer? Let’s head to the top of the Official World Golf Ranking (more controversial these days, but you know what I mean) to see who’s beaten everyone else the most often.

Courses

But when it comes to golf courses, who’s the best is a slightly tougher question to answer. Courses don’t play each other, after all. We play them, and then we decide which we like best, the same way we’d pick a favorite restaurant. Plenty of “the best” are private courses, too, and they’re scattered across the country, which means we’re working with incomplete data, and unlike our well-traveled raters, we certainly don’t play ’em all — so, yeah, it’s arbitrary.

This is also a different question than which course is your favorite, which I think makes it more interesting. This is a question of cachet and reputation and brand. There can never be a definitive answer, but who’s the best remains important, because this is sports and because we like lists and because we make ’em anyway, whether in our magazine or our minds, our notes app or our group text — wherever you might store a bucket list. It’s good to know who stands at the top.

Here’s who you said currently does:

“Which course do you most associate with being ‘the best golf course in the U.S.’?”

33.72% — Pine Valley

28.45% — Augusta National

12.90% — Pebble Beach

11.73% — Cypress Point

3.52% — Pinehurst No. 2

2.05% — Shinnecock Hills

2.05% — National Golf Links of America

5.58% — Other

You’re a discerning group, so this is a smart list. But it’s still interesting — and telling. Let’s dig a little deeper.

First of all, you guys really like golf. You really know golf (of the readers who responded to our survey, nearly two-thirds said they play 30-plus times per year and 35% said they play more than 50 times a year) and you can really play golf (about half of respondents were 10 handicaps or lower) too.

Pine Valley‘s brand is strong. It’s tremendously private. It’s rarely captured on camera. It’s brutally hard to get on and brutally hard to play if you do. But it’s known specifically for being No. 1. You, my well-read readers, aligned with us here; Pine Valley topped our list again. How well does its reputation travel? It won this vote even though only about a third of you said you even know somebody who has played there.

This isn’t a question with a right answer, though, so those of you who answered Augusta National weren’t wrong. While Pine Valley is well-known to the avid golfer, Augusta National is almost certainly the most famous golf course in the world. Even though it’s just No. 6 in our ranking, Augusta is golf’s Churchill Downs or Wimbledon Club, an immaculate setting that plays host to the sport’s biggest event every year. Per your survey answers, Augusta is also where you’d most like to play — 51% of you picked Augusta as your dream tee time, while Pine Valley was third at 12.5%. And No. 12 at Augusta is the single hole you want to play the most.

Also, I bet if you polled the readers of a non-golf magazine they’d lean even more heavily Augusta. Either that or…

…Pebble Beach, which came in third. This is another a good choice; Pebble tops our list of Top 100 Courses You Can Play. It’s the best public golf course in the U.S., even if “public” comes with a hefty price tag. But from the U.S. Open, from the PGA Tour, from video games and from its iconic coastal stretch, Pebble Beach is nearly as iconic as anywhere.

From a perception standpoint, Cypress Point is the West Coast’s answer to Pine Valley — the Stanford to its Harvard. It’s shrouded in mystique, it’s tough to get on and what photos and videos do emerge always look spectacular. It’s also just a couple miles from Pebble, its well-regarded public neighbor (the Stanford to Pebble’s UC-Berkeley, if we want to stretch out the analogy) and gains some additional notoriety from being the private club ’round the corner.

Pinehurst No. 2 was this year’s U.S. Open host and is the crown jewel of “The Cradle of American Golf.” It’s No. 2 on our list of public courses, ahead of other east-coast contenders like Bethpage Black, Kiawah Island’s Ocean Course or TPC Sawgrass’ Stadium Course.

Others got votes, too, including Shinnecock and National. The Long Island influence is strong. But as we all know, the real best course is the next one. See you out there.