The Public Golf Coast: Courses You Can Actually Book, Savannah to Charleston

The Lowcountry corridor runs about 100 miles from Savannah up to Charleston, and a surprising amount of its best golf is open to anyone with a tee time and a credit card. You do not need a member to sign you in. Between the private gates you will find municipal Donald Ross designs, resort courses that host the PGA Tour, and daily-fee tracks that ask $40 and give you marsh views the whole way around. Here is where to book, moving south to north.

Start in Savannah, where Bacon Park Golf Course keeps a 1926 Donald Ross layout in play as a municipal course. Green fees run $49 to $59, which is close to theft for original Ross green complexes. West of town, Crosswinds Golf Club opens its fairways from $30 to $60, and Henderson Golf Course near the airport sits at $35 to $55. All three are true daily-fee courses with no membership strings attached.

Hilton Head and Bluffton: resort golf without the resort bill

The island most people associate with Harbour Town has plenty of bookable golf beyond the famous lighthouse hole. Harbour Town Golf Links itself, the Pete Dye design that has hosted the RBC Heritage since 1969, runs $250 to $450 for the round of your year on its tight, tree-lined corridors along Calibogue Sound. If that number stings, Palmetto Dunes offers three resort courses at gentler rates: the Robert Trent Jones Oceanfront course ($120 to $250) with its par-4 10th hole on the Atlantic, the Arthur Hills course ($100 to $200), and the George Fazio course ($100 to $180), the only par-71 on the island.

Cross the bridge to Bluffton and the prices drop again. Crescent Pointe, an Arnold Palmer signature design with 13 holes touching the marsh, books from $50 to $110. Eagle’s Pointe by Davis Love III runs $60 to $120. Hilton Head National, a Gary Player and Bobby Weed collaboration, sits at $50 to $120, and Island West opens at $40. These are the courses locals play on a Tuesday.

Beaufort to Charleston: history, harbor views, and a bargain municipal

Heading north, Fripp Island near Beaufort gives you two resort options with real coastline. Ocean Point Golf Links, a 1964 George W. Cobb design, sends seven holes along the Atlantic and books from $70 to $150. Ocean Creek by Davis Love III runs $70 to $120. The Legends at Parris Island, a 1947 Cobb course, is public and priced $40 to $75.

Around Charleston, the value pick is the City of Charleston Municipal Golf Course. John Fought renovated the 1929 layout along the Stono River, reopened it in 2022, and it still charges $35 to $60. Links at Stono Ferry, a Ron Garl design that hosted Nationwide Tour events, runs $60 to $110 with a back nine along the Intracoastal. In Mount Pleasant, Patriots Point Links gives you Charleston Harbor and the USS Yorktown off the 17th tee for $60 to $120, and Charleston National, a Rees Jones design, books from $60 to $120. On Kiawah Island, Osprey Point by Tom Fazio ($180 to $280) is the resort’s public-access option built around four natural lakes.

Sixty-plus courses stretch across this coast, and the bookable ones cover everything from a $30 morning outside Savannah to a bucket-list morning at Harbour Town. Browse the full directory with green fees, tee-time links, and maps at lowcountry.one/golf.