What defines ‘affordable’ in golf? As any ardent golfer will tell you, this is a question to which the answer has changed considerably in the last few years.
Playing a ‘Top 100’ course is one of life’s great joys but now more than ever has come to be synonymous with often exorbitant green fees. Among a multitude of reasons for these increases, courses can trade off the fact that they’re part of an elite list, there is obviously a huge slant on where you are located and what your neighbours are pricing their green fees at and, in recent times, green fees at many clubs have seen a huge uplift.
If you don’t believe us, consider this: according to UK Golf Guy, the average green fee at a Top 100 course in the UK in 2024 was £237: a rise of 10.7% year on year and, perhaps even more scarily, £70 more than what you would have expected to pay in 2021.
With demand higher than ever, some green fees now approaching the thousand-pound mark (thanks Turnberry) and other top 10 courses now routinely charging in excess of £400 for a round, this doesn’t seem like a trend that’s set to abate any time soon.
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There are, of course plenty of methods to make paying a cheaper green fee possible. The dream is to be invited by a member or you can join a group where you might be able to offer a reciprocal in return. Or just make the most of playing these incredible courses at a non-peak time of year.
If this isn’t an option, however, thankfully there are more than 3,100 golf courses dotting the UK, leaving hundreds of courses where you can have serious fun without leaving a considerable dent in your wallet. And here at GolfMagic, we’ve made it our mission to put together a list of the best places in the UK to play an affordable round, starting with the cheapest highly-rated tracks we can find and topping out at around the £200 mark.
For the purposes of providing some form of clarity, we’ve decided to group this list in a loose order according to price bracket and alphabetical order, giving you a simple one-stop guide to finding great affordable golf.
All that’s left to consider is this: which one are you going to visit first?
The best UK golf courses under £50 
Seascale Golf Club
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Seascale Golf Club
Location: Seascale, Cumbria
Green fees (weekday): £30-40
An unheralded gem of the Cumbrian coast, our most recent round at Seascale, which cost £40, was as much fun as anywhere we’ve played recently, with the conditioning of the course particularly phenomenal and the time of year. A traditional links designed by Willie Campbell and George Lowe in the late 1890s, it’s a remarkably pure place to play golf and easily one of the best value links experiences in England.
Visit Shiskine Golf Club
Shiskine Golf Club
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Shiskine Golf Club
Location: Shiskine, Arran, Scotland
Green fees (weekday): £37
What’s not to love about a course like Shiskine? A 12-hole gem on one of the beautiful of the Scottish Islands, you can jump on at Shiskine for less than £40 year round, be back in the clubhouse in around two hours and have an absolute whale of a time the entire way. A peaceful links track playing along one of the beautiful stretches of coastline in the UK, this is affordable golf at its purest.
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Sunningdale Heath Golf Club
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Sunningdale Heath Golf Club
Location: Sunningdale, Surrey
Green fees (weekday): £35-£50
While its next-door neighbour naturally gets all the plaudits, Sunningdale Heath is truly one of the most charming courses in the legendary Surrey sandbelt, beloved as much for its welcoming, inclusive nature as it is incredibly fun layout designed by the legendary Harry Colt. Formerly a ladies-oriented golf club and famously patroned by the Queen herself, Sunningdale Heath is short but remarkably tough, with fourteen par three holes and four par fours configured in a way that’ll represent a true challenge to just about any golfer.
Make no mistake, however, Sunningdale Heath still delivers all the hallmarks of idyllic Surrey heathland golf, with an open layout, beautiful flora and devilishly tricky greens – made all the harder by the deluge of long par 3s, many of which play well over 200 yards. If you can play well here, you can play well just about anywhere.
Visit Shiskine Golf Club
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The best UK golf courses under £100 
Courtesy The Manor House Golf Club
The Manor House Golf Club
Location: Castle Combe, Wiltshire
Green fees (weekday): £65-£95
Set amidst the truly idyllic surrounds of the Cotswolds village of Castle Combe, The Manor House is known first and foremost for its palatial five-star hotel, but its adjoining golf club is a surprising treat and one of the most underrated courses in this part of England. Starting as a fairly conventional parkland track, The Manor House truly turns it on when you pass the turn, snaking its way through some of the Cotswolds’ most dramatic valleys in a scene akin to something you’d find in Middle Earth.
Add in the charming pubs and rooms that await you down the hill at the other end, and it’s fair to say there aren’t many more picturesque places in England for a stay and play.
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Visit The Manor House
Courtesy Royal North Devon Golf Club
Royal North Devon
Location: Westward Ho!, Devon
Green fees (weekday): £90-100
The idea of playing a round on any Royal-titled golf club for less than £100 feels like fantasy in 2025, but at Royal North Devon, England’s oldest golf course and the oldest links course anywhere outside of Scotland, this is very much the reality. A remarkably flat, open course that, even by links standards, seems to simply melt into the surrounding land, Royal North Devon stretches across 160 acres of common grazing land in the Northam Burrows AONB, and is a must-play as much for its sense of history as it is the unique, almost eerily natural surroundings.
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Visit Royal North Devon Golf Club
Seacroft Golf Club
Seacroft Golf Club
Location: Seacroft, Lincolnshire
Green fees (weekday): £60-£90
Rated by Golf World as the best round you can play anywhere in the UK for under £70, Seacroft is a beloved coastal links not all that far from the Lincolnshire home of England Golf, which incidentally has designated Seacroft as a Championship venue. Starting life as a small nine-hole course on the southern tip of the holiday town of Skegness, Seacroft was extended in the ’20s to encompass a sprawling links that stretches south over picturesque coastline.
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Visit Seacroft Golf Club
The best UK golf courses under £150 
Courtesy Aberdovey Golf Club
Aberdovey Golf Club
Location: Aberdovey, Gwynedd, Wales
Green fees (weekday): £85-£125
I’ve long been an admirer of Aberdovey. Again, the journey here plays a huge part and this one is different as hopefully you won’t need your car. This is Bernard Darwin’s one-time playground and it’s a fabulous course and one of the great Welsh jewels.
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If anywhere deserves a country membership it’s here, for all manner of reasons. A spectacular part of the world and an even better golf course.
Visit Aberdovey
READ OUR FULL ABERDOVEY GOLF CLUB REVIEW
Courtesy Goswick Links
Goswick Links Golf Club
Location: Goswick, Northumberland
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Green fees (weekday): £130-£150
Set amidst one of England’s most historic and mystical stretches of coastline, Goswick Links is flanked by the ruins of Bamburgh Castle and looks out on the North Sea towards Lindisfarne’s Holy Island, making for a truly magical space to play the game. The Links at Goswick, in keeping with this spirit, are excellent, winding their way through hills and dunes towards the sea.
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Courtesy Pennard Golf Club
Pennard Golf Club
Location: Southgate, Swansea, Wales
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Green fees (weekday): £70-£110
It’s been far too long since I’ve been to Pennard and, while it is very much on the up, it’s probably still not too well known in some circles. Even so, the so-called The Links In The Sky is a genuine Welsh classic, serenely floating along picturesque clifftop to make for one of the UK’s most unique links golf experiences.
Visit Pennard
READ OUR FULL PENNARD GOLF CLUB REVIEW
Silloth on Solway
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Silloth on Solway Golf Club
Location: Silloth, Cumbria
Green fees (weekday): £70-£110
Another bona fide top 50 UK course that you can play for well under a hundred quid when the time is right, the only thing holding Silloth back from true legendary status is its remote Cumbria location – which might explain why it remains so affordable to play. Even so, it remains one of England’s greatest, toughest and most celebrated links, and a course that would be well worth travelling to even if the price were significantly higher.
Visit Silloth on Solway
Courtesy Southerness Golf Club
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Southerness Golf Club
Location: Southerness, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland
Green fees (weekday): £95-£115
One of Scottish Golf’s true underrated gems, Southerness is in a part of the northern nation not routinely singled out for its great golf, but is perhaps all the better for it.
Don’t be fooled by the talk of this being one of the toughest courses in the UK – it’s so playable and it’s sensationally good. The turf, routing and overall experience is so enjoyable, forming an experience we’re eager to relive as soon as possible.
Visit Southerness
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READ OUR FULL SOUTHERNESS GOLF CLUB REVIEW
The best UK golf courses under £200 
Courtesy Brora Golf Club
Brora Golf Club
Location: Brora, Highland, Scotland
Green fees (weekday): £80-£180
To the Highlands and to Brora, which just a short drive from from Royal Dornoch constitutes one of the area’s definitive golf experiences and an absolute must-play for any golfer touring the area. It’s as rugged and playable as you could hope for, with coastal vistas to match.
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Visit Brora
READ OUR FULL BRORA GOLF CLUB REVIEW
Machrihanish Golf Club
Machrihanish Golf Club
Location: Machrihanish, Argyll and Bute, Scotland
Green fees (weekday): £95-£155
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Widely considered one of the best 30 courses in the UK, Machrihanish truly stands out for its pricing given its stature. The beauty of Machrihanish and its surrounds is that those inclined is that you can also play Machrihanish Dunes and Dunaverty for less than a £400 combined, making this remote pocket of Southwestern Scotland one of the best value places in the UK – if not the world – to play golf.
Machrihanish is truly exceptional, all of it. The getting there, the welcome, the surrounds, the opening tee shot and everything that follows.
Visit Machrihanish Golf Club
READ OUR FULL MACHRIHANISH GOLF CLUB REVIEW
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