Best Value Alternatives to the Old Course at St Andrews

The Old Course ballot has roughly a 10–15% daily success rate in peak summer. Which means that most mornings, most people who enter don't get on. If you're planning a Fife golf trip around the Old Course and treating everything else as a backup, you're building on unstable ground.

The better mental model: plan a trip that is excellent whether or not you get on the Old. The courses around St Andrews are genuinely good. Several of them are as good, in different ways. Some are better value by a substantial margin.

Here is where to put the round if the ballot says no.

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The St Andrews Links alternatives

New Course — £95

The New Course (opened 1895, redesigned by James Braid 1913) is the most played alternative to the Old and the most frequently underestimated. It is a harder course than the Old in most conditions — tighter fairways, more severe rough, a bunkering structure that is less forgiving to the wayward drive. The key links holes are at least the equal of their Old Course equivalents.

Green fee: £95. No ballot required; advance booking recommended. For visitors who get on the Old Course during their trip, the New is the obvious second round. For those who don't, the New is a better course than the one they missed.

Jubilee Course — £95

The Jubilee runs closest to the sea of all the St Andrews courses and is the most wind-exposed. In calm conditions it's the most underplayed of the major Links Trust courses; in a 25 mph westerly it becomes, by common visitor agreement, the hardest golf in St Andrews. Donald Steel updated the design in 1988, which modernised the strategic bunkering without losing the fundamental links character.

Green fee: £95. No ballot. Often easier to book than the New on short notice.

Castle Course — £120

Opened in 2008, designed by David McLay Kidd, on the clifftops east of town. A more dramatic visual experience than any of the links courses — clifftop tees, sea views on every hole, greens that need the wind factored into every approach. A different course entirely from the Old; visitors either love it or find it an acquired taste. Worth knowing about if you want something visually spectacular and don't mind a higher green fee.

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The nearby Fife alternatives at a fraction of the price

Crail Balcomie Links — £45–55

Crail Golfing Society's Balcomie Links, founded 1895, occupies the headland at Fife Ness — the easternmost point of Fife, where the North Sea meets the Firth of Forth. The course is an old-fashioned out-and-back layout with views on almost every hole and a playing character that is entirely its own: shorter than most courses (par 69), but with coastal rough, firm turf, and a 6th hole played along the shore that would sit comfortably in any top-50 ranking.

Green fee: £45–55 depending on season. 20 minutes from St Andrews by car. For the price of one Old Course round, you can play Crail three times.

Crail Craighead Links — £55–70

The newer of the two Crail courses, a Graham Marsh design from 1998 that is longer and more modern in feel than Balcomie. Plays to 6,700 yards; parkland character in the inland sections, links at the coast. Good value for a relatively new course of this standard.

Elie Golf House Club — £50–75

Elie is the links that golf writers tend to recommend quietly to each other while pointing everyone else at St Andrews and Kingsbarns. The course is laid out on a strip of links south of the village of Elie — natural links terrain, original James Braid routing, a submarine periscope in the starter's hut used to check whether the first fairway is clear (the periscope mechanism is original and operational). The 13th is widely cited as one of the best par 4s in Scotland.

Green fee: £50–75 depending on season. 25 minutes from St Andrews. Worth booking in advance; the club has limited tee time slots for visitors and they fill up.

Lundin Golf Club — £75–100

A traditional links on the Firth of Forth, 30 minutes south of St Andrews. Lundin has hosted Final Qualifying for the Open Championship, which is the reliable credential for its difficulty and condition. Standing stones from the Bronze Age stand beyond the 3rd fairway — 3,000 years old, entirely unremarkable to the members, inexplicably moving to most visitors.

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Kingsbarns — the premium alternative

Kingsbarns is not cheap (£295), but it's different from the Old Course in the most important way: you can book it up to 12 months ahead with certainty. If you're building a guaranteed Fife round that competes with the Old Course in quality, Kingsbarns is the answer. Tom Doak's design philosophy, Kyle Phillips' clifftop routing, and a conditioning budget that few clubs in the world can match.

No ballot. Direct booking at kingsbarns.com.

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If you want the Old Course and can't get on the ballot

Tour operator allocation: Golf tour operators (St Andrews Golf Company, Links Trust Golf Packages, and others) hold pre-purchased blocks of Old Course tee times. Access through a package is more expensive than the direct green fee — expect to pay £400–500+ for an arranged tee time — but you're paying for certainty, not the round.

Walk-up singles: Show up at the Links Trust starter's hut early. Single players sometimes get added to groups that have a vacant slot. It requires flexibility on timing and is never guaranteed, but it works more often than visitors expect.

The R&A Ballot reserve list: The Links Trust occasionally has last-minute ballot slots released the morning of play. Again: no guarantee, early arrival required.

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For the full ballot guide: Old Course Ballot — Complete Guide. For the Fife courses in detail: Fife Golf Trail: Best Course Combinations for a Weekend Stay.