Leven Links sits on the Firth of Forth immediately alongside Lundin Golf Club, the two courses separated by a stone boundary wall and not much else. The club is less well known than its neighbour — Lundin tends to get the recommendation in most Fife itinerary guides — but the golf is comparable and the price is noticeably lower. Links turf, a coastal routing, the same weather that rolls in across the Forth: the experience of a round at Leven is not obviously inferior to a round at Lundin.
Like Lundin, Leven has been used as an Open Championship Final Qualifying venue. That designation requires a course to hold a field of professional golfers competing for places in a major championship, which is not a standard every course meets. The layout is traditional seaside golf — fairways that follow the natural ground, greens that reward the right approach and make the wrong one expensive, and a wind that does most of the work of making the course difficult.
Green fees run £55 to £75, making Leven one of the better-value proper links rounds on the Fife coast. There is no mystique attached to the name, no famous hole that appears in coffee-table books, and no premium for reputation. What there is, is genuine links golf at a price that allows you to spend the money saved on Kingsbarns or the Old Course instead. Playing Leven and Lundin back to back on the same day is straightforward given their proximity and makes for a thorough afternoon on this part of the coast.