The Best Golf Courses in the South Bay
Ask where the best golf courses in the South Bay are and every honest answer starts in the same place: the Palos Verdes Peninsula, where the land shrugs up out of the beach cities and drops straight into the Pacific. Three very different courses share those cliffs — a daily-fee spectacle where every hole stares at the ocean, a county muni whose green fees have no business coming with these views, and a 1924 Golden Age design from the same partnership that built Riviera and Bel-Air. No other corner of Los Angeles packs this much ocean golf into a few square miles.
What makes the peninsula genuinely rare, though, isn't the scenery — it's the access. In a region where clifftop golf usually hides behind a membership committee, two of the three headliners here are open to anyone with a tee time. That inverts the usual LA golf math, and it's why we'd send a visiting golfer to the South Bay before almost anywhere else in the county.
But the South Bay isn't only postcards. Down off the hill, the flatland munis do the real daily work of golf in this part of Los Angeles — including one course that matters to American golf history far beyond its scorecard. Here are our five, in order.
1. Trump National Golf Club Los Angeles — Rancho Palos Verdes
All 18 holes look out over the Pacific, and unlike nearly every course with a view like this, it's daily-fee public. The Pete Dye original — opened as Ocean Trails before a 1999 landslide sent the 18th sliding toward the ocean — was rebuilt and reworked by Tom Fazio, reopening in 2006 at a reported cost of around $264 million, frequently cited as the most expensive golf course ever constructed. From the Black tees it's a legitimate monster: 7,242 yards, par 71, a 74.6 rating and a stout 144 slope that owes as much to the wind-swept clifftop exposure as to the length. Premium green fees, yes — but as a one-round splurge, nothing else in LA touches it.
2. Palos Verdes Golf Club — Palos Verdes Estates
The peninsula's aristocrat: a 1924 George C. Thomas Jr. and William P. Bell design — the same Golden Age partnership behind Riviera and Bel-Air — with fourteen of its eighteen holes offering Pacific views. It's private, so for most of us it's an invitation course, but it's also the South Bay's proof of pedigree: barrancas cutting the routing, small well-bunkered greens, and a 2013 renovation that reopened the ocean vistas. At 6,433 yards and par 71 it sounds gentle; the 72.3 rating, 133 slope, grabby kikuyu and ocean wind say otherwise — this is precision golf exactly as Thomas and Bell intended, good enough to host the inaugural LPGA Palos Verdes Championship in 2022.
Palos Verdes Golf Club
Palos Verdes Estates, CA
3. Los Verdes Golf Course — Rancho Palos Verdes
The people's version of peninsula golf, and pound for pound the best value in the county. William F. Bell routed this LA County course along the clifftops in 1964, and the back nine delivers the shots everyone comes for — the drive at the 11th aimed straight at the Pacific, and the signature 15th playing along the bluffs with Catalina Island filling the horizon. At 6,605 yards, par 71 (72.4/125), it's an honest, walkable test where the sea breeze does the defending. It's also one of the most heavily played courses in the United States, so book early and expect a full tee sheet.
4. Chester Washington Golf Course — Los Angeles
No ocean views here — just the most historically important municipal course in Los Angeles County. Opened in 1928 as Western Avenue, it became the epicenter of Black golf in LA: Charlie Sifford made it his home course, and activist Maggie Hathaway's 1955 fight ended discrimination on county golf land, making this the county's first integrated course. The golf itself, redesigned by William F. Bell in 1970, is a sneaky-good iron-player's test — 6,286 yards, par 70 (70.6/124), where thick kikuyu and tight Poa annua greens punish anything careless. It's the only course in the county portfolio designated an LA County Historical Landmark, and it earns the visit.
5. Alondra Park Golf Course — Lawndale
Every good golf region needs a workhorse, and Alondra Park has been the South Bay's since 1947. The William P. Bell and William Johnson design is a flat, walkable par 72 of 6,445 yards (70.0/118) — the friendliest full-length round on this list — backed by a separate 18-hole par-3 course and a night-lit driving range. It's a high-volume everyman facility in the best sense: where South Bay golfers learn the game, groove the swing after work, and rack up the rounds that the clifftop courses get the credit for.
Which South Bay course should you play?
For a once-a-year splurge, book Trump National and take an extra layer for the clifftop wind. For the best scenery-per-dollar in Los Angeles, it's Los Verdes — reserve well ahead. Palos Verdes Golf Club is the round to say yes to if a member ever offers. And if you care about where the game has been and where your irons are going, Chester Washington rewards the trip, while Alondra Park is the easy answer for beginners, practice sessions, and a quick par-3 loop under the lights.
Palos Verdes Golf Club
Palos Verdes Estates, CA