North Carolina is the “Home of American Golf” at Pinehurst with a bounty of golf courses affiliated with just the Resort where Tommy Armour once remarked: “The man who doesn't feel emotionally stirred when he golfs at Pinehurst beneath these clear blue skies and with the pine fragrance in his nostrils is one who should be ruled out of golf for life." In addition to No. 2 at Pinehurst where more single golf championships have been played than any course in America, there's Pine Needles and Mid Pines, The Dormie Club, and Tobacco Road nearby.

The eastern, coastal plain and tidewater area features top rated golf courses just over the South Carolina line from Calabash to Shallotte and convenient to Myrtle Beach. These include Tiger's Eye at Ocean Ridge, River's Edge, Bald Head Island, and up to Cape Fear National outside Wilmington. The gently, rolling, Piedmont where the majority of the population resides boasts the Duke University Golf Club, UNC Finley, Tanglewood Park, and Lonnie Poole at NC State. The rugged rolling hills stretch up to the high southern Appalachian Mountains containing the Blue Ridge and Great Smokey Mountains features the Grove Park Inn in Asheville and the Sequoyah National in Cherokee all of which and more are found in this guide to the best public golf courses in North Carolina.