New York
Long Island Golf Courses & Tee Times
Public golf on Long Island is run by the state, both counties and several towns, and each one gives its own residents the head start. The course everyone knows is Bethpage Black in Farmingdale, a state park course that opened in 1936 and in 2002 became the first publicly owned and operated course to host the U.S. Open. Tiger Woods won it and was the only player under par. The Black has since held the 2009 U.S. Open, the 2019 PGA Championship and the 2025 Ryder Cup, and it gets the Women's PGA in 2028 and the PGA again in 2033. Bethpage alone sees about 300,000 rounds a year across its five courses, so plan ahead.
Can't get a tee time on Long Island? Yoink watches 46 public courses, from Farmingdale, Riverhead, East Meadow, Manorville and Smithtown. Pick your courses, set the day and time you want, and get a notification when a tee time opens, cancellations included.
The longest layout here is Pine Hills Country Club - Pine Hills at 7,132 yards; there are 10 nine-hole courses; there is one executive or par-3 course for a quicker round.
Who runs public golf on Long Island
New York State Parks runs golf at five Long Island parks: Bethpage's five 18-hole layouts (Black, Red, Blue, Green and Yellow), 27 holes at Sunken Meadow in Kings Park, Montauk Downs, a 9-hole course at Sag Harbor and a pitch and putt at Robert Moses. All book through the State Parks online system. Nassau County runs seven courses: Red, White and Blue at Eisenhower Park in East Meadow and four nines. A Nassau Leisure Pass, required for golfers 10 and up, gets you the resident rate. Suffolk County runs Santapogue Creek in West Babylon (the old Bergen Point), Timber Point, Indian Island and West Sayville. A resident Green Key costs $30 for three years; non-residents can buy a $50 key to book at non-resident rates or a $200 VIP key for resident rates. Towns run their own: Huntington has Crab Meadow and Dix Hills, Hempstead has Lido and Merrick, Brookhaven has Mill Pond and Rolling Oaks, and Oyster Bay's Woodbury course is residents only.
Public courses worth knowing on Long Island
- Bethpage Black: Opened in 1936 and credited by State Parks to A.W. Tillinghast. Par 71, 7,468 yards from the tips, carts not allowed, and a warning sign on the first tee since the 1960s. Two U.S. Opens, the 2019 PGA and the 2025 Ryder Cup.
- Eisenhower Park Red Course: Devereux Emmet design from 1914 that hosted PGA of America events as far back as 1926, and later the Commerce Bank Championship on the PGA Tour.
- Montauk Downs: Dates to 1927, redesigned in 1968 by Robert Trent Jones Sr. with his son Rees. State Parks says the wind off the ocean and bay changes how it plays every day. Open year-round.
- Sunken Meadow: 27 Alfred Tull holes in Kings Park, built in 1962 and 1964, hilly and wooded, with Long Island Sound views from the range. Play any two nines.
- Lido Golf Course: Town of Hempstead's 18-hole, par-72 links-style course at 6,896 yards, open year-round and closed Wednesdays.
- Crab Meadow: Town of Huntington course in Northport on the North Shore, designed by William F. Mitchell, 6,574 yards from the back.
Booking tee times on Long Island: the local rules
Bethpage books online only. Verified New York residents get seven days, opening at 7:00 PM a week before; everyone else gets five days, also from 7:00 PM. Get verified by emailing a photo of your New York license or non-driver ID, or show it at the park. It costs $5 a player to book, you can book the Black once every 28 days and the Red once every 14, and since May 1, 2025 you get six cancellations a month. Miss the window and the Black still holds its first 6 to 12 times for walk-ups, then one foursome an hour. In Suffolk, Green Key holders book seven days out and Non-Resident Key holders five, with the new day opening at 6:00 PM, online only, for a $4 fee per player. Black is open April 15 to November 15 and closed Mondays; Blue and Yellow stay open all year, as do Eisenhower's White and Blue, Montauk Downs and Suffolk's Indian Island.
Yoink
Know the rules. Let Yoink do the waiting.
Booking windows decide who gets first pick. After that, times come back one at a time as plans change. Yoink watches all 46 courses on Long Island and tells you when a time that fits comes back, so you're not refreshing the page all week.
46 courses on Long Island
East Meadow
Eisenhower Park - Blue
Robert Trent Jones's 1951 design and the shortest of the park's three 18s: elevated greens, twin par 3s side by side, and it's open year-round.
Eisenhower Park - Red
Devereux Emmet laid it out in 1914 for the old Salisbury club; Walter Hagen won the 1926 PGA there, and the Champions Tour came back decades later.
Eisenhower Park - White
Robert Trent Jones drew it in 1950 with elevated greens and two identical versions of every par 3, so there are 22 holes on the ground. Open all year.
Farmingdale
Bethpage Black
The sign on the first tee says it's only for highly skilled golfers, and it means it. Two U.S. Opens, the 2019 PGA and the 2025 Ryder Cup were played here.
Bethpage Blue
Tillinghast's 1935 course on the hilliest ground in the park: blind shots and raised greens on a hard front nine, then a flatter, shorter, easier back.
Bethpage Green
The park's oldest course: the old Lenox Hills club, reworked by Tillinghast. Same hills as the Black next door, but 6,378 yards from the tips.
Bethpage Red
The hardest course in the park after the Black: Tillinghast's 1935 layout, heavy on long par 4s, doglegs through the trees and holes across a windy flat.
Bethpage State Park (all 5 courses)
Five public 18s in one state park, led by the Black: a Tillinghast course with a warning sign on the first tee and two U.S. Opens behind it.
Bethpage Yellow
Alfred Tull's 1958 course, partly made from holes left over when Tillinghast's Blue was rerouted. Shortest of the five: 6,085 yards from the regular tees.
Manorville
Pine Hills Country Club - Pine Hills
A par 73 cut through the Pine Barrens: 7,132 yards between towering pines, with 64 rebuilt bunkers and new native-grass areas.
Rock Hill Golf & Country Club
A Frank Duane design on one of the highest points on Long Island: 7,050 yards, par 71 from the back, and public since 13 friends bought the land.
Swan Lake Golf Club
Charles K. Martin's 1979 layout in the Manorville Pine Barrens. Big greens, sweeping fairways, and water in play on nine holes.
Riverhead
Cherry Creek Golf Links
Opened in 1996 on old potato and sod farms, and it finishes with a 644-yard par 6. The wind off the Sound and the open fields around it has its say.
Indian Island Golf Course
Suffolk County's Riverhead 18, built on an old duck farm on the Peconic River: par 72, open year-round, Green Key to book.
The Woods at Cherry Creek Golf Course
The 2002 sister to Cherry Creek's Links, across the street: rolling, tree-lined fairways, winding doglegs and ponds beside seven holes.
Shelter Island Heights
Smithtown
Smithtown Landing Country Club
The town course with Nissequogue River views, a par-3 Learning Links for the kids, and Michael Hebron, on Golf Magazine's Top 50 teachers list since 1991.
Stonebridge Golf Links & CC
A whole course of Macdonald and Raynor template holes, started by Gil Hanse and finished by George Bahto in 1999: Redan, Biarritz, Eden, Alps, Punchbowl.
What we've seen on tee sheets on Long Island
From the tee sheets Yoink has been reading. Booking window is how far ahead each new day's tee times appear online. Green fees are the range most 18-hole tee times were listed at. Each course page says when and how often we looked. Courses without enough data aren't shown, and residents or members may have different windows and rates.
| Course | Booking window | Green fees (18) |
|---|---|---|
| Bethpage Blue | – | $23 to $38 |
| Bethpage Green | – | $23 to $38 |
| Bethpage State Park (all 5 courses) | 5 days ahead around 7 pm | $23 to $100 |
| Brentwood Country Club | 7 days ahead just after midnight | $38 |
| Cherry Creek Golf Links | 8 days ahead | $30 to $68 |
| Crab Meadow Golf Course | 7 days ahead around 7 pm | $29 to $51 |
| Gull Haven Golf Course | 6 days ahead just after midnight | – |
| Harbor Links Golf Course | – | $11.97 to $24.86 |
| Holbrook Country Club | 7 days ahead just after midnight | – |
| Lido Golf Club | – | $27.50 to $30 |
| Mill Pond Golf Course | 7 days ahead just after midnight | $53.15 to $97.15 |
| Montauk Downs State Park | 5 days ahead around 7 pm | $62 to $111 |
| Pine Hills Country Club - Pine Hills | – | $49 to $88 |
| Rock Hill Golf & Country Club | 7 days ahead just after midnight | – |
| Rolling Oaks Golf Course | – | $58.15 to $69.15 |
| Shelter Island Country Club | 7 days ahead just after midnight | – |
| Smithtown Landing Country Club | – | $54 to $56 |
| Stonebridge Golf Links & CC | – | $58 to $68 |
| Sunken Meadow State Park | 5 days ahead around 7 pm | $28 to $33 |
| Swan Lake Golf Club | – | $75 |
| The Golf Club at Middle Bay | – | $48 to $78 |
| The Woods at Cherry Creek Golf Course | 8 days ahead | $40 to $68 |
| Willow Creek Golf & Country Club | – | $67.49 to $145.49 |
Why tee times on Long Island are hard to get
The season on Long Island runs roughly from spring to late fall. The first warm weekends in spring and the cool, dry weekends of fall are the hardest to book.
Each course releases its tee times on its own schedule, commonly a week or two out, with residents of town and county courses often booking first. Leagues, outings and members claim chunks of the sheet in advance, and whatever prime weekend times are left tend to go on release day.
When tee time cancellations happen
A full tee sheet rarely stays full. Many courses let you cancel without a fee up to 24 or 48 hours before your time, so spots tend to reappear in the last couple of days. A bad forecast shakes more loose, and a foursome that drops to three opens a single. None of it is announced. The time just shows up again on the booking page, and whoever looks first gets it.
How to get a tee time on Long Island
Yoink
All 46 courses on Long Island, watched for you around the clock
Yoink checks all 46 courses on Long Island every few minutes, so every open time is in one place and you're the first to know when one that fits your day, window and group appears, cancellations included.
Doing it by hand? Here's what works.
- Know the booking window. Find out how many days ahead each course releases times, and whether residents get an earlier window. Be ready the morning it opens.
- Look again 24 to 48 hours out. That's when most cancellation deadlines pass and spots come back.
- Be flexible on group size. Singles and twosomes fit into gaps a foursome can't.
- Try twilight and weekday afternoons. They're the last to fill and often cheaper.
- Keep a quicker course in your back pocket. Nine-hole and executive courses are easier to get on and play faster. Around here that includes Bay Park Golf Course, Cantiague Park Golf Course and Christopher Morley Park Golf Course.
Read the full guide to getting a tee time when everything's booked
Tee times on Long Island: questions
How do I get notified when a tee time opens up on Long Island?
Set a watch in Yoink for the courses you want, the days you can play, a time window and the number of players. Yoink checks those tee sheets every few minutes and sends a notification as soon as a matching time appears, cancellations included. You book it directly with the course.
When do tee time cancellations usually show up?
Mostly in the 24 to 48 hours before the tee time, as golfers cancel ahead of the course's cancellation deadline, and whenever the weather forecast changes. They appear without notice and tend to be rebooked quickly.
How far in advance can you book a tee time on Long Island?
It depends on the course. Many public courses open bookings 7 to 14 days ahead, and town or county courses often give residents an earlier window. Each course's own booking page has its policy.
When is golf busiest on Long Island?
Demand is highest on spring and fall weekends. Weekend mornings are always the hardest tee times to get.
Which courses on Long Island are quickest to play?
Nine-hole and executive courses such as Bay Park Golf Course, Cantiague Park Golf Course and Christopher Morley Park Golf Course take less time and are usually easier to book.
Does Yoink book the tee time for me?
No. Yoink tells you when a time opens; you book it with the course on its own booking page, at the course's price, with no extra fee.
More golf in New York
- Western NY — Buffalo & Rochester · 73 courses
- Upstate NY — Capital & Central · 69 courses
- Hudson Valley · 40 courses
- Westchester & Hudson Valley · 18 courses
- New York City · 14 courses
- North Country & Thousand Islands · 10 courses
- Southern Tier · 8 courses
- Northern New England · 1 courses
Just across the state line
Markets with courses within 25 miles of a course here.
- Connecticut, CT · 51 courses
- Northern & Central New Jersey, NJ · 75 courses
- Westchester & Hudson Valley, NJ · 2 courses
- Southern New England, CT · 12 courses
- Southern New England, RI · 8 courses
Sources
Facts on this page come from these pages, checked 2026-09-28. Rates and booking rules change, so confirm with the course.
- parks.ny.gov · official
- parks.ny.gov · official
- en.wikipedia.org · media
- linksmagazine.com · media
- parks.ny.gov · official
- parks.ny.gov · official
- parks.ny.gov · official
- nassaucountyny.gov · government
- nassaucountyny.gov · government
- nassaucountyny.gov · government
- suffolkcountyny.gov · government
- suffolkcountyny.gov · government
- suffolkcountyny.gov · government
- suffolkcountyny.gov · government
- huntingtonny.gov · government
- hempsteadny.gov · government
- oysterbaytown.com · government
- brookhavenny.gov · government
Tee times on Long Island, without the refreshing
Watch as many courses as you like. When a time opens that fits your day, window and group, Yoink tells you first.