Whether you're a course architect sketching a renovation, a superintendent planning a drainage overhaul, or a club manager preparing a hole-by-hole guide, knowing how to draw a golf course layout is a fundamental skill. In the past, this required expensive CAD software or complex desktop GIS tools. Today, you can do it entirely in your browser.
This guide walks you through how to draw a golf course layout using Atlas — a cloud-based mapping platform built for exactly this kind of spatial work.
What You Need Before You Start
Before drawing anything, gather the following:
- A satellite or aerial base map of the course (Atlas provides this out of the box)
- Approximate boundaries of the property (you can trace these from the aerial)
- Hole routing information — even a rough hand-drawn sketch helps
- Any existing survey data in CSV, GeoJSON, KML, or shapefile format (optional but useful)
You don't need to be a GIS professional. Atlas is designed so that course staff and designers can jump straight in.
Step 1: Open Atlas and Set Your Basemap
Log in to Atlas and create a new project. The default basemap shows a satellite view — ideal for tracing the existing course layout. You can also switch to a topographic basemap to see elevation contours, which is particularly useful when drawing fairways on hilly terrain.
Zoom into your course location using the search bar. Atlas uses high-resolution imagery so you can clearly distinguish fairways, bunkers, greens, and hazards.
Step 2: Trace the Course Boundary
Use the polygon draw tool to trace the outer boundary of the golf course. Click around the perimeter of the property, following roads, fences, or natural boundaries visible in the satellite image. Close the polygon to complete the boundary shape.
Style this layer with a transparent fill and a bold outline so it acts as a clear container for all subsequent layers.
Step 3: Draw Each Hole
Create a new layer for your hole routing. For each hole, use the polyline tool to draw the centerline from tee to green. Start each line at the tee box and end it at the center of the green.
Best practice is to draw each hole on its own layer, named "Hole 1", "Hole 2", and so on. This makes it easy to:
- Toggle individual holes on and off
- Apply different colors per hole
- Share hole-specific maps with greens crews or architects
Step 4: Add Tee Boxes, Greens, and Fairways
Switch to the polygon draw tool to outline key features on each hole:
- Tee boxes — draw rectangles for each tee color (championship, men's, women's, forward)
- Fairways — trace the maintained turf area
- Greens — outline the putting surface
- Rough boundaries — optional, for maintenance planning
Use color coding to make the map readable at a glance. Green polygons for fairways, a distinct color for greens, and browns or yellows for sand areas.
Step 5: Mark Bunkers and Hazards
Use the polygon draw tool to outline each bunker. This is one of the most valuable steps for operational use — a precise bunker map lets crews track sand depths, identify wash-out prone areas after rain, and plan sand replenishment routes.
For water hazards, trace the shoreline polygon and apply a blue fill. Add a label with the hazard type and relevant rule information if you're creating a course guide for players or marshals.
Step 6: Add Labels and Distances
Click on any feature to add attribute data. For tees, add the yardage from each color. For greens, you can add green speed targets, aeration dates, or superintendent notes. For hazards, add local rule references.
These attributes travel with the shape — anyone viewing the shared map can click a bunker and see when it was last raked, or click a green to see its current stimpmeter reading.
Step 7: Layer in Elevation Data
One of the most powerful additions to a course layout drawing is elevation. Atlas lets you overlay a topographic layer showing contour lines across the entire course. This is critical for:
- Understanding how water drains across fairways
- Identifying low spots prone to flooding
- Planning cart path routing
- Communicating slope to course architects during redesign discussions
Switch on the elevation layer in the layer panel and you'll see contour lines appear on top of your course drawing.
Step 8: Share the Map
Once your layout is drawn, click Share to generate a link. You can share a view-only version with club members, a collaborative version with your greenskeeping team, or an embedded version for your club website.
Atlas maps are fully responsive, so the course layout looks great on mobile for players walking the course.
Common Use Cases for Golf Course Layout Drawings
- Renovation planning: Share proposed changes with your architect and board with annotations showing what's being moved or removed
- Maintenance scheduling: Assign polygon regions to specific crew members on a visual map
- Marketing: Embed a branded course map on your club website
- Tournament setup: Mark pin positions, gallery ropes, and marshal stations
- Permit applications: Submit a georeferenced course boundary for environmental or planning reviews
Why Draw in a Browser Instead of CAD or Desktop GIS
Traditional tools like AutoCAD or ArcGIS Desktop require software licenses, installation, and training that most golf course operations teams don't have. Atlas removes all of that friction. Your layout lives in the cloud, accessible from any device, and can be shared with an architect in Norway or a greenskeeper on the 16th fairway in real time.
No plugins. No exports. No version conflicts.
If you manage a golf course and have been putting off mapping your layout because the tools felt too complex, Atlas is the fastest way to get started.
