We Reveal The Best Sunglasses To Play Golf (Updated 2019)

Living up to the reputation

Oakley is probably the best-known brand in sport-based eyewear, and for good reason. They’ve always been at the forefront of lens technology, with numerous different options optimized for different sports. 

You’ll see more players on tour sporting Oakleys than any other brand, and many of those players aren’t sponsored by them at all. 

That’s when you know you’re looking at a high-quality product: when tour pros use it without being paid to.

Replaceable lenses

One nice aspect of the Oakley Half-Jacket XL 2.0 is that the lenses are easily replaceable. So if you don’t like the Prizm Golf lens but want something darker or brighter, there are numerous replacement options available for around $30.

They’re easily interchanged, so you can carry several lenses and snap them in and out without any problems.

This is also a bonus because it means you don’t have to buy a whole new pair of sunglasses when the lens gets scratched. I can’t tell you how many times 

I’ve hit a bunker shot on a windy day, accidentally gotten sand on the lens and boom: a big scratch right in the field of vision. With the Oakleys, you can just snap in a new lens and you’re good to go.

Great frame

The delicately balanced arms with rubber “ear socks” squeeze enough to be completely secure on your head, but don’t exert enough pressure to be noticeable. You may very well forget you’re wearing them after a few minutes.

Anything else?

The sunglasses come with a classic Oakley pouch that doubles as a lens cleaner, but I suggest getting a hard case — especially if you plan to store your lenses in your golf bag.

And if you wear prescription glasses, the lenses are RX-ready so you can have them made into prescription sunglasses without any trouble. 

The only drawback I can find with these is that they’re definitely sports-focused and not the most stylish off the golf course. But we’re looking for golf sunglasses, so the Oakley Half-Jacket XL 2.0 is our top pick for 2019.

You can still burn when it’s cloudy out

Your dermatologist will tell you that if you’re spending a lot of time outdoors, you should still wear sunscreen on cloudy days. And by corollary, you should be wearing sunglasses too! The Callaway Sungear Kite sunglasses provide full UV protection from harmful rays even on cloudy days. Your eye doctor will certainly approve.

Good for finding the ball

An unexpected side benefit of the great lenses in the Callaway Sungear Kite sunglasses is that they make it easier to find your ball in the rough. The ball really pops out against the green grass thanks to the tuning of the lenses, so you’ll find your golf ball more quickly.

Full wind coverage

The full-wraparound design means your eyes are fully protected from aggressive winds and your full field of vision is behind the lenses. The adjustable nose pads ensure a good fit for all different face shapes and sizes. I’m not the biggest fan of the design, though it’s sleek enough and certainly won’t look out of place on the golf course.

Course only

The sports-focused wraparound design of the Sungear Kite sunglasses looks great on the golf course, but it doesn’t travel very well. The slightly clunky frames look like cheap plastic, but they actually perform much better than they look, and are a lot more comfortable too. They come with a hard case and a hanging clip so you can just leave them on your golf bag.

The lenses

They’ll do the trick and the price is certainly right, but I’d think about taking them off when you’re reading putts to make sure you’re getting a good look at the contours of the green.

The options

One nice aspect of the Under Armour Igniter sunglasses is that they come in several different color and lens combinations. 

The white and clear frames are definitely eye-catching and will appeal to golfers who like to dress with a bit more color and flair to their outfits. 

There’s a blue lens option that’s good in dim light as well. In addition to the blue option is an orange multiflection lens which I’m not a big fan of under normal circumstances, but can be useful when it’s dim out. 

The lens

I’m guessing what they mean by “High Definition” is that they don’t mute the colors of the golf course like gas-station sunglasses would do. And, wouldn’t you know it, they’re right about that. 

The lenses are a faint brown/gray and let a lot of brightness in while still protecting against all UVA and UVB rays. Usually I remove lower-quality lenses when reading greens but I found that wasn’t necessary with the Maxx Domains.

The drawbacks

There’s always a reason why a good product would be available at a much lower price than its competitors. 

Maxx has to cut corners somewhere, and they do so in the frame. The plastic is a bit more fragile and delicate than I like in my sunglasses, and they’re going to break before a more expensive pair. 

That’s just something that you’ll have to accept when it happens. But when you can afford to have 4 backup pairs for the price of one pair of Oakleys, maybe that’ll be worth it to you!

If you find yourself misplacing your sunglasses all the time, but you still want good performance, I’d suggest stocking up on Maxx Domain HD sunglasses. The lenses perform well.

The nose pads are a bit large and the ear pads may start to get a little uncomfortable at the end of your round, but the performance is still much better than expected.

Great for the beach, how about for golf?

The pair tested used the Maui Jim Rose lenses, a beautiful polarized lens that makes colors truly vibrant. 

The only lenses to truly rival the Oakley Prizm Golf lenses, the Maui Jims made green reading easier with their superior color filtering.

The slight wraparound design covers the field of view nicely and guards your eyes from the wind.

Replaceable lenses

Maui Jim offers a wide variety of lenses, much like Oakley, to cover you in numerous different situations. 

Go with a brighter lens on a dreary day to really brighten things up, or go dark if you’re playing desert golf under an aggressively bright sun.

Rock solid

The construction of Maui Jims is unparalleled. They’re sturdy and highly flexible, fitting beautifully and comfortably on your face but feeling quite sturdy at the same time. You’ll forget that you have them on after a few minutes.

For extremely good visual clarity and featherlight comfort, Maui Jims command a pretty high price tag. The lenses are polycarbonate so they do scratch easily, so I suggest keeping them in your hard case whenever they’re not on your face. 

There’s a reason Maui Jims are found in high-end golf courses’ pro shops: they’re top-of-the-line, and priced as such. 

Superlight

The O2O sunglasses are incredibly light. When you first put them on, you barely notice they’re there at all. 

The lenses aren’t going to win any clarity contests but they do the trick well enough, and the wraparound style gives you a consistent field of view.

After a while

The problem I kept running into with the O2Os was that despite the ultralight weight, the ear arms kept digging into the skin behind my ears and causing a dull, uncomfortable pain. 

I found myself taking the sunglasses off for a few holes and then putting them back on, only to have the pain come back after a half hour or so. 

For sunglasses designed to be worn for long stretches of time (as we all know, a round of golf can stretch past five hours), this discomfort didn’t sit very well with me. 
I do have a pretty large head size though, so if yours is smaller you may have more success with long-term wear of the O2Os.

Durability

The O2Os are reliable and not easy to break, as the plastic is remarkably flexible. And they come with a lifetime warranty backed by a good customer service reputation. 
The anti-scratch coating seems to work well, and the sunglasses will survive quite a few drops, bends and general abuses that may occur during a frustrating round of golf.

Better than most

Most wear-over or clip-on sunglasses are either extremely dark or distractingly large. The Jiangtun wear-overs are as small as any I came across, and when paired with a low-profile pair of glasses, didn’t look as absurd as other styles I tried. 

I went with the brown lens, which represented colors fairly well but didn’t compare to the sports-focused sunglasses available.

These stay in place much better than any other wear-overs I tried. I should warn you, they’re fairly small so if you have a large frame (think Clark Kent), they may not work. 

Comfort-wise they’re good enough to get through a round of golf on a sunny day. At a very attractive price, these are a great backup to keep on hand.

Accessories

A surprising perk at this price point is the inclusion of a soft case, a hard case and a cleaning cloth. These are a good pair to stash in your golf bag and forget about until you need them, and then you’ll be glad you have them.

Form over function

The Adidas Arriba sunglasses won’t offer you the visual clarity of Oakleys or Maui Jims, but they’re an attractive pair of sunglasses for golfers who like to look good on and off the course. 

They’re incredibly comfortable and lightweight, seeming to float on your face while barely making contact with your nose and ears.

There’s a particularly unique looking green option with a green mirrored lens that I loved the look of, but found the green tint of the lenses to be utterly useless on the golf course. 

It made everything monochrome and got in the way of being able to read the greens. The green tint even made it harder to find golf balls! So I’d suggest sticking to the more traditional grey lens. 

Durability

Maybe it’s the lack of frame, but these just don’t seem as durable as the offerings from the other major manufacturers. 

Dropping them on a cart path could easily crack the lens, at which point the whole thing is rendered useless. So be careful with these, and keep them in a hard case when you’re not wearing them.

Can I just use a yellow ball?

Well, yes. You can certainly use a yellow ball, and more and more manufacturers are offering a yellow option. But I’m not a big fan of using a colored ball on the course — to each their own, it’s just not for me. 

How do these sunglasses work?

I was surprised to find that the MyUV Golf Ball Finders actually did a pretty darn good job of helping find golf balls. 

They block out the pervasive blue rays from the sun, which are highly reflective and cause white balls to blend into the background. So it was not only easier to find the ball once it was on the ground, it was easier to track it during its flight against the big blue sky.

Are they useful elsewhere?

The blue-hued lenses, much like the green lenses of the Adidas sunglasses reviewed above, sure made the green look odd. It’s remarkable how much a golfer uses the hues of the green to help them read both break and speed. 

I never quite realized it until I started using these sunglasses that aren’t made with ultra-fine-tuned lenses specifically engineered to help golfers read greens.

The green just looked flat through these, and I had to take them off when chipping and putting. But the money and time they’ll save you in finding lost desert golf balls more than makes up for any annoyance of having to remove them at the green.

If you play a lot of desert golf, it behooves you to look into these blue-tinted Golf Ball Finders.