What are Golf Towels Used for? (Explained!) 

Although often overlooked, golf towels are actually one of the most important pieces of equipment that any golfer owns. Most players hang their towels from outside of their bags, while others keep them in one of the pockets.

In the sections that follow, we explain in detail why golf towels are such a key component of your golf kit. We inform you how best to use them and recommend the best golf towel material.

By the end of this article, you will have a newfound respect for the humble golf towel and recognize the important role it plays in keeping your equipment in top shape.

What Do You Use a Golf Towel For?

A golf towel is an important part of your kit as it allows you to wipe your clubs clean after every shot. When you take a divot, you can use your towel to wipe the mud, sand, and other debris from your clubface, which ensures your club is ready for your next shot.

If you don’t wipe your club clean, you risk mishitting your next shot! This is because mud and sand will remain on the face and can cause the ball to deviate upon impact.

Although it’s a really small step to take, wiping your clubs clean with a towel is super important.

A towel is also really important when you’re playing golf in the rain. If your grips become wet, it’s a lot more difficult to control your shots, and the club may even slip out of your hands.

Having a towel on hand enables you to dry your grips before taking a shot.

Finally, a golf towel is used to wipe your clubs down after a round. In most instances, you don’t need to wash your clubs after playing, so using a towel to wipe any mud from the shafts, grips, and club faces will be more than sufficient.

Now that you know the basics let’s take a look at some of the specifics regarding golf towels so you can pick up the right product to hang from your bag.

What Kind of Towels Do You Use for Golf?

The best type of towel to use for golf is a microfiber towel. Microfiber towels are excellent for trapping dirt, removing it from the face of your clubs, and allowing you to get every last dirt particle from within the grooves of your clubface.

Microfiber towels are also great at absorbing water, and they dry much more quickly than standard cotton towels.

This is handy if you’re playing golf in the rain, as you don’t need to worry about your towel becoming sodden after a heavy downpour.

Another good thing about microfibre towels is that they’re durable and tend to last much longer than standard cotton towels.

If you’ve used a cotton towel in the past, you will have noticed that it has only been good for a couple of rounds before needing to be replaced.

The good news is that you can buy microfiber golf towels from all of the biggest brands in golf and a range of niche retailers. Whether you want a PING, Callaway, or TaylorMade microfiber golf towel to add to your bag, you can easily find one.

How Do You Use a Golf Towel?

Using a golf towel is simple. Your first job is to attach it to the outside of your bag, ideally on a loop or clip so that it hangs from your bag. You then use it to wipe your club clean in a matter of seconds before returning your club to the bag.

This saves you from having to open up your bag every time you want to wipe your clubs down.

When the golf towel is hanging from your bag, For most golfers, these steps become like second nature and are part and parcel of the pre-shot routine. 

When you’re wiping the clubface, make sure you use the towel to remove as much dirt from the ridges as possible. Even a tiny particle of mud or sand can affect your next shot, so it’s really important to wipe the clubface clean before returning it to the bag.

Some golfers also keep one towel inside the bag, which can be used to dry the grips after a rain shower. This is perhaps the best way to go, as relying solely on one towel isn’t ideal if the weather changes mid-round!

Are Golf Towels Worth it?

Golf towels are definitely worth it. In fact, we would go as far as to say that they’re one of the most integral items you can carry in your golf bag. If you don’t wipe the clubface clean after a shot, you make life so much more difficult for yourself in terms of ball striking.

The same is true if you don’t bother drying your grips after a rain shower. It’s really tough to execute the perfect golf shot at the best of times, and trying to do so with a wet grip makes things that little bit harder.

You can also use your golf towel to wipe your ball clean when you’re on the green.

Removing any dirt, sand, and debris from your ball on the green will help you hit a straighter putt and will improve your chances of rolling the ball into the hole.

So, in other words, you should think of a towel as an essential item for your golf bag.

Given that they’re affordable and easy to hang from your bag, you would be doing yourself a disservice if you don’t pick one up to help keep your clubs clean throughout your round.

How Many Towels Should Be in a Golf Bag?

Most golfers have one golf towel in the bag. That being said, it’s a good idea to keep an extra one inside the bag, so you can dry your clubs if the weather changes. The towel on the outside of the bag should be used for wiping clean your clubs after every shot.

Then, if you get caught in a downpour, you can use the towel inside your golf bag to dry the grips and shafts of your clubs.

Granted, you don’t need to carry two golf towels, but because they’re so light and don’t take up a great deal of space, it’s undoubtedly worth the investment.

If you’re particularly well organized, you could keep a third golf towel in your locker.

You can use this one to wipe your clubs clean at the end of your round, as the towel hanging from your bag is likely to be pretty dirty by the time you finish eighteen.

Just remember that you need to take your towels home and launder them before returning to the course.

Few things are worse than a smelly, dirty towel hanging from the side of your golf bag, and they’re not likely to do you any favors when it comes to cleaning your equipment.

What Kind of Towels Do Caddies Use?

Most caddies use microfiber towels to clean their player’s clubs between shots. Microfiber towels are perfect for removing dirt and debris from golf clubs, and they’re good at absorbing water.

Caddies are tasked with keeping clubs pristine throughout the round, as professional players don’t want to see any dirt or sand on their club faces.

For this reason, most caddies on tour carry multiple towels to make sure they’re covered for every eventuality.

If you’ve ever watched a pro golf tournament, you’ve almost certainly seen a caddy pull out something similar to a beach towel when the rain has started in an attempt to dry the grips and shafts!

So, you can take inspiration from tour caddies and keep several towels in your bag. This will cover you from shot to shot and also when the rain starts falling.

After all, you don’t want to let the elements affect your ability to strike the ball well.

How Do You Tie a Golf Towel?

If your golf towel doesn’t come with a clip for whatever reason, you can attach some string to the corner of a standard towel and tie it onto your golf bag. Most golf towels have a corner label where you can loop the cord through and tie it to the bag.

Most golf bags come with various clips and loops that you can hang your towel from. In fact, many even come with a towel clip that is specifically for tying and hanging a golf towel from the outside of your bag.

What’s more, most golf towels come with clips that you can then attach to your golf bag, making the whole process entirely straightforward.

One other thing to remember when you’re tying a golf towel is to make sure that it’s high enough up on your bag so that it doesn’t trail on the ground.

This is particularly important if you have a stand bag, as you don’t want your towel to get dirty for no reason.

Conclusion

Now that you know what are golf towels used for, as well as how many and what kind you should have in your bag, it’s time to get a couple for your bag.

We can’t stress enough how important golf towels are for keeping your golf clubs clean. If you play shots with dirty clubs, it will be much more difficult to execute the shot that you desire, and your ball flight will suffer as a result.

You can buy golf towels from all golf retailers and specialist niche stores online, so you’re certainly not short of choice! 

The best towels are those that are made from microfibre, so make sure you do your research before settling on the ideal golf towel for your bag.