Amazon Basics Golf Ball Review: Is Amazon's viral $1 ball actually any good?

Given the rising cost of living over the last few years, it probably shouldn't come as a surprise that one of the biggest equipment stories of the year ended up being Amazon releasing a $1 golf ball.

Even so though, it's fair to say the virality of the surprise release probably caught even the e-commerce giant off guard, with media outlets even outside of the golf industry picking up on the release and golfers from both sides of the pond instantly rushing to secure a dozen for themselves.

Some dozen packs are even selling for close to double their retail price on eBay, which is odd given they're still in stock on Amazon itself.

The question on everyone's lips, however, is simple: is the Amazon Basics golf ball, dubbed the Core Soft, any good? And if so, can it present a real challenge to the best beginner golf balls out there?

To find out, we hit the simulator at one of London's leading indoor golf centres, TeeGo Angel, bringing along a pair of leading two-piece competitor golf balls in Wilson's Duo Soft and Titleist's TruFeel for comparison. Here's what we thought.

Looks and features

Let's start, aptly, with the basics. Indeed, the Amazon Basics Golf Ball is basic both by name and by nature, designed not to compete with the most premium balls on the market in the manner of the much-loved Kirkland Signature golf ball, but rather provide an affordable, simple and easy to hit ball for a wider range of players. 

There's very little here in the way of fancy tech or showy branding. It has a simple Amazon arrow logo denoting the brand, as well as a simple alignment aid to help with lining up putts. It's utterly inoffensive, but if you're the kind of person who finds looking down at a more premium brand's logo inspiring, it might look a bit too minimal for your eye.

This minimalist approach continues with the ball's construction and intent. This is very much a basic, two-piece soft feel golf ball in the vein of models like Titleist's TruFeel, Callaway's SuperSoft and Srixon's AD333. It has a soft, durable ionomer cover generating a reasonable amount of greenside spin, layered over a single low compression core to aid ball speed and distance for players across the swing speed spectrum.

Made by the same factory that produces balls for Kirkland and PXG, the Core Soft does, according to the boffins at MyGolfSpy, have a couple of small quirks that help it stand out from the pack of entry-level golf balls. Most notably it's among the smallest diameter ionomer golf balls around, which theoretically should aid performance compared to most entry-level balls, which tend to be on the larger side (if imperceptibly).

Aside from that, the Core Soft slots in very neatly among its more expensive competitors in metrics like weight and compression, which as we found out upon hitting it, made it a surprisingly adept performer.

Performance

We were fully prepared for the Amazon Basics Golf Ball to perform towards the bottom of the pack even by the standards of entry-level soft feel golf balls, but that simply wasn't the case. Rather, in just about every metric it performed exactly how you'd expect a more expensive two ball to.

To give the Basics ball a fair test, we hit a number of shots with a variety of clubs with the Core Soft, Wilson's ultra-low compression Duo Soft and Titleist's slightly more premium TruFeel, testing metrics like launch angle, spin rate and distance to see how it fared. Suffice it to say were impressed given the price, but not entirely overwhelmed with excitement.

The Core Soft feels, given the low compression, soft and supple off most clubs, with a solid amount of feedback that prevents it feeling overly mushy at faster speeds. It also fell basically right in the middle of the Duo Soft and the TruFeel (in our opinion the best performing two-piece ball you can buy) in terms of overall performance.

All of this comes with the caveat that as a mid-handicapper my own swing leaves some natural margin for error here, but given the Core Soft is distinctly aimed at golfers like me and even towards the higher handicaps, I can say with reasonable authority that for this level of golfer the Amazon Basics is both easy to hit and an able performer compared to models that'll generally set you back more than £10 more per dozen.

Should you buy the Amazon Basics Golf Ball?

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Amazon Basics Core Soft Golf Balls, 12-Packfrom £17.06 at amazon.uk

After spending an hour or so hitting the Amazon Basics Golf Balls against its more expensive competitors, I left with the distinct feeling that it could well end up being a bit of a game changer in the beginner golf ball market.

While its performance is by no means spectacular, its soft feel and reasonable performance numbers, even in the hands of a rank amateur, more than stands up to that of the premium brands and ticks every box you'd expect of a big name two-piece golf ball, making it a near irresistible bargain at its price point.

While some two-piece golf balls, like Titleist's TruFeel as you can see above, have the Core Soft Bested in terms of short game performance, for the vast majority of golfers simply wanting an affordable, reliable option that they won't miss too much if they hit a few into the trees, the Amazon Basics Golf Ball will cut the mustard and then some.

As such, I think we can safely expect to see plenty of these out on our local municipal courses in the years to come.