CityGolf USA Is Building the First 18-Hole Indoor Course in America

CityGolf USA announced this week that they’re building the first full 18-hole indoor simulator golf course in the United States, and they’re putting it in Nashville.

Not a sim bay. Not a virtual range with a couple screens. A full 18-hole indoor golf course, with actual simulator screens for full shots and 18 synthetic green complexes for chipping, pitching, bunker play, and putting. You walk the course, hole by hole. You hit real short-game shots onto real surfaces. The sim handles everything from the tee box to about 50 yards out.

This is not what we’ve seen before. For context on how indoor golf venues compare, see our sim venue format comparison guide and commercial golf simulator comparison 2026.

What CityGolf Actually Is

The concept comes from GOLFZON, the Korean company that dominates the Asian simulator market in a way that’s hard to overstate. Think about how many sim brands exist in the US — Garmin, Trackman, Foresight, Uneekor, SkyTrak, Rapsodo, Full Swing, FlightScope, Square Golf, Bushnell, ProTee. Now imagine one company with a bigger market cap than all of them combined, with proprietary hardware, software, course license deals, and a franchise network of 3,000-plus locations across Asia. That’s GOLFZON.

CityGolf is their premium concept. They already have two locations in China. The Tianjin location, which opened in September 2024, hosted nearly 10,000 rounds in 2025. As of June 2026, they’d already recorded 7,623 rounds this year. The math works at the unit level, and they’re bringing it to the US.

The Nashville location will have:

• 18 sequential holes with GOLFZON simulators for full shots
• 18 synthetic green complexes for chipping, pitching, bunker play, and putting
• A modern driving range with GOLFZON simulators
• Full restaurant and bar
• Retail pro shop
• Private event spaces
• PGA-certified professionals for lessons, leagues, and player development

Pricing is set at $60 to $125 per round depending on time of day, with the average round coming in under $100. For context, that’s about what you’d pay for a decent municipal course around Nashville, except you don’t need a tee time three weeks out and you can play at 9 PM in January.

The Key Partnership Structure

This is a joint venture between GOLFZON America and Nessie Capital, backed by Parlay Capital Holdings and the Tennessee Golf Foundation. Tony Graffia Jr. (Nessie Capital) is CEO of CityGolf USA. AJ Zahn is COO. The partnership model is worth noting because it’s not a franchise play in the traditional sense — it’s a strategic collaboration between a Korean tech giant, a US investment firm, and a local golf foundation that represents one of the game’s governing bodies.

That third party is significant. The Tennessee Golf Foundation doesn’t put their name on something unless they believe it grows the game. The Foundation’s mission is to make golf accessible and affordable across Tennessee, and CityGolf fits that brief in a way that a traditional country club or a standalone sim facility might not. An 18-hole round at under $100 in a city center, no membership required, with PGA instruction and junior programming built in — that’s a public good, not just a commercial venture.

Why This Matters for Everyone Who Cares About Sim Golf

Every time a facility like this opens, three things happen that directly affect the home sim market.

One, it normalizes the indoor experience. There are still millions of golfers who have never hit a ball into a simulator screen. They think it’s a video game. They don’t understand the accuracy or the immersion. When a place like CityGolf opens with 18 real greens and simulators that cost more than most people’s cars, those golfers walk in skeptical and walk out converted. They become the people who, six months later, start searching for “how to build a golf simulator at home.” For those ready to take the plunge, start with our best golf simulator for beginners guide or our complete guide to opening a sim venue.

Two, it creates a clear upgrade path. Most people won’t drop $5,000 on a home sim without trying it first. CityGolf gives them a $75 way to experience top-tier GOLFZON simulation with real short game. If they love it, they’re shopping. If they just like it, they’ll come back. Either way, the industry wins.

Three, it validates the thesis. The fact that GOLFZON — a company that could build sim facilities anywhere in the world — picked Nashville as its first US CityGolf location is data. It means they believe the US market for premium indoor golf is real, growing, and profitable enough to justify a seven-figure buildout with 18 simulators, 18 greens, and a full hospitality operation. When a Korean behemoth with 20 years of sim data makes that bet, you should pay attention.

How It Compares to Other Indoor Concepts

There is nothing quite like CityGolf in the US right now. Five Iron Golf and Golf VX are premium sim lounges with bars and events, but they’re bay-based — you rent a simulator, not a course. You don’t walk hole to hole hitting real pitches and putts. Golfzon has their own standard sim franchise (Golfzon Park) with hundreds of locations, but CityGolf is a tier above that — higher build quality, more real-golf elements, longer rounds, higher ticket.

The closest analogue is probably the short course movement or the “18-hole putting course” trend, but those are outdoor. CityGolf is fully indoor, climate-controlled, and open year-round.

For the home sim builder reading this: the fact that CityGolf exists means you can try a 18-hole sim round with actual short game before you build. The fact that they’re expanding nationally means the technology and the business model are both proven enough to attract serious capital. And the fact that GOLFZON thinks the US is ready for this should tell you everything you need to know about where indoor golf is headed in 2027 and beyond.

CityGolf USA hasn’t announced an opening date yet beyond the Nashville flagship. Founding memberships are available through their website. If you’re in or near Nashville, this is the closest thing to a real round of golf you’ll ever play indoors. And if you’re building a sim at home, this is your chance to see what the ceiling of the technology looks like — at least until they open one near you.