Golf cart tires, wheels and lift kits

Every tire and wheel decision on this page comes back to one number: the overall height of the tire. Stock is 18 inches. Get to about 20 and you are at the limit of what most carts clear without a lift. Past that, you are buying a lift kit before you buy tires.

How to read a tire size

Golf cart tires use two formats and they say the same things in different orders.

The stock format is height by width by wheel: 18x8.50-8 is 18 inches tall overall, 8.5 inches wide, for an 8 inch wheel. A 22x11-10 is 22 tall, 11 wide, on a 10 inch wheel. Easy.

Street tires use the car format: 215/40-12 is 215 mm wide, the sidewall is 40 percent of that width, on a 12 inch wheel. To get the height, double the sidewall (215 x 0.40 x 2 = 172 mm, about 6.8 inches) and add the wheel (12). That is about 18.8 inches overall. A 205/50-10 works out to about 18.1 inches; a 215/35-14 to about 19.9. Those three are the sizes that fit most carts without a lift, which is why they are everywhere.

Turf, street or all-terrain

Turf tires are the stock tread: shallow, wide, soft. They are the right tire if the cart lives on a course or a lawn and the wrong one for pavement, where they wear fast and squirm in corners.

Street tires (sometimes sold as “low profile”) have a car-style tread on a short sidewall. They roll quietly, corner better and last longer on asphalt. This is the tire for a cart used as a second car in a neighborhood, and the golf cart wheels guide is organized around them.

All-terrain tires have a deep, open tread for sand, gravel and wet grass. They are heavier and louder on pavement and cost a little range. A 20x10-10 all-terrain is the biggest you can usually run without a lift; the 22 and 23 inch sizes are lifted-cart tires.

DOT and load ratings

A turf tire is not a highway tire and most are not DOT marked. If you are making the cart street legal, or registering it as an LSV, a DOT-approved tire is on the list in most places, and street tires from Kenda, Arisun, GTW and the other common brands carry the stamp. Check the sidewall for “DOT” before you buy for a cart that will see a public road. The street-legal pages cover the rest of that list.

Load range matters less than people think. A standard four-seat cart with four adults weighs about 1,500 pounds, so under 400 pounds per tire; any golf cart tire rated load range B or better is fine. Six-seaters and carts that tow should look for load range C.

What fits without a lift

On a stock Club Car Precedent or Yamaha Drive, 10 and 12 inch wheels with the matching street tires fit without touching anything. 14 inch wheels with 215/35-14 tires (about 20 inches tall) usually fit as well, with the occasional rub at full lock on a loaded cart. The Precedent clears 20x10-10 all-terrains on most carts.

The EZGO TXT is the tight one. The front body sits closer to the tire, so owners generally stop at 12 inch wheels and 18.8 inch tires without a lift, and go to a 3 inch spindle lift before trying anything taller. The RXV is similar at the front and needs its own kits for everything.

Wheel offset is the other variable. Most 10 and 12 inch cart wheels are sold in a 3:4 offset (3 inches inboard of the mounting face, 4 outboard), which pushes the tire out slightly and is what the non-lifted sizes above assume. A centered or deeper offset can change clearance in either direction, so if a combo is sold as “non-lifted” it is the offset as well as the tire that makes it so.

Lifted combos

Once you lift, the usual pairings are a 3 inch spindle lift with 20 or 22 inch tires on 10 inch wheels, and a 4 to 6 inch A-arm lift with 22x11-10, 23x10-12 or 23x10-14 tires. The lift kit guide has a table of what each kit clears. Buy the lift first, fit the wheels and tires second; a 23 inch tire sitting in the garage is the wrong order.

Bolt pattern is 4x4 on all three makes, so the wheel itself fits whatever you drive. Lug nuts are 1/2-20 on Club Car and EZGO and 12mm x 1.25 on Yamaha; check which your combo ships with. If you are not sure which cart you have, the fitment finder works from the serial plate.