Do unused golf balls expire?
Not in any way a gift buyer needs to worry about. A modern golf ball is a solid core wrapped in durable plastic — there's nothing in it that spoils on a shelf. Stored in its box at normal room temperature, out of direct sun, a dozen balls will play the same in ten years as it does today. The idea that balls have a use-by date is mostly a hangover from very old wound-core balls, which genuinely did degrade over time; today's two-piece and multi-layer balls don't.
What actually degrades a golf ball
Two things, and neither happens in a cupboard. The first is use: a ball that's been hit hundreds of times, scuffed on cart paths or nicked by a wedge picks up surface damage that can affect flight. The second is a cut or crackthrough the cover, which does end a ball's useful life. A new, boxed ball has neither, which is why "fresh" isn't a spec you're paying for — you're paying for the brand and the construction.
The heat, cold and water myths — and truths
The conditions that do harm a ball are extreme and sustained, not everyday. Leaving balls in a car through a baking summer or a freezing winter, repeatedly, can affect the core over time — a golf bag in a hot trunk for one season is fine; years of it is the concern. Water is the real one: a ball that sits submerged in a pond for months slowly takes on moisture through the cover and can lose a little performance, which is why "lake balls" recovered from water hazards are sold cheap. A ball that spends five minutes in a water hazard before you fish it out is unaffected.
Old balls in a drawer or a pond
If a golfer unearths a dozen from a drawer that's been there for years, they're almost certainly fine to play — store-kept balls simply last. Recovered pond balls are a different story: they may look clean but have been submerged long enough to matter, so they're best treated as practice balls rather than gamers. As a gift, none of this is your problem — a sealed new dozen sidesteps all of it.
Why this makes balls a low-risk gift
The upshot is reassuring: golf balls are one of the safest gifts there is precisely because they don't spoil. You can buy them well ahead of an occasion, they'll keep indefinitely if the recipient doesn't get through them quickly, and there's no shelf-life clock ticking. The only real decisions are which type suits their swing and how many to buy — covered in compression explained and how many balls a golfer needs.