White Oak is one of the smaller access areas of Jordan Lake State Recreation Area, on the east shore of B. Everett Jordan Lake in Chatham County. It sits just north of US 64, a few hundred yards up White Oak Beach Road from the highway and close to the park visitor center on State Park Road. The mailing address says Apex, but the town itself is roughly nine miles east. The parking lot is a short walk from the sand, and a boat ramp sits a little north of the beach.

The beach is a narrow crescent of sand in a small cove rather than a long open strand. NC State Parks describes White Oak as a large rental facility for up to 500 people, with a swim beach, boat ramp, volleyball courts and horseshoe pits, and the area is built around one very large group picnic shelter. The whole area can be reserved by a single group, and when it is, the gate is closed to everyone else.

When it is not booked, White Oak opens for public day use on weekends and holidays only, during a short season. For 2026 that season runs April 4 through September 28, and the park has posted April 3 through September 28 for 2027. Outside those dates it opens only for rentals. Day-use gates at Jordan Lake open at 8 a.m. and close at 8 p.m. in April and September and at 9 p.m. from May through August, and staff lock them promptly. Calling the visitor center at 919-362-0586 before a trip is the easiest way to find out whether a weekend is taken.

Jordan Lake charges a vehicle entrance fee of $10 per day, or $5 when a senior 62 or older or a military member or veteran is in the car. The fee applies on weekends and holidays in April, May and September and every day from Memorial Day to Labor Day, which means every day White Oak is open to the public is a fee day. A seasonal parking pass covering one vehicle per day at Jordan Lake, Falls Lake and Kerr Lake costs $70 for 2026 and is sold only at those parks' visitor centers. Pets are allowed in the park on a six-foot leash but not on the swim beaches.

The park's White Oak listing does not mention lifeguards, so plan on watching your own group. Shade on the sand is limited, so bring your own. For water quality, the Haw River Assembly samples popular swimming spots in the Haw River watershed for E. coli every week from Memorial Day to Labor Day and posts results on Swim Guide, where White Oak has its own listing.

The lake itself is a US Army Corps of Engineers reservoir. A damaging tropical storm in September 1945 pushed the flood control project that became the B. Everett Jordan Dam, and the Corps dammed and flooded the Haw and New Hope rivers between 1973 and 1983. At normal pool the lake covers about 13,940 acres with roughly 180 miles of shoreline, averages about 14 feet deep, and supplies drinking water to Cary, Apex, Durham and other Triangle towns. The state recreation area around it dates to 1981.

NC State Parks says Jordan Lake hosts the largest summer concentration of bald eagles east of the Mississippi River, with around 26 to 28 nesting pairs here in winter. The park points eagle watchers to New Hope Overlook and to Shelter 1 at Ebenezer Church, both a short drive south of White Oak.