Future Japan Trip Planning

[Phantom]

It is my understanding with the JR Pass to get on a shinkansen all I do is have to feed it into the gate and collect it as I go through and then I am able to get on in the unreserved section of the train. If my ticket is asked for the JR Pass is all they need to see if I'm in unreserved, correct?

However, if I want to get a seat in the reserved section I just have to use my JR Pass at a ticket machine which will then give me a reserved ticket. As far as I can tell only the JR Pass would be used to go through the gates and this reserved ticket is not used when going through the gates? Is it used at any other point or is it just a proof of purchase type thing if my ticket is asked for in the reserved section?

How do local trains work? If I were to get on a local train between Yamagata and Fukushima do I need to get an additional ticket? Or are they all unreserved and I can simply get on with my JR Pass?

Also, what is the best way to go about purchasing the JR Pass? I have seen online that my ways to reserve are less limited buying direct through JR so I will probably do that. More or less just asking if there are any logistical tips in getting and activating it I guess.

At this time, I think in the period when I will have an active JR Pass the only trains I will be using are Shinkansen and local JR. My first and last day will likely use Skyliner, JR local and Keisei local. I may want to get an IC/Suica card for those locals? I'm not very familiar with IC/Suica, but I understand one can be used to buy things like food in some places?

Edited February 8 by Phantom

[Tony Galiani]

The Suica Card can be used at many stores including combinis.  The JR East web site has a list of the places where it can be used.

Personally, I have moved to an eSuica stored on my phone as it is easier to recharge but that is just preference as both the card or the electronic version are easy to use.

Tony

[Gunzel]

You are correct about JR Pass and unreserved seats, and how the reserved seat tickets work with it. Reserved seat ticket with JR Pass is only really shown now if there is some problem (you’re in the wrong seat, someone else is in your seat, for some reason your reservation has not made it to the conductor’s device), or if you need to cancel or change your reservation (you can’t reserve a seat that would cross over with another reservation you already have, this didn’t used to be the case), but of course you need to have it. 
 

Local trains work like unreserved seats on the Shinkansen, just use the pass. 
 

Buying JR Pass online is the way to go now. You can buy and start booking 30 days ahead. Book and choose seats online. You can book from the machine however you buy the pass, but in my opinion it’s not as god as online, and you can only start doing it once you’re in Japan and have exchanged the pass. 
 

I usually arrange my travel so I don’t have to pick up the pass at Narita, as it’s usually pretty busy, but if you want to catch Narita Express that doesn’t work. 
 

IC cards are very useful. You can use them for travel, payments at many shops (especially those located in/around stations), vending

machines, luggage lockers etc. I understand there is still a shortage of physical cards, although the 28 day ones for tourists are available, but if you intend going back again these are a bit wasteful as you will need to purchase again. I transferred my Suica card to my iPhone a while ago, I believe you can provision a new Suica/PASSMO/ICOCA directly now to an iPhone, I think Android is more difficult because many (most?) non-Japan market phones don’t include the requisite hardware.

[chadbag]

Adding a Suica/ICOCA/Pasmo directly to your iPhone or Apple Watch is super easy and the way to go if your iPhone based.  Note if you want one on your watch it’s a different and separate card from the one on your phone.  
 

It doesn’t really matter which one you get though I’d stick with Suica or ICOCA which are sponsored by JR East and JR West respectively.  I think Pasmo is sponsored by a bus company?  They all use the same backend.  At least the Suica and ICOCA do.  And you can use them in most aces across Japan no matter which one. 

[UnfinishedKit]

Pasmo is by the Tokyo subway a Toei subway. It’s really doesn’t matter though as they are all completely interchangeable. 
 

A few other things to note - amthe National JR pass is not as great a deal as it used to be so it it might be worth looking at the regional passes or just buying tickets. Advanced purchase fares on the Shinkansen can be quite good and you can load them onto your mobile Suica, albeit only through the Japanese version of ekinet for JREast fares. There was a small extra discount for not getting a paper ticket as well. 
 

JREast and JRWest also both operate loyalty schemes attached to using Suica and ICOCA respectively. Can’t comment on the JRWest one but the JR East pays you back 1-2% for your spend in stations using the attached Suica, you just load it back onto your card once you hit 500円. Turns out I can spend quite a lot in stations, Hasegawa Sake in Tokyo, Kimijimaya liquor in Ebisu, the supermarket in Ebisu have all taken a chunk of my money. And don’t forget the New Days underground in the south west corner of Tokyo Station has quite a lot of railway merch, sometimes has limited edition Tomix diorama collection stuff plus is the place to get stamp rally books if there is a JR related one on.  Maybe not worth it for a single trip or if you’re not in JRE territory but I’ve earnt a few free lunches out of it. Again, Japanese site only and it’s not accessible outside Japanese, or inside Japan if you use a roaming sim. Use a VPN to make it work if it doesn’t. 

[Phantom]

5 hours ago, Gunzel said:

You are correct about JR Pass and unreserved seats, and how the reserved seat tickets work with it. Reserved seat ticket with JR Pass is only really shown now if there is some problem (you’re in the wrong seat, someone else is in your seat, for some reason your reservation has not made it to the conductor’s device), or if you need to cancel or change your reservation (you can’t reserve a seat that would cross over with another reservation you already have, this didn’t used to be the case), but of course you need to have it. 
 

Local trains work like unreserved seats on the Shinkansen, just use the pass. 
 

Thanks! I will still have to make some reservations though, if I recall correctly the Yamagata shinkansen in reservation only. I assume the JR Pass is also usable as a platform ticket to watch trains without any travel planned?

 

5 hours ago, Gunzel said:

I usually arrange my travel so I don’t have to pick up the pass at Narita, as it’s usually pretty busy, but if you want to catch Narita Express that doesn’t work. 

Where do you generally get it? Is it available at most major stations, like Ueno for example?

 

3 hours ago, chadbag said:

Adding a Suica/ICOCA/Pasmo directly to your iPhone or Apple Watch is super easy and the way to go if your iPhone based.  Note if you want one on your watch it’s a different and separate card from the one on your phone.  
 

It doesn’t really matter which one you get though I’d stick with Suica or ICOCA which are sponsored by JR East and JR West respectively.  I think Pasmo is sponsored by a bus company?  They all use the same backend.  At least the Suica and ICOCA do.  And you can use them in most aces across Japan no matter which one. 

Im not on apple unfortunately. Does Suica also work for Keisei? If not, I may just go cash for those trips. Trips not covered by JR Pass will be one skyliner trip on one day and an additional skyliner trip and some locals around Tokyo on another day. I can pay for Hotel, JR Pass etc ahead of time and I'm not sure how many places a credit card can work so I may plan for the majority of my spending to be cash just in case.

 

1 hour ago, UnfinishedKit said:

A few other things to note - amthe National JR pass is not as great a deal as it used to be so it it might be worth looking at the regional passes or just buying tickets. Advanced purchase fares on the Shinkansen can be quite good and you can load them onto your mobile Suica, albeit only through the Japanese version of ekinet for JREast fares. There was a small extra discount for not getting a paper ticket as well. 
 

The kanto-tohoku pass is not available for 7 days and I don't think it gets to Yamagata either. I think I'm stuck with the national pass. The kyushu and western passes do look like they could be quite good on a future trip though.

[UnfinishedKit]

56 minutes ago, Phantom said:

4 hours ago, chadbag said:

Im not on apple unfortunately. Does Suica also work for Keisei? If not, I may just go cash for those trips. Trips not covered by JR Pass will be one skyliner trip on one day and an additional skyliner trip and some locals around Tokyo on another day. I can pay for Hotel, JR Pass etc ahead of time and I'm not sure how many places a credit card can work so I may plan for the majority of my spending to be cash just in case.

All ICCard brands work on all transport systems that take ICCards. It does not matter whose you have. You can charge them all at anyone’s top up machines as well
 

Many Android phones also do mobile suica, however it depends which one you have. Apple have been pretty consistent in installing the felica chip to make it work for about 5 years now. I’d imagine most Android brands are similar but I don’t know. 
 

As for payments in general, foreign credit cards are much better accepted now than before COVID. With tap and go pretty universal where they are accepted. There’s still a few anomalies, the main one being charging a physical ICCard requires cash, mobile you can charge with a card.  Some small shops and restaurants will be cash only or only do digital payments with PayPay which is much harder for foreigners to set up. Rural and small town busses can be cash only (also an odd one from a few years back, the JR train that runs north from Nagano to Nozawa runs over the Nagaden tracks for a few kilometres and so we had to pay 50円　supplement to the driver 「ワンマン」on top of our JR passes for that).

 

I don’t think I’ve run into anything like that is digital payments only; as is becoming more common down here in Australia. you’ll be fine with just cash, although I’d recommend buying a taller wallet if you have a short one for USD, AUD or other skinny currency, if only to avoid the shame of paying with crumpled bills, (nice souvenir as well, I got a lovely orange Porter one in Shinagawa station which I use on the increasingly rare occasions I need to carry a wallet)
 

 

[UnfinishedKit]

I would check that your hotels are paid in advance. The place we stay when we go skiing in Zao is cash only. (or bank transfer, can use Wise for that). I book that through booking.com but they don’t seem to be hooked into the payment system. No particular worry with that, just have to remember to go to Lawson before checkout in that case but it’s good to be prepared. 

[Phantom]

7 minutes ago, UnfinishedKit said:

I would check that your hotels are paid in advance. The place we stay when we go skiing in Zao is cash only. (or bank transfer, can use Wise for that). I book that through booking.com but they don’t seem to be hooked into the payment system. No particular worry with that, just have to remember to go to Lawson before checkout in that case but it’s good to be prepared. 

Do you mean that the payment is done when you checkout of the hotel? I'm going to do my best to make sure they are paid ahead of time as that greatly simplifies things. No worrying about figuring out how to do it/when to do it when I get there.

[Phantom]

17 minutes ago, UnfinishedKit said:

All ICCard brands work on all transport systems that take ICCards. It does not matter whose you have. You can charge them all at anyone’s top up machines as well
 

Many Android phones also do mobile suica, however it depends which one you have. Apple have been pretty consistent in installing the felica chip to make it work for about 5 years now. I’d imagine most Android brands are similar but I don’t know. 

I think I will see about getting a suica then.

[UnfinishedKit]

20 minutes ago, Phantom said:

Do you mean that the payment is done when you checkout of the hotel? I'm going to do my best to make sure they are paid ahead of time as that greatly simplifies things. No worrying about figuring out how to do it/when to do it when I get there.

I’ve definitely stayed at a bunch of places that are pay on arrival or pay when you leave. Notable one is the villa fontaine grand at Haneda airport, if only because I stayed there in December and May last year. Booked through booking.com, no advanced payment rate available, pay (through a very annoying kiosk check in unit on arrival), pay incidentals on departure.
 

A lot of business hotels are like this - Tokyu stay is my go to brand in Tokyo and they are pay on arrival IIRC. 

[Kingmeow]

6 hours ago, UnfinishedKit said:

Many Android phones also do mobile suica, however it depends which one you have. Apple have been pretty consistent in installing the felica chip to make it work for about 5 years now. I’d imagine most Android brands are similar but I don’t know. 

 

From what I heard, only Android phones purchased in Japan will work with mobile Suica.  Outside Japan Android phones will not work.  I don't know the tech behind it.  Something about not having the proper hardware and/or software.

 

Also, if you are in the US, take a look at Klook(.com).  They have a lot of Japan discounts, including JR Pass.  BUT, because the pass went up in price by 70% a year or so ago, it may not be worth it even with a Klook discount.  Our first trip in Fall 2023 we got the JR Pass (7-day) and it was awesome.  On our second trip in Fall 2024 we did some calculations and it wasn't worth it any more due to the price increase.  We basically purchased Shinkansen tickets a la carte.

[Phantom]

5 hours ago, Kingmeow said:

Also, if you are in the US, take a look at Klook(.com).  They have a lot of Japan discounts, including JR Pass.  BUT, because the pass went up in price by 70% a year or so ago, it may not be worth it even with a Klook discount.  Our first trip in Fall 2023 we got the JR Pass (7-day) and it was awesome.  On our second trip in Fall 2024 we did some calculations and it wasn't worth it any more due to the price increase.  We basically purchased Shinkansen tickets a la carte.

I'm probably just going to get it direct from JR (apparently you can do online reservations this way??). I will get my money's worth out of it. I'm not sure if I will end up saving much, but I am confident I will use its value. Even if I didn't quite fully get its worth the convenience of being able to hop on any unreserved train will probably be worth it for my plan.



On a side note, regarding the forms provided to you on plane discussed earlier here, apparently you need to make an account to do it digitally and I think it might just be easier to prep ahead of time the info I need to fill it out and then just do it on the plane.

[UnfinishedKit]

5 hours ago, Kingmeow said:

From what I heard, only Android phones purchased in Japan will work with mobile Suica.  Outside Japan Android phones will not work.  I don't know the tech behind it.  Something about not having the proper hardware and/or software.

Never had an Android phone. The feature you are looking for is FeLiCa, it runs the IC card systems not just in Japan but also in Hong Kong and a few other places. When Apple first launched the feature it was only available in ‘Japanese’ iPhones but Apple sells the same phones in a lot of markets, alll you had to do was switch the phone region to Japan, enable the Suica and then switch back to your home region and it would work. 
 

4 minutes ago, Phantom said:

On a side note, regarding the forms provided to you on plane discussed earlier here, apparently you need to make an account to do it digitally and I think it might just be easier to prep ahead of time the info I need to fill it out and then just do it on the plane.

Yes much easier to do on Visit Japan Web than do it on paper. Once you have done the process take a screenshot of the QR code it generates just in case you don’t get signal when you land (or are going to purchase a physical SIM, rather than roam or purchase an eSIM). 
 

The other thing with the JR pass is that I’ve seen people tie themselves in knots trying to use JR when there’s a private train, subway or bus that’s more convenient. Especially in tokyo and Osaka/Kyoto the private operators go more places than JR. 

 

And from a strictly train nerd perspective you may want to maximise your opportunities to ride different railways.  If I’m going to Odawara I absolutely want to ride the Odakyu Romance Car one way and the JR Superview Odoriko the other. One is on the pass and one isn’t. 

 

 

[Phantom]

Just now, UnfinishedKit said:

The other thing with the JR pass is that I’ve seen people tie themselves in knots trying to use JR when there’s a private train, subway or bus that’s more convenient. Especially in tokyo and Osaka/Kyoto the private operators go more places than JR. 

 

And from a strictly train nerd perspective you may want to maximise your opportunities to ride different railways.  If I’m going to Odawara I absolutely want to ride the Odakyu Romance Car one way and the JR Superview Odoriko the other. One is on the pass and one isn’t.

Only private railway I have plans for currently is Keisei on days the pass wouldnt be active anyways. I agree though, I am mostly just focusing on shinkansen for this trip.

[RS18U]

On 2/8/2025 at 5:36 PM, Gunzel said:

I understand there is still a shortage of physical cards

I had no issues getting 2 cards, one for me and one for my wife, in November.  Got them at Tokyo Station and made good use of mine while I was there.  Very handy to get water at vending machines.  I have an Android so have physical cards, but did download CardReader so I can keep track of the balances.

[Phantom]

55 minutes ago, RS18U said:

I had no issues getting 2 cards, one for me and one for my wife, in November.  Got them at Tokyo Station and made good use of mine while I was there.  Very handy to get water at vending machines.  I have an Android so have physical cards, but did download CardReader so I can keep track of the balances.

Is the app literally called "CardReader"?

[chadbag]

21 hours ago, Phantom said:

I think I will see about getting a suica then.

 

Yes a Suica card is worth having.  Most all transport, regardless of company, work with the IC cards like SUica, ICOCA, Pasmo, etc.  There are a few odd ones that don't but I've never run into them.  JR or private railway.

 

Unless you get the 28 day tourist version, the normal one will keep a balance up to something like 10 years? after last use, so you can leave any remaining money on it when you leave and have it when you go back.  There is something like a 500 yen deposit you pay when you get the card, and can get back when you turn the card back in (if you ever do) but if you do trun it in, unused balances are lost as I understand it.  I've ket our physical cards even though we almost exclusively use the ones on our iPhone and Apple Watches.  I tell the kids to use up any balance at a vending machine or store.

 

[Phantom]

From what I have found online the timetable book is >1kg which is probably unreasonable for how I'm packing. Do they sell timetables for just JR East or just shinkansen?

[kuro68000]

6 hours ago, Phantom said:

Is the app literally called "CardReader"?

 

There are a few...

 

CardReader: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=digital.cardreader&hl=en

Suikakeibo: https://play.google.com/store/search?q=suikakeibo&c=apps&hl=en

Metrodroid: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=au.id.micolous.farebot

 

You have to remember to scan your card regularly because it only stores the last 20 transactions.

 

Suikakeibo has interesting stats but makes you pay to export the data in a useful way. CardReader is probably the most useful, it outputs to plain text and CSV.

 

According to Suikakeibo I travelled over 2,500km on public transport on my last trip, but that doesn't include shinkansen and I'm not sure how accurate things like bus routes are.

[kuro68000]

5 hours ago, chadbag said:

 

Yes a Suica card is worth having.  Most all transport, regardless of company, work with the IC cards like SUica, ICOCA, Pasmo, etc.  There are a few odd ones that don't but I've never run into them.  JR or private railway.

 

I've found that Suica doesn't work on some buses. From memory I had problems in Mito and Niigata. Next time I might investigate what cards work there because using cash was a real pain.

[RS18U]

10 hours ago, Phantom said:

Is the app literally called "CardReader"?

From the Play Store:

 

[chadbag]

4 hours ago, kuro68000 said:

 

I've found that Suica doesn't work on some buses. From memory I had problems in Mito and Niigata. Next time I might investigate what cards work there because using cash was a real pain.

 

Yeah local busses may be hit or miss.  I may have ridden busses that didn't take IC cards.  I don't remember recently having the issue and the bus we used to take a lot we no longer do since my MIL passed and we base at my wife's sister's place now.  Always good to have a small amount of cash on you.

 

[Tony Galiani]

As promised, here are cover shots of the freight annual I found at Book Off in Shinjuku.

Hope this is helpful.

Tony

[Tony Galiani]

Want to include this page as well.  My iPhone tells me it says something to the effect that this is the original freight schedule for JR and local railways.

Both issues have maps with freight flows for the entire network but I only saw schedule pages in the 2023-2024 issue.  There may be more info buried in there that I cannot read.

TBH, I have not parsed through all the schedule pages but hope this helps.

Tony