Practical

Japan by Train

The shinkansen is the least interesting train in Japan. What the fast line is actually for, when the rail pass stops making sense, and the small lines that are worth building a day around.

A green and cream tram-train running along a narrow street between houses — Kanagawa · April 2026

Japan's railways are two different things wearing the same uniform. There is the fast network — shinkansen and limited expresses — which exists to move you between cities and is very good at it and not much fun. And there is everything else: the commuter lines, the private railways and the single-track branches, which is where the country is actually visible from a window.

Most itineraries spend all their money on the first and none of their time on the second.

At a glance

Shinkansen: Tokyo–Kyoto 2h10, Tokyo–Osaka 2h30, Tokyo–Hakata about 5h
Reservations: Not needed on most shinkansen — unreserved cars exist on every service
IC card: Suica or Pasmo opens every gate on the local network nationwide
Luggage: Oversized bags need a reserved seat with luggage space on the Tokaido line
Rail pass: Worth it only with several long legs. Do the arithmetic, don't assume

What the fast line is for

The interior of a Green Car on a shinkansen with dark green seats in rows of two — A Green Car, two seats either side of the aisle instead of the usual two and three.Japan · September 2022

The shinkansen is a tool for deleting distance. Tokyo to Kyoto is two hours and ten minutes, city centre to city centre, with no security queue and a train every ten minutes. Nothing else in the country changes an itinerary as much.

What it is not is a scenic railway. The Tokaido line runs in cuttings, tunnels and sound barriers for most of its length, and the famous Fuji window lasts about forty seconds on a clear day, on the right-hand side heading west. Treat the ride as transit and read.

The Green Car — two seats either side of the aisle instead of two and three — costs roughly 30–50% more than ordinary class. On a two-hour run it is a comfortable luxury rather than a necessary one. On the five-hour run to Hakata it starts to look sensible.

The rail pass arithmetic

The nationwide Japan Rail Pass used to be an automatic purchase. It is not any more. After the 2023 price rise it only recovers its cost on an itinerary with several long legs — think Tokyo to Hiroshima and back, or Tokyo–Kyoto–Hakata–Tokyo inside a week.

A trip that stays between Tokyo and Kyoto, with a couple of day trips, almost always comes out cheaper on individual tickets. So does a trip based in one city.

Work it out properly: add up the single fares for the long legs you actually intend to take, and compare. Regional passes — the Kansai area, the Tohoku area, the JR East passes — frequently beat the national one, because they cost less and cover the ground you are really using.

The local trains are the point

A green and cream tram-train running down the middle of a narrow shopping street — The Enoden runs in the road for a few hundred metres at Koshigoe, between Kamakura and Enoshima.Kanagawa · April 2026

The Enoden, between Kamakura and Fujisawa, is ten kilometres long and takes thirty-four minutes. It runs along the coast, then turns inland and spends a few hundred metres in the middle of a shopping street at Koshigoe, close enough to the shopfronts to read the price labels. It costs a few hundred yen and it is a better hour than most paid attractions in Tokyo.

A JR commuter train with an orange and green stripe standing at a suburban platform — The orange-and-green band is the Shonan livery, the colour JR uses on the lines running south-west out of Tokyo.Kanagawa · April 2026

The same is true of ordinary JR lines once they leave the city. The Shonan colours — an orange and green band, named after the coast these trains serve — run down to Kamakura, Odawara and Atami on tracks that spend long stretches within sight of the sea. No supplement, no reservation, same IC card.

A single tram waiting at a crossing on a wet city street at night — Toyama's tram network is small, cheap and still the quickest way across the city centre.Toyama · February 2020

Then there are the tram cities. Toyama, Hiroshima, Kagoshima, Matsuyama, Hakodate and a handful of others kept their street railways when Tokyo tore its own up. They cost about ¥200 a ride, they take the IC card, and in each of those cities they go where you are going.

Practical things that save an hour

Use the IC card for everything local. Buying paper tickets from a machine for each local journey is the single most common way visitors waste time in Japan. Tap in, tap out.

Learn the words for the train types. Local (各駅/普通) stops everywhere; rapid (快速) and express (急行) skip stations; limited express (特急) needs an extra ticket. On private railways these are colour-coded on the platform display, and the fast one is often the same price as the slow one.

Check which station. Several cities have a JR station and a private-railway station with similar names in different places — Osaka's Umeda and Osaka, Kyoto's Kawaramachi and Kyoto, Nagoya's Meitetsu and JR halls. Your map app knows; your assumption does not.

Put large luggage ahead of you. On the Tokaido, Sanyo and Kyushu shinkansen, bags over 160 cm combined require a reserved seat in the oversized-baggage section, booked in advance and free. Turning up with a large case and no reservation is a fine.