Random tips and reminders about visiting Japan as a tourist

Published on: October 29, 2025 by Joona Tuunanen

I just arrived back to Finland from Japan. This time my wife and I stayed mostly in Tokyo and Osaka for overall 2 weeks or so.

We’ve previously been to Japan in 2018 when we went to Tokyo and Kyoto. So kinda similar trip than this one, even if that was a bit shorter.

There are so many things I’ve learned and re-learned in Japan so I thought it’s a good idea to write them down as I’m no doubt being asked about the country, my tips when visiting it etc.

So without further ado, here are some things I’ve learned about visiting Japan.

General observations

Japan is a very clean country. That’s maybe not a surprise. But what makes it quite odd, is that how do they pull this off even though there are very few garbage bins around. Be prepared to carry some of your eventual garbage with you for some time before you can throw it out.
It’s also a very lean country. Even if you’re normal weight in the west, don’t be surprised if you end up feeling fat. As one fried of mine once said “I can be thin, but not Asian thin”.
Subway cars are one of the quietest places you can find. Most of the people are quiet and staring at their phones. To me this behavior seems considerate - people in general don’t want to bother others.
…but the metro stations in general are very loud. Each station (in Tokyo) seem to have their own unique jingles that play all the time. On top of that there’s quite a lot of random ambient noises, especially in busier stations like Tokyo Station, Shibuya, Shinjuku etc.

Navigation and getting around

If you can’t find something, look up! Many things are on second or third floors. Or you might see a helpful sign.
Top tip is to get Suica Welcome from whatever app store your phone uses. This app allows you to put money on a virtual card, which you can then use in public transport and also on many of those vending machines you see around. When you have Suica, you can just tough for example the metro gate with your phone and it automatically charges the correct price.
Metro is really cheap! Most of the trips we took were roughly 20-40 mins and typically the prices were from 1.2e (220yen) to a few euros (480yen).
If you’re changing cities strong recommendation that you use luckage forwarding! We used it when we were going from Osaka back to Tokyo. Usually you have a cutoff time at your hotel, let’s say noon, and if you take your luggage to the reception before that, they’ll arrange an overnight delivery for your luggage to the new hotel. How handy is that!?! This process means you should take some of your daily essentials with you in a backbag or something as you’ll be without the luggage for a day. The cost was roughly 10 euros per luggage.
Luggage forwarding also works within Tokyo to the airport! Our flight was leaving 11pm and aimed to be at the airport by 8pm so we had plenty of time to pick up the luggage. We needed to take them to our hotel reception by 9am and the earliest times they promised when the luggage would be at the airport was from 4pm onward.

Clothes shopping and fashion observations

In many places the staff are quite active and willing to help. This depends of course on the place you go to, but especially in smaller boutiques, brand flagship stores and things like that the staff comes to you.
You can get tax free (about 10% off) from most places. Carry a passport with you to get the discount. They’ll scan it / take a picture of it, check that you have a temporary visitor status and then you’re done.
You can wear everything you bought during the trip even if you got the tax discount. It’s very unlikely that anyone at the customs would be asking you to show receipts or all the items.
Converse made in Japan are great. They operate under local licence so lot of the designs are unique to Japan. Also the materials are different. A related top tip is to visit the White Atelier in Shibuya in Tokyo to get custom designed Converse!
It’s not like it doesn’t happen at all, but it’s not that common to see people wearing hats or caps at least during those times I’ve been there (May, October). That’s a big difference compared to Finland.
People seem to take really good care of their shoes. My shoes were ok, but not exactly spotless, so I felt a bit like a hobo walking around in them.
Related thing, if you go clothes shopping, be prepared to remove your shoes a lot - usually you can’t enter fitting rooms with shoes on. In many places they also have these covers for the neck to keep the garments clean while you test them.
Some brands and shopping malls that we liked: United Tokyo, Shibuya Parco (this is mostly stuff with higher prices)