Tokyo
Fourteen million people and almost no noise. Tokyo rewards walking one neighbourhood at a time rather than trying to see it.
Not one city, but forty towns
The mistake first-time visitors make is treating Tokyo as a single place with a list of sights. It is a collection of districts that grew separately and still behave that way — Yanaka is a low-rise neighbourhood of temples and cats, Shimokitazawa is second-hand shops and tiny theatres, Ginza is where the city dresses up. Each rewards an afternoon on foot. What surprises people most is the quiet: a city this size that runs on time and barely raises its voice. It suits a first trip to Japan as well as anywhere, because everything is legible — the trains, the food, the signage — and because the leap from a convenience store breakfast to a two-star counter is about twenty minutes.
Explore Tokyo on the map
City locations, drawn from our published destination data. Attractions, hotels and restaurants are not mapped yet.
The unmissable Tokyo
What a day here can be
Pick two or three of these and leave the rest. Tokyo punishes a packed schedule more than most cities.
⛩ Cultural
- Senso-ji and the Nakamise approach, best before eight
- Meiji Jingu’s cedar avenue, a ten-minute walk from Harajuku
- The Yanaka cemetery lanes and the old shotengai below them
🍜 Food
- A department-store basement food hall — Isetan or Mitsukoshi
- Standing sushi and yakitori under the tracks at Yurakucho
- A six-seat ramen counter where you buy the ticket from a machine
🚄 Day trips
- Hakone for the lake, the ropeway and a Fuji view on a clear day
- Nikko for mountain shrines in cedar forest
- Kamakura for the Great Buddha and the coast, an hour south
👨👩👧 Who it suits
- First-time visitors — few places are easier to start
- Families: teamLab, Ueno’s museums and very safe streets
- Couples: the view bars, and Yanaka on a slow morning
Three days minimum, five if you can
East side
Asakusa and Senso-ji early, the Sumida river, then Ueno or Yanaka in the afternoon.
West side
Meiji Jingu, Harajuku and Shibuya, finishing high up for the sunset.
Centre
Ginza, the Imperial Palace gardens, and an evening under the tracks at Yurakucho.
Out of the city
Hakone or Nikko as an overnight, or Kamakura as a day — each is a different Japan.
Trains, and your own two feet
Tokyo is a walking city stitched together by rail. Almost nothing needs a taxi.
🚇 Rail and metro
- JR lines and two metro networks overlap — the map is denser than it is difficult
- The Yamanote loop connects most places a visitor wants
- Trains stop around midnight and start again about five
💳 IC cards
- A Suica or Pasmo covers every line, bus and most convenience stores
- Tap in and out; no need to work out the fare
- One card per traveller, topped up at any machine
🚶 On foot
- Expect 12–15,000 steps a day and pack for it
- Stations are large: allow ten minutes inside the big ones
- Taxis are excellent, expensive and rarely necessary
What nobody tells you before you arrive
None of this is a problem. All of it is easier to know in advance than to discover at the door.
Signage, stations and larger restaurants are bilingual. Small counters and older izakaya often are not, and a translation app plus pointing works. A guide earns its place for the food-led half of a trip rather than the sightseeing half.
A standard Tokyo double is small by European or Indian standards. Read the room size in square metres rather than the star rating, and prioritise the district — you will spend very little waking time in the room.
The best small restaurants seat eight and take reservations weeks ahead, often by phone in Japanese. Vegetarians should know that dashi — a fish stock — is in most broths and many sauces; ask us to flag the kitchens that will cook around it.
Cards work almost everywhere now, but small shrines, older counters and some markets remain cash-only. Convenience-store ATMs accept foreign cards around the clock.
Where to base yourself
In Tokyo the neighbourhood matters more than the hotel. Pick the district first; the room follows.
Shinjuku
- The busiest transport hub in the country
- Good for first visits and for late arrivals
- Noisier, and the station takes practice
Ginza
- Quiet at night, central by day
- Best for couples and for shorter, smarter trips
- The most expensive rooms in the city
Shibuya
- Young, loud and very well connected
- Good if nightlife and shopping matter
- Less restful with children
Asakusa
- Old Tokyo, low-rise, near Senso-ji
- Better value and more atmosphere
- Further from the western districts
Where the photographs come from
Four that are worth the detour, and the hour each of them works.
🌆 High up
- Shibuya Sky at sunset — book the slot, not the day
- The free observatories at the Metropolitan Government Building
⛩ Old Tokyo
- Senso-ji before eight, when the approach is empty
- The Yanaka lanes at any hour — nobody photographs them
🏛 Architecture
- Tokyo Station’s red-brick facade, floodlit after dark
- teamLab’s installations — timed entry, and worth it
Easy from Tokyo
Everything here is inside two hours of the centre.
Related to Tokyo
Journeys that include Tokyo — each one visits the city as part of its itinerary.
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