Flying in
Which airport you land at is mostly decided by where you are flying from, but it still shapes your first afternoon in Japan — some airports are a 30-minute train ride from downtown, others are well over an hour.
THE SHORT VERSION
If you can choose, fly into Haneda rather than Narita for Tokyo, and Kansai for Osaka/Kyoto — both are closer to the city than the alternative. Fill in Visit Japan Web before you fly to speed up immigration and customs. If you plan to travel light around the country, look into forwarding your suitcase by takkyubin (courier) instead of dragging it onto trains.
MAJOR AIRPORTS
AIRPORT ⇄ CITY CENTER
Buy an IC card (Suica/Pasmo/ICOCA) at the airport station on your way into town — it works everywhere from here on, see the Transportation guide.
| Method | Speed & cost | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Train | Fastest & cheapest | Most travelers — Narita Express/Skyliner, Tokyo Monorail/Keikyu, or the Haruka to Kansai |
| Limousine bus | Slower in traffic | Heavy luggage — no transfers, direct to your hotel/station |
| Taxi | ≈ ¥20,000–30,000 (Narita → central Tokyo) | Late night after trains stop, or a group splitting the fare |
IMMIGRATION & CUSTOMS
Register on Visit Japan Web before you fly and fill in your immigration and customs declarations.
Get the QR code it generates — this speeds up both queues on arrival.
Immigration counter: fingerprint and photo are still required for most nationalities and cannot be skipped.
Customs: check current duty-free limits for alcohol, tobacco and gifts before you pack.
TRAVELING LIGHT: LUGGAGE FORWARDING
Japan’s takkyubin courier network (Yamato’s black-cat logo is the biggest) will collect a suitcase at the airport or your hotel and deliver it to your next hotel, usually the following day, for roughly ¥2,000–3,000 a bag. It is the standard way Japanese travelers move between cities with big luggage, and it means you can ride trains and subways with just a day bag.
GETTING TO YOUR NEXT CITY
For onward travel within Japan, the shinkansen usually beats a domestic flight once you count airport transfer time — see the Transportation guide for whether the Japan Rail Pass is worth it on your route. Domestic flights still make sense for long hops like Tokyo–Sapporo or Tokyo–Okinawa.