How to Book Shinkansen Tickets Online: smartEX, Klook & Station Guide (2026)

Here is the honest version of the answer, before we get into any of the detail: most travelers only ever need one service, and it is free to join. What trips people up is not the booking screen — it is the assumption that Japan has one nationwide Shinkansen website. It does not. This guide walks through choosing the right channel, registering, collecting or scanning your ticket, changing a booking for free, and buying at the station on the day, using only what JR’s official sites actually say in 2026.

Last updated: July 2026 | Author: Yuu (Nagoya-born, 35-year resident)

This article may contain affiliate links. See our affiliate disclosure for details.

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Table of Contents

1. The 90-Second Verdict: Which Way to Buy Is Right for You
2. The Ground Rule: There Is No Nationwide Shinkansen Booking Site
3. The Complete smartEX Guide: Registering, Collecting, Boarding
4. Changes and Refunds: The Most Valuable Rules in This Guide
5. Hayatoku Advance Fares: The Line-Up That Actually Exists in 2026
6. Seats, Oversized Luggage, and How the Price Is Built
7. Buying at the Station: Vending Machines and the JR Ticket Office
8. How This Fits with the Japan Rail Pass
9. Frequently Asked Questions
10. About the Author
11. Related Guides

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The 90-Second Verdict: Which Way to Buy Is Right for You

If you are short on time, start here.

If you take away one rule from this guide, make it this one.

The moment you collect a paper ticket, you lose the right to change your booking for free.

With smartEX, as long as you have not tapped through the gate with an IC card and have not collected a paper ticket, you can change your booking as many times as you like, free of charge, right up to the departure time. Swap it for a paper ticket at a station machine and that flexibility is gone. There is no reward for collecting early.

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The Ground Rule: There Is No Nationwide Shinkansen Booking Site

This is where overseas travelers stumble first. Japan’s railways are run region by region by separate companies, and Shinkansen online booking is split along the same company lines. There is no single official site called “book the Japanese bullet train.”

The Three Territories

Sources: [Source] / [Source] / [Source]

In other words, Tokyo to Kyoto and Tokyo to Sendai are booked on different websites. Open smartEX hoping to reach Kanazawa on the Hokuriku Shinkansen and the route simply will not appear.

Booking Channels Compared: Which One Should You Use?

Sources: [Source] / [Source] / [Source] / [Source]

smartEX or EX Yoyaku: Which Should You Choose?

Here is the comparison JR Central publishes itself, for Tokyo – Shin-Osaka on the Nozomi, Ordinary reserved seat, regular season.

Source: [Source]

Let us be blunt: smartEX saves you ¥200 a trip. It is not a money-saving tool. Its value lies in being able to lock in a seat before you land and in changing that booking for free right up to departure.

EX Yoyaku discounts more deeply at −¥490, but carries a ¥1,100 annual fee. To recover that fee on the difference alone you would need roughly 3.8 Tokyo – Shin-Osaka-class journeys a year (1,100 ÷ (490 − 200)). On top of that, joining requires a contract with an eligible credit card company: you either apply for a new JR Central Express Card, or add the “JR Tokai Express Reservation Service” rider (Plus EX membership) to an eligible card you already hold. Those are the only two routes in [Source].

For a short-stay visitor, that makes it smartEX (or an OTA) in practice.

The OTA Option, Klook Included

Online travel agencies such as Klook sell individual Shinkansen seats, not just the Japan Rail Pass. The seat options presented include Ordinary Car (non-reserved and reserved), Green Car, and on some lines Gran Class [Source].

There are two good reasons to go this way: you can buy in your own language (the official smartEX site is Japanese and English only), and you can pay for it alongside everything else you are booking.

The trade-offs deserve equal honesty.

• Flexibility is weaker than smartEX. Klook states plainly that once you are within one hour of departure, once the QR code has been scanned, or once physical tickets have been picked up, changes and cancellations are no longer allowed [Source]. smartEX lets you change free until the departure time, so this is a clear gap
• The displayed price is converted into the currency of wherever you are browsing from. JR’s yen prices are fixed worldwide, but an OTA’s number changes from reader to reader. Check what it comes to in yen before you pay
• QR boarding works on “most routes,” but some require ticket pickup. Klook itself says some exceptions require ticket pickup, and directs you to the “How to use” section on the checkout page [Source]. No list of which routes are the exceptions is published, so read that section before you buy

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The Complete smartEX Guide: Registering, Collecting, Boarding

Now the main event. If you have decided on smartEX, here is the sequence from sign-up to the platform. Our dedicated SmartEX guide goes further into the fare products and how they compare with a rail pass.

What You Need to Register

smartEX is the online booking service for the Tokaido, Sanyo and Kyushu Shinkansen. There is no annual fee, and you can book from your own country before you arrive in Japan. To register you need:

• An email address
• Your name (the Roman-alphabet name printed on your credit card — see the next section for why)
• Date of birth (you must be 18 or over)
• A login password
• Credit card details, for payment
• IC card details (optional — you do not have to register one)

Sources: [Source] / [Source]

Payment is from the registered credit card only. No other payment method can be used [Source].

One thing worth flagging: the official smartEX site exists in Japanese and English only. JR Central’s visitor information site is available in several languages, but the booking screen itself will be English or Japanese.

Three Conditions to Check Before You Fly, If Your Card Was Issued Overseas

There is no clear official statement on whether a credit card issued outside Japan can be used with smartEX. So we will stick to what can be confirmed. Three necessary conditions are stated officially.

Condition 1: the card must be an accepted brand.

Visa, Mastercard, JCB, American Express, Diners Club, Discover and the J-WEST Card (Basic only) are accepted. Debit cards and prepaid cards can also be used [Source].

Condition 2: 3-D Secure must be enabled.

A card without 3-D Secure (“identity authentication service”) set up cannot be used [Source]. This is the mechanism branded Visa Secure, Mastercard ID Check and so on. Confirm with your issuer that it is switched on before you travel. It is a difficult thing to sort out once you have landed.

Condition 3: the Roman-alphabet name on the card must match your registered smartEX name.

From May 25, 2026, members who have not registered their name in the Roman alphabet cannot make new bookings or changes [Source]. A mismatch between the cardholder name and the registered smartEX name also blocks use [Source].

If anything, this favors holders of overseas-issued cards, whose names are already printed in the Roman alphabet. But make your passport, your card and your registration match exactly. Middle names and spelling variants are what trip people up.

The practical conclusion: the surest way to find out whether you meet all three conditions is to try registering before you travel. Registration is free, and nothing is charged unless you make a booking.

A Note on Visitor IC Cards (Welcome Suica and PASMO PASSPORT)

IC cards aimed at overseas visitors can be registered with smartEX too. Unlike ordinary IC cards, though, they have an expiry date, and an expired card cannot be used for IC card boarding. A card bought overseas and never used must also be activated at a gate in the PASMO or Suica area before it will work for the Shinkansen [Source].

Practical tip: once you have your Welcome Suica, tap through a local-line gate once before you try to use it on the Shinkansen. If the gate still will not accept it, the official advice is to collect a paper ticket at a pickup point instead. Our Suica and IC card guide covers how to get and top up one of these cards.

Collecting and Boarding: Three Methods, Do Not Confuse Them

Once you have booked on smartEX, there are three ways to actually get on the train [Source].

Method 1, IC card boarding, is the most reliable and the one we recommend. The sequence is: specify your boarding IC card when you book, tap it at the automatic gate at your departure station, take the “EX Seat Information” slip that comes out (this is where your seat number is printed), then tap again at your destination. Any of the ten nationally interoperable IC cards works — Suica, ICOCA, TOICA, PASMO and the rest [Source].

The Honest Position on QR-Tickets

Do not assume that booking on smartEX automatically means you can walk through the gate with a QR code.

JR Central’s English site presents the QR-Ticket as one of the three boarding methods and puts it first among the recommended ways to buy. Meanwhile, the Japanese-language boarding guide still carries wording in places that limits the QR-Ticket to a specific package product. We could not find a single official sentence that settles which of the two is current. So treat it like this.

• The two methods that definitely work are IC card tap-through and paper ticket collection. Plan around those first
• If you want to use a QR-Ticket, check on the booking screen whether a QR-Ticket can be issued for your particular reservation
• A QR-Ticket only works at Shinkansen gates displaying the “QR” mark — this part is officially confirmed [Source]
• Adding it to Apple Wallet is iOS only. On Android, printing it out is the main route [Source]
• Even when you pass the gate with a QR code, you still need to take the Seat Information slip

Collecting a Paper Ticket: The Traps Are Where and When

To collect a paper ticket you need a pickup code and your login password. The pickup code consists of a QR code and a 16-character alphanumeric string, issued from the “check, change or refund your booking” page in a browser or from the EX app. Issuing it requires a registered phone number or email address for the one-time password. It is valid for 7 days after issue [Source].

Watch out: this pickup-code QR and the boarding QR-Ticket are two different things. Holding the pickup code over a ticket gate will not let you through. It is read by a machine in order to print your paper ticket.

Where you can collect is limited.

Source: [Source]

When you can collect is the trap that bites into itinerary planning.

Source: [Source]

“I will land at the airport and collect all my tickets for the trip from a machine” does not work. A machine will not print anything more than 3 days ahead of the travel date. If you really want to collect several at once, go to a staffed counter.

Better still, do not collect them at all. The next section explains why.

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Changes and Refunds: The Most Valuable Rules in This Guide

The real value of smartEX is not the price. It is here.

Changes Are Free, and Unlimited

“Reservations can be changed as many times as you like up to the time of departure of your reserved train” — provided you have not gone through the gate with an IC card and have not collected your ticket.
— smartEX official [Source]

Laid out as conditions:

• Condition 1: before you enter the gate with an IC card
• Condition 2: before you collect a paper ticket
• Condition 3: before the departure time of your reserved train
• The service runs 24 hours, apart from system maintenance
• You can change to a travel date within 3 months of the original booked travel date
• For non-reserved seats, the change deadline is 23:30 on the travel date itself

Source: [Source]

Translated into traveler terms: the weather is bad, so push Kyoto back two hours. Sightseeing ran long, so take the next train. The morning finished early, so take an earlier one. All of that is free. Which is exactly why we recommend smartEX to travelers whose plans are not settled.

And the Moment You Collect a Paper Ticket, That Right Disappears

The free-change condition is “before ticket collection.” So the instant you swap your booking for a paper ticket at a station machine, free changes no longer apply. The same goes for tapping through the gate with an IC card.

The conclusion: do not collect. Register an IC card and tap straight through. It is the most flexible and the safest way to travel.

Refund Fees

Unlike changes, refunds (cancellations) cost money.

Source: [Source]

For the amounts charged by section after departure, check the official fee table. Once the train has left, the deduction is large enough that very little may come back.

Which is precisely why you should change the booking the moment you know you cannot make it. Changes are free, a pre-departure refund is ¥320, and a refund after you have missed the train is worse again.

Bookings Close 4 Minutes Before Departure

smartEX accepts bookings up to 4 minutes before the departure time shown in the timetable [Source]. Booking on your phone while walking to the platform is a genuinely workable strategy. There is no need to join the queue at a machine.

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Hayatoku Advance Fares: The Line-Up That Actually Exists in 2026

smartEX offers “Hayatoku” fares — cheaper tickets for booking ahead. But this is an area where names and conditions change constantly.

The Products That Exist as of July 2026

These, and only these, appear on the official smartEX product list.

Standard products

• smartEX Service (bookable up to 4 minutes before departure)
• smartEX S Work Seat
• smartEX S Work P Seat

Hayatoku (advance) products

Source: [Source]

If you see any other Hayatoku name on an English-language blog, it no longer exists. Several older wide-area advance products were withdrawn after travel on April 24, 2025, and a separate discount scheme was retired after travel on March 31, 2026. EX Hayatoku 21 is the post-revision name of an earlier wide-area 21-day product [Source].

Where to Check the Actual Discount

This guide does not quote Hayatoku prices. They are set section by section, and even the official site links out from each product page to a separate fare table. Always confirm the amount on the official “sections and prices” listing [Source]. Your benchmark is the standard smartEX price (¥200 below the station window); Hayatoku goes lower again from there.

Understand the Catch on EX Hayatoku 21

Cheap comes at a cost. EX Hayatoku 21 discounts Ordinary reserved seats on the Nozomi, Mizuho, Sakura and Tsubame when you book by 23:30, 21 days before travel. Sales run from 10:00, one month before the travel date, until 23:30, 21 days before, for parties of 1 to 6 [Source].

Here is the problem.

“Once booked, no changes of any kind are permitted, including changing trains.”
— smartEX official, EX Hayatoku 21 [Source]

Stopovers are not allowed either. Seat numbers are capped per train, and there are blackout dates in busy periods.

EX Hayatoku 7 covers Ordinary reserved seats on the Nozomi, Hikari, Kodama, Mizuho, Sakura and Tsubame when booked by 23:30, 7 days before travel. It too bundles the basic fare and the limited express charge into a single product, allows no stopovers, and cannot be combined with other discounts [Source]. On changes: if your booking still meets the Hayatoku conditions at the time you change it (7 or more days before travel, and so on), you can change within the same Hayatoku product. Fall outside those conditions and it becomes a change to a different product such as standard smartEX, with the difference payable [Source].

When Hayatoku Bookings Open

At 10:00 Japan time, exactly one month before the travel date [Source]. That is the same moment JR tickets in general go on sale. If you are booking from abroad, do the time-zone arithmetic. On popular routes in peak season, seats move in that first minute.

Verdict: Who Should Use Hayatoku?

Our position is unambiguous: we do not recommend Hayatoku to first-time visitors. You would be buying the inability to move your itinerary in exchange for a few thousand yen. Being able to change a standard smartEX booking, free, as often as you like, is itself worth a great deal.

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Seats, Oversized Luggage, and How the Price Is Built

These are the choices the booking screen will put in front of you, in order.

There Are Only Three Seat Types

On the Tokaido and Sanyo Shinkansen the seating is Ordinary non-reserved, Ordinary reserved, and Green Car. Green Cars are cars 8 to 10 [Source].

There is no Gran Class on the Tokaido Shinkansen. Gran Class is the top class on JR East’s Shinkansen network. Do not go looking for it between Tokyo and Kyoto or Osaka.

smartEX also sells “S Work Seat” and “S Work P Seat” products aimed at working passengers [Source]. For sightseeing, a standard Ordinary reserved seat is plenty.

In Peak Periods the Nozomi Has No Non-Reserved Seats (2026 Fiscal Year)

This is the fact most English-language articles have failed to update. During peak periods JR Central runs the Nozomi with every seat reserved and no non-reserved section at all. From the 2026 fiscal year, three-day weekends were added to Golden Week, Obon and the New Year period.

Periods covered in the 2026 fiscal year

Source: [Source]

If you are traveling in one of those windows, advance booking is effectively mandatory. Outside them, turning up and riding on the day is a perfectly realistic plan.

“You Cannot Board with a Non-Reserved Ticket” Is Inaccurate

Let us correct a common misunderstanding. If you hold a non-reserved limited express ticket during an all-reserved period, you cannot take a seat, but you can still board. You may use the vestibule areas of the Ordinary cars, excluding the Green Cars (cars 8 to 10). Crowding may mean you cannot get on the specific train you wanted [Source].

There is also an escape route. Only the Nozomi goes all-reserved. The Hikari and the Kodama keep their non-reserved cars.

Sources: [Source] / [Source]

How to Use a Non-Reserved Ticket: You Can Re-Board on the Same Day

Non-reserved seats have one strength reserved seats do not. On the same day, you can board the non-reserved section of any subsequent train on the same route [Source]. Go to the station first thing and jump on whatever arrives; if sightseeing runs long, take the next one. It is the only legitimate way to travel on the day with no booking at all.

Green Car, and the Fact That There Is No Onboard Trolley

In the Green Car you can order snacks and drinks from your smartphone. In Standard Class, though, food and drink sales are not available on board [Source].

Buy before you board. Tokyo, Nagoya and Shin-Osaka stations all have excellent ekiben (station bento) counters. “I will grab something on the train” no longer works.

Oversized Luggage: Free to Reserve, ¥1,000 If You Do Not

Essential reading if you are traveling with a suitcase. Baggage whose three dimensions total more than 160 cm and up to 250 cm counts as “oversized,” and on 16-car Nozomi, Hikari and Kodama services on the Tokaido and Sanyo Shinkansen it requires an advance reservation for a seat with an oversized baggage area [Source].

Source: [Source]

Reserving is free, and not reserving costs ¥1,000. That asymmetry is the whole point. Lock it in when you choose your seat.

A rough size guide: a typical large checked suitcase in the 28–30 inch class can exceed 160 cm across its three dimensions. If you are unsure, put a tape measure on it while you are packing.

How the Price Is Built: Three Variables

Three things determine what a Shinkansen ticket costs.

Variable 1: which service you take (Nozomi or Hikari)

Source: [Source]

The Nozomi is the fastest and by far the most frequent, and costs a little more. The Hikari takes longer and comes in a few hundred yen cheaper. That is the whole relationship.

Variable 2: reserved or non-reserved

When you travel non-reserved for the whole journey, the non-reserved limited express charge is ¥530 below the regular-season reserved charge, and it is the same all year round [Source]. Note that a special-section limited express charge applies if you travel Tokyo – Hakata entirely in the non-reserved section of a Nozomi or Mizuho.

Variable 3: the season (four tiers)

The reserved-seat limited express charge runs on a four-tier seasonal system [Source].

Which dates fall into which tier is published as a seasonal calendar on JR Central’s official site [Source]. Non-reserved fares do not move with the season.

The swing is at most ¥400. That is not a large enough difference to rearrange a trip around. The bigger seasonal consideration by far is the Nozomi going all-reserved.

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Buying at the Station: Vending Machines and the JR Ticket Office

For anyone thinking “I would rather not register online” or “I am uneasy about my card”: buying at the station is completely fine.

JR Central officially describes three ways to buy a Shinkansen ticket: ticket vending machines, the JR Ticket Office, and the online reservation services [Source].

The Machines Work in English

“Every ticket vending machine in our stations is equipped with English menus and sells tickets with information in English.”
— JR Central official [Source]

Every ticket machine at a JR Central station has English menus. There are menus in languages other than English as well [Source]. A complete list of supported languages is not published, so check on the screen itself whether your own language is there.

The sequence at the machine runs: choose English from the language selection, pick the Shinkansen ticket menu, enter your departure and arrival stations and the date and time, choose reserved or non-reserved and Ordinary or Green Car, enter the number of passengers, then pay by cash or credit card.

The JR Ticket Office Is Your Ally for Complicated Routes

When the route is complicated, when there are connections involved, or when you have a question about luggage, a staffed counter is the fastest way through.

The name on the door varies by company. In the JR Central area, which includes Nagoya, it is signed “JR Ticket Office.” In the JR East and JR West areas the usual name is Midori-no-madoguchi. The name changes with the region; the function does not.

You Can Buy on the Day — With Two Caveats

In ordinary periods you can simply turn up at the station and travel. A non-reserved seat needs no seat selection at all, and on the same day you can re-board a later train. Two situations, though, call strongly for booking ahead.

• All-reserved Nozomi periods (see the table in the previous section for the 2026 fiscal year dates). There are no non-reserved seats at all in those windows
• If you have oversized luggage. Seats with an oversized baggage area are limited in number, and if they are full on the day you will be charged the ¥1,000 fee

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How This Fits with the Japan Rail Pass

“If I buy a Japan Rail Pass, do I need any of this?” For most travelers, the pass does not pay for itself. And the people it does not pay off for are exactly the readers of this guide.

Three Things to Know If You Are Still Weighing Up a Pass

1. The pass does not let you ride the Nozomi or the Mizuho, non-reserved seats included. You can ride them by buying a separate NOZOMI MIZUHO Ticket: ¥4,180 for Tokyo – Nagoya and ¥4,960 for Tokyo – Shin-Osaka
2. Seat reservations are free. There is no additional charge
3. The oversized luggage rules apply to pass holders in exactly the same way. You still need to reserve in advance

Source: [Source]

The full break-even arithmetic lives in our companion guide, Is the Japan Rail Pass worth it?, which compares real ticket costs against the pass price across seven genuine itinerary patterns.

If You Want to Compare Tokyo – Nagoya Travel Options Themselves

This guide covers how to book, nationwide. For the separate question of whether to take the Shinkansen, the bus or a plane, see our Tokyo to Nagoya transport guide. And if you have settled on touring Central Japan, a regional pass may be the better answer — see our Central Japan rail pass guide.

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Frequently Asked Questions

How far in advance can I buy Shinkansen tickets?

From 10:00 Japan time, exactly one month before the travel date [Source]. That timing applies to JR tickets in general, and Hayatoku products go on sale at the same moment. If you are booking from abroad, work out the time difference. At the other end, smartEX takes bookings up to 4 minutes before departure [Source].

Can I register a credit card issued outside Japan with smartEX?

The official site says nothing about the country of issue, so we will not claim it either works or does not. What we can give you are the three necessary conditions that are stated officially. (1) The card must be Visa, Mastercard, JCB, American Express, Diners Club or Discover. (2) 3-D Secure (identity authentication) must be set up. (3) The Roman-alphabet name on the card must match your registered smartEX name — registering that name has been mandatory since May 25, 2026 [Source] [Source]. The surest approach is to try registering before you travel.

What do I do if my plans change after booking?

You can change your booking free of charge, as many times as you like. The three conditions are: before you enter the gate with an IC card, before you collect a paper ticket, and before the departure time of your reserved train [Source]. Cancelling costs ¥320 per person even before departure, so if you know you cannot travel, look at changing rather than cancelling [Source]. Hayatoku products are the exception: EX Hayatoku 21 permits no changes at all once booked [Source].

When and where can I collect a paper ticket?

At JR Central, JR West and JR Kyushu stations (reserved-seat machines, dedicated pickup machines and ticket counters), and at vending machines at some JR East stations. No other company’s machines or counters can issue them. On timing: from 3 days before the travel date at machines, and from one month before at a staffed counter [Source]. That said, collecting costs you the right to free changes, so we would rather you boarded with an IC card.

Can I just turn up on the day without booking?

In ordinary periods, yes. Buy a non-reserved limited express ticket at a station machine — every machine at a JR Central station has English menus [Source]. With a non-reserved ticket you can also board a later train on the same day along the same route [Source]. The all-reserved Nozomi periods are the exception, since the Nozomi has no non-reserved seats then. The Hikari and Kodama keep theirs, so switching to one of those is a workable move [Source].

Can I bring my suitcase straight on board?

If its three dimensions total 160 cm or less, there is nothing to arrange. Over 160 cm and up to 250 cm counts as oversized baggage, and on 16-car Tokaido and Sanyo Shinkansen services it requires an advance reservation for a seat with an oversized baggage area. Reserving costs nothing extra, but bringing it on board unreserved incurs a ¥1,000 fee (tax included). Anything over 250 cm in total cannot be brought on board. Strollers, wheelchairs, musical instruments and sports equipment need no advance reservation, whatever their size [Source].

I want to go from Tokyo to Sendai or Kanazawa. Can I book that on smartEX?

No. smartEX covers only the Tokaido, Sanyo and Kyushu Shinkansen, from Tokyo to Kagoshima-Chuo [Source]. Tohoku, Hokkaido, Akita, Yamagata, Joetsu and Hokuriku are handled by JR East’s Ekinet [Source], and the Sanyo, Kyushu, Nishi-Kyushu and Hokuriku lines by JR West’s e5489 [Source]. If you lose track of which site you need, go to a station machine or counter. They sell tickets for every line.

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About the Author

Yuu was born in Nagoya and has lived here for 35 years. He spent a month backpacking around New York during university and has since traveled to more than 15 countries. He has ridden the Tokyo – Nagoya Shinkansen more times than he can count, and wrote this after giving visiting friends the same explanation over and over. If you remember only one line of it, make it this: do not collect the paper ticket.

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Related Guides

• Is the Japan Rail Pass Worth It? — the break-even arithmetic across seven real itineraries
• Central Japan Rail Pass Guide — how to choose a regional pass once you have decided to travel Central Japan
• Tokyo to Nagoya Transport Guide — Shinkansen vs bus vs plane
• Suica and IC Card Guide — the card you tap through the Shinkansen gate with
• Getting Around Nagoya — moving around the city once you arrive

— Yuu

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