Oz Macks,
My family is travelling to Japan for a holiday and I would like to purchase 2 sim cards for phones. I haven't been to Japan in 8 years and last time we were there it was next to impossible to get a sim card unless you purchased one at the airport. What is the best way to do things nowadays?
What is "reaearch"?
Get the Japan SIMs from SimsDirect or Travelkon. Both worked fine for me the last few weeks and I traveled the whole country.
Worst case besides the airport you can go to BIC Camera/Softmap or Yodobashi Camera and very nicely ask "Sim cardo wa doku desu ka?" and they'll set you up with a data SIM card 😉
They don't sell sim cards, only e-sims.
This sounds fantastic, are e sims difficult to install etc?
Very easy but you need a phone that supports e-sim.
Sweet I'll confirm this first.
Hey man thanks for this tip it worked out really well.
Tel-U $11US for 30days 8gb
I hope ease of access to sim cards for travellers is the only thing that has changed about Japan, I will be a very sad tourist if the country has changed even slightly.
Oh, you'll be pleasantly surprised. More merchants are now accepting credit cards :)
I just got back mid September from Japan.
Expect to see a lot more rubbish bins next to vending machines. Acure who operate a heap of them (train stations especially) have now added bins to nearly all. I find Coca-Cola to be the worst offenders by having no bins anywhere.
Google Maps has improved a lot with public transport too. Finding trains and platforms is a lot easier. I'd still recommend Navitime for the Shinkansen as you can filter out the ones you have to pay for (which the JR pass now discounts). Speaking of the JR pass you can now reserve seats for free at the machines by scanning the ticket QR code.
Even planning to travel a lot outside of Tokyo, I am struggling to see the value in the JR Pass now that it's so expensive :(
How much travelling did you do to make it worth it, or did you buy before the price hike?
Bought before the price hike but racked up close to 160,000 worth of travel. If you're spending a lot of time in one region a local pass, i.e. JR West might be more worthwhile.
If you're only going as far as Kyoto, you really need to do your sums.
Even the Kyoto-Osaka leg is cheaper on local with a local pass.
Do you have an itinerary?
@Benoffie: It's still in the works, but so far looking like:
Tokyo, Hakone, Nagoya (for Takayama), Takayama, Kyoto, Nara, Osaka, Kobe, Himeji.
Maybe a day trip to Nikko if we can fit it in too.
The current plan is to fly into either Tokyo or Osaka, then fly out of the other one.
2-3 week itinerary. I'm looking at the different JR passes now. I didn't realise there we so many options beyond the original one.
@Kail: Everything up to Osaka is really under the max Yen and where you start comparing sectors to passes.
To give you an idea, Tokyo > Kyoto return in Green Class on Shinkansen just cost me $750 ish for two adults 2 weeks ago.
However if you're jumping on and off for a fortnight and are crossing from the Tokaido line to the Sanyo line, then it could be worth the pass.
I sat there and punched in the trips on Google to get rough pricing then compared with JR Pass pricing.
It's worth noting that the JR booking system and Shinkansen app are both crap, have non stop issues with foreign credit cards and there's issues with pass delivery.
This is leading to huge lines at the airports.
There's also no Suica and Pasmo atm outside of airports due to IC shortages. I recommend grabbing one if possible or a 3 day subway pass in the airports before leaving. You cannot get these at stations apart from Tokyo Station tourism centre.
@Benoffie: Thank you so much for the information!
I'll definitely have to math out the rail prices and see how it goes.
I found the best value for myself was going through Klook - YMMV
We just used Mobal for 2 weeks. No issue with eSim or network at all
https://www.mobal.com/japan-esims/
We are using eSims from SimsDirect now in Korea and for SEA and no issues either.
Fantastic advice here gents I'll go for the jr West pass Shinkansen seems a little prohibitive at first glance
It's a good idea to use Google Maps to see how to get from A to B before going away just in case you're in areas where the pass won't cover it. Afterall not every station and line are run by JR.
My hotel in Kyoto for example was at a Keihan Railway station and I used them to get to a lot sights or the main train stations. Keihan aren't JR so not covered by the pass. I had to use my IC Card instead.
I used Felix with added International Roaming pack on my most recent trip.
I found free wi-fi is everywhere, so didn't use much data.
And being able to make calls and text is something you can't usually do with a travel sim.
When you arrive in any major town just go to a 'Bic Camera' department store. Don't worry they sell all kinds of tech. There you will be able to buy a data only/travel SIM from one of their phone counters.
You may need to take your phone and the new SIM to one of their specialist tech gurus but they did it for free as they didn't speak English and I Japanese but they new what i was after.
The coverage was pretty spotty and i had to turn my phone off/on again after leaving wi-fi but its good enough for holiday use.
So what reaearch have you done already?