How to Buy Train Tickets in Japan (Machines, IC Cards & the Shinkansen)

9 July 2026

🗾 Planning a trip to Japan? Book tours & experiences with instant confirmation — browse them on GetYourGuide → Affiliate link — supports Wakoku at no extra cost to you.

The first time I stood in front of a Japanese ticket machine, a wall of buttons and a colour-coded map of fares hovering above my head, I froze. There was a queue behind me, the fares were written in yen I couldn’t parse fast enough, and I had no idea whether I needed one ticket or two. It turned out to be far simpler than it looked — and once you understand the logic, buying train tickets in Japan is genuinely easy.

This guide walks you through every way you’ll actually buy a ticket: the humble fare ticket from a machine, the tap-and-go IC card, and the slightly different process for the shinkansen and limited express trains. By the end you’ll walk up to any machine and know exactly what to do.

The two systems you need to understand

Japanese train travel runs on two overlapping systems, and knowing which one you’re using clears up most confusion.

The first is the paper fare ticket (切符, kippu). You buy it from a machine, it takes you a set distance, and the gate swallows it when you leave. The second is the IC card — a rechargeable smart card like Suica or Pasmo that you simply tap on the gate. The card works out the fare automatically and deducts it from your balance.

For most travellers, the honest answer is: get an IC card and use it for almost everything local. But you’ll still meet the paper-ticket machine, and you’ll definitely need to know how tickets work for long-distance trains, so it’s worth understanding both.

Buying a paper ticket from the machine

Local ticket machines (券売機, kenbaiki) sit in a row just before the ticket gates. Above them is a large map of the rail network with a number next to each station — that number is the fare, in yen, from where you’re standing to that station.

Here’s the process:

1. Find your destination on the map above the machines and note the fare next to it (for example, ¥200).
2. Tap the English button. Almost every machine has one, usually in a corner of the screen, and it switches the whole interface to English.
3. Insert your money. Machines take coins and notes (¥1,000 notes always; many take ¥5,000 and ¥10,000 too).
4. Select the fare, not the station — you press the button showing ¥200, or the “1 adult” fare you calculated.
5. Take your ticket and change from the tray below.

If you’re travelling with children, note that kids aged 6–11 pay a child fare (小人, kodomo) — usually half the adult price, selected with a separate button. Children under 6 generally ride free.

One reassuring thing: if you can’t work out the exact fare, buy the cheapest ticket available and settle the difference at your destination. That’s what the fare adjustment machine is for, and it’s completely normal.

Fare adjustment: the machine that saves you

Say you bought a ¥200 ticket but your actual journey cost ¥260, or you changed your plans mid-trip. Don’t panic at the gate. Look for the fare adjustment machine (精算機, seisanki), usually near the exit gates. Insert your ticket, it shows the shortfall, you pay it, and it prints a new valid ticket. Feed that into the gate and walk out.

This is one of the most useful things to know in Japan, because it removes all the pressure of calculating the perfect fare in advance.

Using an IC card (the easy way)

If you’d rather skip the mental arithmetic entirely, an IC card is the answer. The main cards are:

The good news: these cards are almost entirely interchangeable nationwide. A Suica bought in Tokyo works on the subway in Osaka, on buses, and even to buy a drink from a vending machine. You tap it on the reader as you enter the gate, tap again as you leave, and the correct fare is deducted — no fare charts, no adjustment machines.

You can buy a physical card and top it up (チャージ, chāji) at any ticket machine, or add a digital Suica or Pasmo to an iPhone or Apple Watch and recharge it from your phone. If you’re planning several days of city travel, sorting this out on your first morning will make everything smoother. Learning a few travel phrases for asking station staff for help doesn’t hurt either — a polite sumimasen goes a long way at a busy gate.

Buying shinkansen and limited express tickets

Long-distance trains work differently, and this is where a lot of first-timers get caught out. For a shinkansen (bullet train) or a limited express (特急, tokkyū), you usually need two tickets combined:

You buy both together, and they often print as a single ticket or a pair you insert into the gate at the same time. You cannot ride a shinkansen on an IC card fare alone or a normal local ticket — the express portion is extra.

You have three ways to buy them:

• The ticket office — JR East’s is famously called Midori no Madoguchi (みどりの窓口, “the green window”). Staff can help in English, reserve seats, and handle complex routes.
• Dedicated reserved-seat machines, which have full English menus and are faster once you know your route.
• Online reservation (such as JR’s regional booking sites), where you reserve a seat and collect or tap in with a QR code or linked IC card.

When you buy, you’ll choose between a reserved seat (指定席, shiteiseki) and a non-reserved seat (自由席, jiyūseki). Reserved guarantees you a specific seat; non-reserved is slightly cheaper and lets you sit in any open seat in the designated cars — fine outside peak travel periods, risky during holidays like Golden Week or Obon.

The golden rule: keep your ticket

Whichever system you use, remember this: hold on to your ticket until you have completely exited the station. Japanese gates take your ticket on entry and give it back, then take it for good only when you leave. If you lose it in between, you’ll have to pay again. For shinkansen journeys you may be feeding two tickets at once — put them in together and the gate handles it.

If you ever put a ticket into the wrong slot, or the gate flaps close on you, don’t force it. Step to the side, and a staff member at the manned gate (there’s almost always one at the end of the row) will sort it out in seconds. Station staff in Japan are unfailingly patient with visitors.

A quick vocabulary cheat sheet

Putting it all together

For everyday city trips, buy an IC card on day one and just tap in and out — it’s the single biggest stress-remover in Japanese travel. Keep the paper-ticket process in your back pocket for the occasional line that needs it, and remember the fare adjustment machine means you can never really overpay. For the shinkansen, budget a few extra minutes at the green window or a reserved-seat machine, and know that you’re buying a base fare plus an express ticket.

Do that, and the wall of buttons that once made me freeze becomes exactly what it’s meant to be: one of the fastest, cleanest, most reliable train systems in the world, open to you with a single tap.