Recently, with Japan experiencing a surge in inbound international travelers, it’s not unusual to hear locals remark “These days, it feels like there are more foreign tourists in [sightseeing place] than Japanese people!” Oftentimes this is an exaggeration, but in the case of hotels in Kyoto, it’s the statistical truth.
The Kyoto municipal government recently released its tourism-related numbers for 2024, reporting that during the year 8.21 million foreign travelers stayed in hotels within Kyoto City. That’s the largest number ever, and a 53.2 percent increase from the previous year. It’s also the first time in history for more foreign travelers than Japanese ones to stay in Kyoto hotels, which received 8.09 million Japanese guests in 2024.
That figure of 8.09 million Japanese guests is down 13.8 percent from the year before, illustrating that as Kyoto becomes an increasingly popular destination for visitors from outside Japan, a growing proportion of Japanese travelers are choosing to stay elsewhere. Along with large crowds at sightseeing attractions and congestion on public transportation, Kyoto’s rising hotel prices are making it a less attractive place for Japanese travelers to stay.
At the end of May, the Kyoto City Tourism Association announced the results of an April 2025 survey of room rates at 106 hotels within the city, finding an average per-night room price of 30,640 yen, the highest amount since the organization began tracking the average price in 2014 and also the first time for it to go past 30,000 yen. With a favorable exchange rate to take advantage the higher hotel rates may not be much of a deterrent to foreign tourists, but for the local Japanese population already struggling with increasing consumer prices, hotel rate hikes in Kyoto aren’t nearly so easy to brush off.
Surprisingly, even as Kyoto’s hotels welcomed fewer Japanese travelers in 2024, the city itself still had an increase in Japanese sightseers, with an estimated total of 45.18 million Japanese people spending some amount of travel time within the city. That number is up 4.6 percent from 2023, and coupled with the drop of Japanese Kyoto hotel guests for the same period indicates that many Japanese visitors were either from-home day trippers or stayed in hotels outside of Kyoto City.
On the other hand, the 10.88 million foreign tourists who visited Kyoto in 2024 were a 53.3-percent increase over the previous year, almost exactly the same increase as that for foreign Kyoto hotel guests.
The situation hasn’t been at all bad for Kyoto’s bottom line. Tourism-related spending in the city was up significantly in 2024, with visitors spending an estimated 1.9075 trillion yen, another record-breaking figure and a 24.1-percent increase from the year before. As such, the city is unlikely to enact any drastic policies to pump the brakes on inbound international tourism, but as the city gets more crowded and more expensive, it also gets closer to a tipping point where Japanese travelers might think it’s no longer worth visiting.
Source: City of Kyoto, Kyoto City Tourism Association via Nihon Keizai Shimbun
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- External Link
- https://soranews24.com/2025/06/14/foreign-tourists-outnumber-japanese-ones-at-kyoto-hotels-for-first-time-ever/
29 Comments
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masugomi
Kyoto: on top of my list of places to avoid. Let me know when the numbers come down again.
HopeSpringsEternal
Japanese not thrilled about the $cost of Kyoto, especially with hotel surcharges thru the roof, and Govt. wants 'new' foreign money, not JN's taking up rooms.
wallace
Tourists outnumber the Kyoto citizens, like in most popular locations.
MiuraAnjin
How things change.
To think that in the late '80s Hawaiians were complaining about Japanese tourists outnumbering Americans.
fluffy_canyons
The population of Japan is rapidly shrinking, have kids or get used to it ?
fluffy_canyons
…on the other hand, Kyoto is absolutely wonderful , can it be expanded ? Can Japan build anything else like Kyoto? Can new zen gardens and temples be built ? If people want it, make more.
tora
House prices way up. Happy camper here.
Garlic eater
What a ridiculous and potentially inflammatory comment. How could they lawfully restrict foreigners from entering without passing an absurd law that would raise the eyebrows of every other country? And does the Kyoto tourism industry really care that much whether they get paid in yen or dollars (or riyals or anything else) flowing in? This comment seems illustrative of the remnants of a mentality from a time when Japan once thought of themselves as being uniquely set apart from other nations. For a foreigner it’s a bizarre cultural artefact that makes Japan a puzzling destination.
Meiyouwenti
I’m going to visit Kyoto and enjoy the sights of the ancient city when another Covid-like pandemic breaks out and scares away all inbound tourists.
Pukey2
Thank god I did all my travels to Kyoto over a decade ago.
grc
A new Covid outbreak would not ‘scare tourists away’. The borders would be closed like last time.
2 Year Old
And the hotel operators and tourist industry and all those brown envelopes that go alone with it are LOVING this situation.
Foreign tourists, like bogan Aussies who get $38 AUD (approx ¥3800 an hour )as retails staff vs ¥1100 in Japan... the now “expensive” note prices in Japan are a bargain compared to a similar priced hotel back in Australia.
The whole of Kyoto is like an Asian Disneyland for many western people, as it is so different from their towns/cities. And so cheap…
Show me the money!!
sunfunbun
Yen is low, pay in Japan is crap. A minimum wage level of 3000 yen or more happens in other countries.
It allows for a minimum wage individual to take trips to a cheaper fare than vacationing in their own country, even with airfare. And they can afford it. So, tons of tourists in Japan. Few Japanese tourists abroad, or even domestically, because pay is so low, and the Japanese are convinced working hard for a third of the pay abroad is nothing to complain about.
Japanese minimum wage workers...1100 yen... unaffordable travel as they do not make enough money to go to Kyoto, much less abroad, and airline tickets are going to be expensive because demand is low due to all of the above.
It'd take two months pay to take a trip to the USA, while it takes about 2 weeks pay in the USA to do the same to Japan.
The weak yen is not going up anytime soon, either. At relative .7 value to the dollar, the Yen has no buying power, so economics say, the rich come to and buy in Japan, the poor don't go nor buy abroad.
Plus, the Japanese youth are not interested in other countries to travel because they lack an adventurous spirit, and only care to 'Nippon dayou, Nippon'.
Since the Japanese believe the low pay rate is literally nothing to scream about, the one way vacation is not going to change anytime soon.
Blacklabel
It’s so cheap in Japan for tourists. I wish this would lead to them taking taxis instead of dragging all their luggage on the train and in public.
falseflagsteve
Quite a few bad eggs amongst those tourists who behave in an entitled and vulgar manner.
factchecker
Kyoto is a zoo now. Glad I saw the place 20 years ago.
syniksan
Can't wait.
Bob Fosse
Things change. Kyoto was a mud pit before it became a city. It’ll become a mud pit again. That’s life pal, don’t blame Chinese tourists.
1glenn
Tourist destinations being "overrun" with tourists seems to be a world-wide phenomenon. If it were me, I would look for places off the beaten path, the places popular with only a few tourists. Such places exist all over the world, although some things, like the Eiffel Tower, are only in one place.
TokyoLiving
Enjoy Japan, behave well, leave your money, get back..
Repeat..
stickman1760
This is the government policy. They have 30 million tourists now and want to bump it up to 60 million by 2030. Why? Because they can’t do anything else to generate revenue except raise taxes. The yen is going nowhere except down so expect more and more foreign tourists taking up seats at your favorite ramen shop.
Newgirlintown
It’s almost like you can plot the increase in dog-whistle xenophobia along with the increase in visitors from overseas on a graph.
Aly Rustom
Exactly!
DanteKH
Is not just Kyoto, but is everywhere. The hotel prices are getting out of controls, with some business hotels offering rooms for triple or quadruple the price compared to 4, 5 years ago.
Japanese tourism or local tourism is rapidly going into extinction, due to the falling currency, inflation and rampant price hikes that makes going into holidays just almost impossible anymore, especially for families.
I really do miss the Corona times, when hotels were offering discounts after discounts, you could get food coupons that you could pay the full dinners with it, and especially no freaking noizy tourists, no crowds, all was perfect back then.
We need a Corona 2.0 again :)
Kaowaiinekochanknaw
That's some serious omotenashi
https://www.japan.travel/en/au/experience/culture/omotenashi/
Well done Kyoto.
There is a good business case for lower priced 1 or 2 star hotels to cater for locals with less disposable income.
When traveling around other countries, I have often seen some very cheap places that locals stay in, as they can't afford the nicer hotels that the international tourists can. SE Asia has loads of them, so they could be built in Japan too.
Nice hotels are looking to get the best paying guests they can of course.
This may solve the price concerns in some case and locals may find Kyoto to be worth visiting for the cultural sites after all.
Can't drink champange on a beer budget, but many historical sites are free or quite cheap, even on a local's lower salary.
MiuraAnjin
Most Thais cannot afford to stay in a hotel in Phuket. Very few Pinays holiday in Cebu.
Japanese are poor and not getting any richer.
max-velocity
If the hotels are occupied, the owners are happy, whoever their guests are.
ILoveDownvotes
Woah, 45m Japanese visiting Kyoto in 2024, 10m people from abroad in 2024.
Looking at the news, I always thought it was the reverse of that.
Kazuaki Shimazaki
@sunfunbunJune 14 09:00 pm JST
Yes, other countries make more than Japan, but not THAT much more. Even in Luxemborg, supposedly with the best minimum wage anywhere promises only less then US$3,000 a month. Assuming they work 160 hours per month that comes out to US$18.75, or ~2,700 yen.
https://www.rippling.com/blog/highest-minimum-wage-in-the-world