Where to See Cherry Blossoms in Tokyo
The hanami spots locals actually go to, and when to go
Cherry blossom season in Tokyo lasts about two weeks, usually late March into early April, and the whole city reorganises its life around it. The famous spots are famous for a reason, but timing matters more than the location: Ueno Park at 8am is magic and at 2pm it is a queue. My personal pick is the Meguro River in Nakameguro after dark, when the lanterns come on and the blossoms reflect in the water. Book accommodation three to four months ahead for this period, it is not optional.
23 places
Late March to early April When
The places
🌿 Park · Shinjuku Shinjuku Gyoen Tokyo's finest park: 58 hectares combining a French formal garden, English landscape garden, and Japanese s...
🌿 Park · Harajuku Yoyogi Park A vast open park where Tokyo comes to play. Weekend musicians, unicyclists, dog walkers, and picnickers fil...
🌿 Park · Ueno Ueno Park Tokyo's oldest public park, home to five major museums, a zoo, a lake with rowboats, and the city's most fa...
🌿 Park · Kichijoji Inokashira Park A beloved local park built around a large lake, with rowboat rentals, a small zoo, and weekend street music...
🌿 Park · Bunkyo Koishikawa Korakuen One of Tokyo's oldest and most exquisite Japanese gardens, built by the Mito Tokugawa clan in 1629. Every c...
🌿 Park · Yanaka Yanaka Cemetery More park than cemetery. Wide tree-lined avenues, cats everywhere, old Tokyo quiet. One of the best cherry ...
🍜 Food · Nakameguro Nakameguro riverside dining The Meguro River canal path is lined with some of Tokyo's most photogenic restaurants. Every cuisine is ava...
🎵 Nightlife · Nakameguro Nakameguro canal bars The canal-side path becomes a social street at night, with bars and small restaurants opening their windows...
🌿 Park · Komagome Rikugien Gardens An Edo-period strolling garden considered Tokyo's most beautiful, built around a central pond with 88 scene...
🌿 Park · Tachikawa Showa Kinen Park A vast 165 hectare national park in western Tokyo with rental bikes, lakes, seasonal flower fields, and the...
🌿 Park · Suginami Wadabori Park A long green corridor along the Zenpukuji River in Suginami where local life happens: baseball practice, ba...
🌿 Park · Asakusa Sumida Park The riverside park stretching along both banks of the Sumida River between Asakusa and the Skytree. A class...
🏘 Neighbourhood · Yanaka Yanaka The Tokyo that survived: low wooden houses, temple after temple, cats on walls, and craftsmen still at work...
🏘 Neighbourhood · Kichijoji Kichijoji Consistently voted the neighbourhood Tokyoites most want to live in: Inokashira Park at its heart, the Harm...
🏘 Neighbourhood · Nakameguro Nakameguro The canal-side neighbourhood that defines fashionable low-key Tokyo. Cherry trees arch over the Meguro Rive...
🏘 Neighbourhood · Ichigaya Ichigaya A quiet stretch along the old Edo castle moat where fishermen cast lines in the middle of the city. The che...
👁 Viewpoint · Chiyoda Chidorigafuchi The Imperial Palace moat, lined with hundreds of cherry trees that lean out over the water. During sakura s...
🌿 Park · Shirokanedai Happo-en Free-to-enter Japanese strolling garden attached to a famous wedding venue, with roots going back 400 years...
🌿 Park · Komazawa Komazawa Olympic Park Big Setagaya sports park built for the 1964 Olympics, with brutalist stadiums, a landmark control tower, an...
🌿 Park · Hakusan Koishikawa Botanical Garden Japan's oldest botanical garden, run by the University of Tokyo and descended from the shogunate's 1684 med...
☕ Cafe · Nakameguro Starbucks Reserve Roastery Tokyo A four-storey Kengo Kuma-designed roastery on the Meguro River with a copper cask rising through the whole ...
⛩ Shrine · Chiyoda Yasukuni Shrine A vast 1869 shrine at the top of Kudan hill, entered through one of the largest torii gates in Japan. The J...
🌿 Park · Chiyoda Kitanomaru Park The former northern citadel of Edo Castle, now a wooded public park that holds the Nippon Budokan concert h...
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