Foreign visitors to Japan top 200,000 in Sept.

Jiji Press

18:03 JST, October 20, 2022

TOKYO (Jiji Press)—The number of foreign visitors to Japan in September is estimated to have totaled 206,500, rising for the third straight month, the Japan National Tourism Organization said Wednesday.

The monthly figure topped the 200,000 mark for the first time since Japan started easing its COVID-19 border control measures in March.

In September, the country further loosened the border measures, raising the maximum number of people allowed into the country to 50,000 per day.

Still, the September figure was down 90.9 % from the same month in 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic.

The latest total included 32,700 from South Korea, 30,900 from Vietnam, 18,000 from the United States and 17,600 from mainland China.

On Oct. 11, Japan scrapped the daily entry cap and resumed accepting individual tourists from abroad and visa-free visitors.

“We finally realized the drastic easing (of border measures), and it is expected to have a great impact on inbound tourism,” Japan Tourism Agency Commissioner Koichi Wada told a press conference Wednesday.