By Vittoria Giubbolini. Cover image by charlesdeluvio via Unsplash.
And honestly, they’re right to go — we’d leave tomorrow too, because opening Instagram or TikTok right now means there is a very good chance someone you follow is walking through Tokyo after dark, checking into a ryokan, saving another restaurant or wondering how many Japanese beauty products will fit into their luggage, and every new post adds another reason to search for flights. The obsession exists well beyond our feeds, with Japan welcoming a record 42.68 million international visitors in 2025 and more than 21 million people during the first half of 2026, showing how a country that has influenced our imagination for years has now become one of the places everyone seems determined to experience for themselves.
Why does Japan look so good on our feeds?
Japan has the ability to change atmosphere completely within the same trip, which means the intensity of Shibuya can give way to a quiet neighbourhood or a traditional inn within a few hours, while experiences that might barely make it into a travel diary somewhere else suddenly become things you want to photograph and remember, whether you are browsing a stationery shop or stopping somewhere for dinner. Social media amplifies that sense of discovery because every traveller seems to come home with a slightly different version of Japan, and the more those images circulate, the harder it becomes to feel that one trip could ever be enough.
Anime made us want to go long before Instagram did
For a lot of people in their twenties, the relationship with Japan started years before they had enough money to buy a plane ticket, because anime and manga introduced Japanese stories and visual culture into their lives while they were growing up, creating an emotional familiarity with a country they had never visited. Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry reports that overseas sales generated by Japanese content increased from ¥4.7 trillion in 2022 to ¥5.8 trillion in 2023, with areas including anime and games playing an important role in that international growth, which helps explain why arriving in Japan can produce the strange feeling of discovering somewhere completely new while recognising references that have been around you for years.
Why Japanese Music Is Fueling the Japan Travel Obsession
The soundtrack has expanded well beyond the Japanese music people might have encountered through anime, because today’s biggest groups are increasingly reaching international listeners through streaming and global touring, while inside Japan the charts reveal a pop scene worth discovering on its own terms. Mrs. GREEN APPLE has become one of the defining groups of the moment, while HANA, M!LK, Snow Man, Number_i, King Gnu and BE are among the names shaping the current Japanese mainstream, giving younger travellers another cultural world to explore through record shops or live venues once they arrive. Music makes the connection with Japan feel even more immediate because discovering the artists people are actually listening to there adds another layer to a trip that many visitors have already been imagining through screens for years.
Why Japanese Onsen Have Become a Must-Try Travel Experience
Then there is the part of the trip where everyone seems to disappear into steam, because the onsen has become one of Japan’s most desirable experiences for travellers who want the pace to change after days spent exploring cities, especially when the hot spring is part of a traditional ryokan or surrounded by a landscape that makes you want to stay there for the rest of the afternoon. Japan’s geothermal geography has created hot springs throughout the country and bathing has deep cultural roots with its own etiquette, so those beautiful outdoor pools that keep appearing online also offer one of the simplest pleasures of travelling there: a few hours when putting the phone away suddenly feels like the obvious thing to do.
The food could justify the flight on its own
You could easily organise an entire trip around deciding what to eat next, because Japan offers the kind of food culture where a restaurant booked months in advance can become one of the highlights and the meal you found almost accidentally the following day can stay with you just as long. Tokyo continues to have an extraordinary concentration of internationally recognised restaurants, while much of the food content that makes people want to travel there revolves around everyday experiences, from small counter restaurants to the things people discover while walking around a neighbourhood, which is probably why conversations about a Japan trip so quickly turn into lists of places everyone insists you have to try.
Why Japanese Skincare Has Become a Travel Must-Buy
Japanese beauty stores have become destinations in their own right, and it is increasingly common to arrive with a list that already includes names such as Shiseido, SK-II, Hada Labo and Anessa, alongside products that might still be much easier to find in Japan than at home. Hada Labo, created by pharmaceutical company Rohto, has built its identity around streamlined formulas and an intense focus on hydration through hyaluronic acid, while SK-II’s famous Facial Treatment Essence centres on PITERA™, an ingredient derived from yeast fermentation and produced in Japan; Shiseido, meanwhile, continues to operate some of the country’s best-known beauty labels, including the sunscreen-focused Anessa. That mix of long-established research and products people discover through beauty content helps explain why a Japanese drugstore can unexpectedly consume an entire afternoon and why the final evening of the trip often ends with someone rearranging their suitcase to make room for another bottle.
