Short, and wherever a fact can change, a link to the official source.
Haneda is close to the centre (thirty minutes to Shinagawa or Hamamatsucho by train); Narita is far (an hour by Narita Express to Tokyo Station, or by the Skyliner to Ueno). If you have a choice, choose Haneda. Both airports have taxis at fixed fares to central zones, and both have counters where a Suica card and a data SIM are sold. Immigration is faster if you register on the Visit Japan Web service before you fly.
One prepaid card taps you through every train, subway and bus in Tokyo and pays at convenience stores, vending machines and most shops. Add it to an iPhone or Android wallet before you land — the Welcome Suica app or the Wallet app both work — and top up from a foreign card. Physical cards are sold at the airports and major stations. Children's fares need a children's card, issued at a station office with a passport.
Two subway companies (Tokyo Metro and Toei), JR's Yamanote loop, and a dozen private lines cover everything in the centre; Google Maps and the Japan Transit Planner give exact platforms and fares. Trains run from about five in the morning to around midnight and then stop — there is no night service, and the last train home is a real deadline, after which it is taxis. Rush hour is 7:30–9 and 5:30–7. Stand on the left of escalators in Tokyo, keep phones silent, and do not eat on the subway.
Clean, honest, metered and expensive by the kilometre, cheap for two or three people over short distances, and the only way home after midnight. The rear door opens itself; do not touch it. Show the address in Japanese on your phone. The GO app hails a taxi and lets you pay in the app; Uber works in Tokyo but dispatches the same licensed taxis. Tipping is not done.
Takkyubin, the overnight courier, will send a suitcase from any hotel or convenience store to your next hotel, or to the airport, for a modest fee, arriving the next day; every hotel front desk does it. Travel between cities with a small bag and let the case follow. Stations have coin lockers of every size, and larger stations have staffed luggage counters.
Tokyo's stations have lifts, tactile paving and staff who will place a ramp for a wheelchair onto the train and radio ahead to the destination; the newer buildings and museums are fully accessible, the old temples and alleys less so. The city publishes an accessibility guide, and the Accessible Japan site is the best independent resource.
Cards are now accepted in most shops, restaurants and taxis in central Tokyo, but small bars, old restaurants, shrines, some ramen shops and the market stalls are cash only; carry twenty or thirty thousand yen. 7-Eleven ATMs (every corner) and Japan Post ATMs take foreign cards with the lowest fees. Do not tip anywhere — it is not expected and can cause confusion; the bill is the bill.
Visitors can buy without the 10% consumption tax at shops displaying the tax-free sign, on purchases over a threshold per shop per day; the shop scans your passport and the refund is immediate or, under the newer system, claimed at the airport. Department stores handle it at a dedicated counter. Rules change — check the official page — and keep receipts and the goods unopened until you leave.
Buy an eSIM before you fly (any of the major travel eSIM providers work in Japan) or a data SIM at the airport; both are cheap and reliable. Free Wi-Fi exists in stations, convenience stores and cafés but is not something to depend on for navigation. Google Maps, Google Translate with the camera, and a transit app are the three things to have working before you leave the airport.
Shoes off where there is a step up and slippers waiting (homes, temples' inner halls, some restaurants). Quiet on trains. No eating while walking in shopping streets. Queue in the marked lines. Hand money on the tray, not into the hand. Bow slightly when thanked; nobody expects you to know the angles. Rubbish bins are rare — carry a small bag. Tattoos are fine in the street and a possible problem at large onsen and gyms. Nobody will correct you; they will just notice.
Shrine (torii gate, Shinto): bow once at the gate, walk at the side of the path, rinse hands and mouth at the basin, toss a coin, bow twice, clap twice, pray, bow once. Temple (Buddhist, with a gate and incense): bow, coin, hands together without clapping. Photography of the grounds is fine; of the inner sanctuary usually not; of a wedding or a priest, ask. A goshuin — a calligraphed stamp in a book you buy at the first temple — is the best souvenir of a trip.
"Itadakimasu" before, "gochisosama" after, if you like. Chopsticks: never stuck upright in rice, never passed food-to-chopsticks, rested on the holder. Slurp noodles; do not slurp soup. Pour for others, let them pour for you. The small appetiser at an izakaya is charged and normal. Split bills are fine among friends but ask for one bill at a counter. Reservations are kept to the minute; call if you will be late, and never no-show — small counters lose the night.
Public bins were removed decades ago; carry your rubbish to a convenience store bin or your hotel. Smoking on the street is banned in most central wards and fined — look for the marked smoking areas; many restaurants are now non-smoking by law. Drinking in public is legal and, at hanami, expected. Jaywalking is technically illegal and locally frowned on.
Tokyo is as safe as a large city gets; the risks are heat in July and August, the last train, and crossing on a red light in front of a policeman. Tap water is drinkable. Pharmacies (drugstores with a green cross) sell most things without prescription; hospitals with English are listed by the city. Bring prescriptions in their original packaging with a doctor's letter; some Western medicines are restricted.
Small earthquakes are common and nothing happens. In a strong one: stay where you are, get under a table, away from windows; do not run outside; wait for it to stop. Buildings in Tokyo are built for it. Afterwards, follow the signs to the nearest evacuation area (usually a park or school) if instructed, and check the official app. Hotels brief guests; trains stop and restart after inspection.
Tokyo's great hotels cluster in Marunouchi, Ginza, Roppongi and Shinjuku's west side, with the new wave in Toranomon and Azabudai; a ryokan in the centre is rare but a few exist in Asakusa and Kagurazaka; the business hotel chains are clean, small and everywhere; and Tokyo has invented its own forms — the capsule, the luxury capsule, the hotel-in-a-bookshop. For a first trip, Marunouchi or Ginza: walkable, central, calm at night.
Late March to mid-April is blossom and the busiest fortnight of the year. May is the best month — warm, clear, green — apart from Golden Week at its start. June is rainy season, soft and grey. July and August are hot and humid, with festivals and fireworks to make up for it. September brings typhoons; October and November are the second-best time, with the maples at their peak in the last week of November. December is bright and cold with illuminations; January and February are clear, dry and the most likely months to see Fuji from the city.
The best counters take bookings by phone in Japanese, sometimes only from regulars; the workable routes are a hotel concierge (ask at check-in, or email ahead — this is what they are for), the booking platforms that charge a fee for the famous places (Omakase, TableCheck, Pocket Concierge), and simply going at opening time to the neighbourhood counters. Cancellation fees are real and charged. Be on time to the minute.
Harder than it looks: dashi (fish stock) is in almost everything, and "no meat" is often taken to allow fish. Shojin ryori — Buddhist temple cuisine — is fully vegan and served at a few restaurants in the city; Indian and Middle Eastern restaurants are reliable; conbini onigiri with plum or kelp are safe. Carry a card in Japanese stating what you cannot eat; a hotel can write it. Halal-certified restaurants exist and are listed by the tourism agency.
Easy: the city is safe, clean, and every station has a lift and a clean lavatory with a changing table. Children under six travel free; under twelve at half fare with a child IC card. Pushchairs work in the subway but not in rush hour. The winners with children: the Sumida water bus, the Skytree aquarium, teamLab, the pandas at Ueno, the Ghibli Museum (book months ahead), the sample-food workshop at Kappabashi, and any conveyor-belt sushi.