Best eSIM for Japan

When you should not buy from us

No eSIM suits every trip. These are the cases where something other than our Japan plan is the better buy.

• You need a Japanese phone number to book restaurants or register for local services. An eSIM gives you data only, so a physical local SIM or a rental phone is the right choice.
• You are staying for months and will use hundreds of gigabytes; at that point a local Japanese contract is cheaper than any travel eSIM, including ours.

What to compare before you buy

The cheapest Japan eSIM is rarely the best one. These are the things that decide whether a plan actually works for your trip.

• Price per gigabyte, not the headline price: a $5 plan with 1 GB costs more per gigabyte than a $13 plan with 5 GB.
• Whether hotspot and tethering are allowed. Many cheap plans block them, which matters the moment you open a laptop.
• What happens when the data runs out: can you top up the same eSIM, or must you buy and install a new one?
• What 'unlimited' means on that plan: almost always a daily allowance at full speed, then a much slower connection.
• Whether validity starts when you buy, when you install or when you first connect. Each of our plan pages says which.
• Whether there is a refund if the eSIM will not work on your phone, and whether a human answers when something goes wrong.

What actually matters in Japan

• Coverage in Japan is excellent, including on most subway lines and the Shinkansen, though tunnels between cities still drop the signal briefly.
• Japan has no free public Wi-Fi worth relying on outside hotels and major stations, so more of your data is used than in Europe.
• Translation apps work far better online than offline, which is the single biggest reason travellers run out of data here.

How much data do you need for Japan?

Most travellers use 300–500 MB a day in Japan. For a ten-day trip, 5 GB is comfortable and 10 GB leaves room for video calls home.

Not sure? The data calculator works it out from how you actually use your phone.