Japan Travel Awards 2025

Japan's Travel Industry: Where Ancient Tradition Meets World-Class Modernity

Japan occupies a singular position in global tourism — a country where a 1,500-year-old philosophy of hospitality called omotenashi (the art of selfless, anticipatory service) coexists with some of the world's most technologically sophisticated urban hotel experiences. With 31 million international visitors in its recent peak year and a domestic tourism market of extraordinary scale and sophistication, Japan's hospitality industry is rightly considered a global benchmark for service excellence.

Tokyo is home to an extraordinary concentration of luxury hotel excellence. The Park Hyatt Tokyo, made famous by Sofia Coppola's film Lost in Translation, set the standard for a generation of urban luxury hotels worldwide. Alongside it, the Mandarin Oriental, Aman Tokyo, The Peninsula, and numerous other world-class properties compete in what is arguably the world's most competitive luxury hotel market. Tokyo's hotel industry continues to grow ahead of peak demand periods, with new five-star openings planned through 2026 and beyond.

Kyoto represents a completely different dimension of Japanese hospitality excellence — one that predates the modern hotel industry by centuries. The city's traditional ryokan (Japanese inns) represent one of the world's most distinctive hospitality experiences: multi-course kaiseki cuisine served in private tatami rooms, soaking baths fed by natural thermal waters, and a service philosophy so refined that guests are treated as honoured family members rather than paying customers. The finest ryokan in Kyoto and the surrounding Kansai region command rates comparable to the world's top luxury hotels.

Osaka has emerged as Japan's culinary tourism capital — a city that is widely believed to have more restaurants per capita than any other city on earth, and where food tourism is the primary driver of visitor spending. Japan's exceptional bullet train (shinkansen) network makes it unique among major tourism nations: travellers can experience Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, Hiroshima, and Mt. Fuji within a single trip with extraordinary ease and comfort, creating a multi-destination itinerary framework that is virtually unmatched globally. Japan's award categories span this entire extraordinary spectrum.