Tokyo Cherry Blossom Map

The places

Park · Shinjuku Shinjuku Gyoen Shinjuku Gyoen is the best park in Tokyo: 58 hectares with a French formal garden, an English landscape garden and a Japanese strolling garden. It has about 900 cherry trees, which makes it the best hanami spot in the city.

Park · Harajuku Yoyogi Park Yoyogi Park is where Tokyo goes to play. At weekends the lawns fill with musicians, unicyclists, dog walkers and picnickers, and the Meiji Shrine forest next door makes it the big green space of the west side.

Park · Ueno Ueno Park Ueno Park opened in 1873 as one of Japan's first public parks. It has five major museums, a zoo, a lake with rowboats and the city's most famous cherry blossom avenue. In spring it's crowded and chaotic, and that's half the fun.

Park · Kichijoji Inokashira Park Inokashira Park is a well-loved local park built around a big lake, with rowboats for hire, a small zoo and street musicians at weekends. Kichijoji has long ranked near the top of polls of where Tokyoites most want to live, and this park is a big reason why.

Park · Bunkyo Koishikawa Korakuen Koishikawa Korakuen is one of the oldest and finest Japanese gardens in Tokyo, laid out by the Mito Tokugawa clan in 1629. Everything a classical garden is supposed to have is here: hills, streams, a lake, a moon bridge, even rice paddies.

Park · Yanaka Yanaka Cemetery Yanaka Cemetery is more park than cemetery, with wide tree-lined avenues, cats everywhere and the hush of old Tokyo. It's one of the best cherry blossom walks in the city, and there are almost no tourist crowds along the main avenue.

Food · Nakameguro Nakameguro riverside dining The Meguro River path in Nakameguro is lined with some of Tokyo's most photogenic restaurants. You can eat almost anything here, but on a warm evening the grilled meat places with tables by the river are the ones to book.

Nightlife · Nakameguro Nakameguro canal bars At night the Meguro River path in Nakameguro turns into a social street, with bars and small restaurants opening their windows to the water. Low-lit and relaxed, the opposite of Shinjuku in every way, and best on a warm night.

Park · Komagome Rikugien Gardens Rikugien is an Edo-period strolling garden that many people call Tokyo's most beautiful, built around a central pond with 88 scenes from classical poetry. The autumn lighting of the maples is one of the city's big seasonal events.

Park · Tachikawa Showa Kinen Park Showa Kinen Park is a huge national park of about 180 hectares in western Tokyo, with bikes for hire, lakes, seasonal flower fields and a 300-metre ginkgo avenue. In November the ginkgo tunnels are reason enough to go.

Park · Suginami Wadabori Park Wadabori Park is a long green strip along the Zenpukuji River in Suginami where local life happens: baseball practice, barbecues, dog walks, morning runs. No tourists at all, and that's the point.

Park · Asakusa Sumida Park Sumida Park runs along both banks of the Sumida River between Asakusa and the Skytree. It's been a cherry blossom spot since the shogun era, and now the tower rises behind the petals.

Neighbourhood · Yanaka Yanaka Yanaka is the Tokyo that survived: low wooden houses, temple after temple, cats on walls and craftsmen still at work. It escaped the 1923 earthquake fires and the war, and walking it is the closest the city gets to time travel.

Neighbourhood · Kichijoji Kichijoji Kichijoji has long ranked near the top of polls of where Tokyoites most want to live. Inokashira Park is at its heart, the Harmonica Yokocho alleys are by the station, and streets of independent shops run off in every direction.

Neighbourhood · Nakameguro Nakameguro Nakameguro is the riverside neighbourhood that defines low-key fashionable Tokyo. Cherry trees arch over the Meguro River between boutiques, bars and some of the best coffee in the city.

Neighbourhood · Ichigaya Ichigaya Ichigaya is a calm stretch along the old Edo castle moat where people fish in the middle of the city. The fishing pond is the Ichigaya Fish Center, right outside Ichigaya Station (JR, Tokyo Metro and Toei lines). The cherry-lined walk along the water up to Kagurazaka is one of the nicest strolls in central Tokyo.

Viewpoint · Chiyoda Chidorigafuchi Chidorigafuchi is the Imperial Palace moat, lined with hundreds of cherry trees leaning out over the water. In sakura season you can row a boat under them, which is about as romantic as Tokyo gets in public.

Park · Shirokanedai Happo-en Happo-en is a free Japanese strolling garden attached to a famous wedding venue, with roots going back 400 years. It's at 1-1-1 Shirokanedai in Minato, a minute's walk from Shirokanedai Station on the Namboku and Mita lines. The pond garden has a row of bonsai up to about 525 years old, a teahouse, koi and cherry and maple colour in season.

Park · Komazawa Komazawa Olympic Park Komazawa Olympic Park is a big Setagaya sports park built for the 1964 Olympics, with brutalist stadiums, a landmark control tower and jogging and cycling loops shaded by zelkova and cherry trees. Local families love it at weekends.

Park · Hakusan Koishikawa Botanical Garden Koishikawa Botanical Garden is Japan's oldest botanical garden, run by the University of Tokyo and descended from the shogunate's medicinal herb garden of 1684. Its 16 hectares mix research plantings with an old landscape garden, ginkgo avenues and one of Bunkyo's best low-key hanami lawns.

Cafe · Nakameguro Starbucks Reserve Roastery Tokyo Starbucks Reserve Roastery Tokyo is a four-storey Kengo Kuma building on the Meguro River with a copper cask rising through the whole thing, a Princi bakery, a teahouse floor and a cocktail bar on top. It's one of only a handful of Reserve Roasteries in the world, and people treat it as a destination in itself.

Shrine · Chiyoda Yasukuni Shrine Yasukuni Shrine is a vast 1869 shrine at the top of Kudan hill, entered through one of the biggest torii gates in Japan. The Japan Meteorological Agency's benchmark cherry tree grows here, and when it opens five blossoms, Tokyo's sakura season is officially declared.

Park · Chiyoda Kitanomaru Park Kitanomaru Park is the former northern citadel of Edo Castle, now a wooded public park that holds the Nippon Budokan concert hall. You enter through the original Tayasumon gate, one of the oldest surviving gates of the castle.

Cherry blossom festivals and light-ups

• 9 Mar to 4 Apr (dates to be confirmed) Cherry Blossom Viewing at the Museum (Tokyo National Museum) Tokyo National Museum (Honkan and garden) Each spring the museum marks cherry blossom works in the Honkan galleries and opens its garden, where about ten kinds of cherry trees bloom one after another. The events are free with admission. Official site Hotels nearby
• 17 Mar to 6 Apr (dates to be confirmed) Ueno Sakura Matsuri Ueno Park Hanami festival along Ueno Park's central avenue of cherry trees, with rows of paper lanterns lit in the evening through the bloom. The busiest and rowdiest hanami scene in the city: go early on a weekday for photos, late afternoon for the party. Official site Hotels nearby
• 18 to 24 Mar (dates to be confirmed) Rikugien Spring Nighttime Viewing Rikugien Gardens The Edo-period landscape garden opens after dark for about a week so visitors can see its huge weeping cherry tree lit up, with last entry at 8pm. Dates shift with the bloom and are confirmed only about a week ahead; advance online tickets are slightly cheaper. Official site Hotels nearby
• 19 Mar to 4 Apr (dates to be confirmed) Bokutei Sakura Matsuri Sumida Park (Sumida-ku side) Cherry blossom festival on the east bank of the Sumida River, a hanami spot planted by shogun Yoshimune in the 1700s. A kilometre of trees is lit nightly from 6:30pm to 9pm, with Tokyo Skytree rising directly behind the blossoms. Official site Hotels nearby
• 20 Mar to 4 Apr (dates to be confirmed) Bunkyo Sakura Matsuri (Harimazaka) Harimazaka Sakura Namiki About 120 cherry trees, including the rare pale-green Ukon variety, line the broad Harimazaka slope near Myogadani. The festival runs for about two weeks, and on its main weekend the road closes to cars for brass bands, taiko, and food stalls on a street most visitors never find. Hotels nearby
• 20 to 28 Mar (dates to be confirmed) Imperial Palace Inui-dori Spring Opening Inui-dori, Imperial Palace (Sakashita Gate to Inui Gate) For about a week at cherry blossom time the road through the Imperial Palace grounds, from the Sakashita Gate to the Inui Gate, opens to the public. The 2026 opening ran from 21 to 29 March, and the Imperial Household Agency announces the dates a few weeks ahead. Official site Hotels nearby
• 25 Mar to 6 Apr (dates to be confirmed) Chiyoda Sakura Festival (Chidorigafuchi Light-up) Chidorigafuchi Green Way The moat path northwest of the Imperial Palace is lined with about 260 cherry trees, illuminated in the evenings during peak bloom. Rowboats on the moat give the classic view of petals drifting on the water; expect a long queue for the boats at peak. Official site Hotels nearby
• 25 Mar to 24 Apr Shinjuku Gyoen Spring Special Opening (cherry blossom season) Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden The garden stays open every day for a month of cherry blossom, about 900 trees of some 70 varieties, from early single-flowered trees in late March to double-flowered ones in April. Official site Hotels nearby
• 26 to 31 Mar (dates to be confirmed) Yozakura-mode (night cherry blossoms) at Yasukuni Shrine Yasukuni Shrine, Shinmon gate For a few evenings at cherry blossom time Yasukuni opens its Shinmon gate from 18:00 to 20:00 so visitors can look through at the inner precinct's cherry trees at night, with food trucks in the outer garden. Official site Hotels nearby
• 27 to 28 Mar (dates to be confirmed) Koganei Sakura Matsuri Koganei Park Local festival among Koganei Park's roughly 1,400 cherry trees of some 50 varieties, held in the plaza in front of the Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum. Around 30 food stalls, taiko and dance stages, and far thinner crowds than any central Tokyo hanami spot. Hotels nearby
• 27 to 28 Mar (dates to be confirmed) Nakameguro Sakura Matsuri Meguro River, Nakameguro Festival weekend on the Meguro River, where roughly 800 cherry trees arch over the canal between Ikejiri-Ohashi and Meguro. Pink bonbori lanterns glow along both banks in the evenings through the bloom period, with food stalls near Nakameguro Station. Hotels nearby
• 10 to 11 Apr (dates to be confirmed) Shibamata Sakura Matsuri Tora-san Museum courtyard and Shibamata Park Shibamata's spring cherry blossom festival at the Tora-san Museum courtyard and Shibamata Park on the Edogawa bank, with game stalls and evening light-ups of the cherry trees. Official site Hotels nearby

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