Tokyo Narita vs. Haneda: Which airport ought to I fly into?

Tokyo stays a perennial vacationer favourite, attracting a file 36.8 million worldwide guests in 2024. So it is smart that the town has two airports serving each worldwide air site visitors and home journey.

Narita Worldwide Airport (NRT), inbuilt 1978, used to serve probably the most long-haul flights of the 2 journey hubs, however that’s now not the case. Of the 2, Haneda Airport (HND) is now the busiest when it comes to passengers, dealing with in extra of 78 million passengers yearly, whereas Narita handles over 30 million every year.

Haneda’s worldwide terminal opened in 2010, and by 2023, it was one of many world’s busiest airports. Since 2020, quite a lot of U.S. airways have added daytime flight service to and from Haneda. Carriers similar to All Nippon Airways and Japan Airways have additionally shifted most of their worldwide flight operations from Narita Worldwide to Haneda, the first cause for the shift being location.

However with loads of flight choices to every, deciding which of the 2 airports you must fly into will be tough. Fortunately, we have weighed up the options of each so to take advantage of knowledgeable resolution earlier than reserving your flight.

Distance to downtown and transportation choices

Tokyo is the world’s most populated metropolis, with over 37 million residents, and it covers roughly 800 sq. miles. Its sheer dimension makes defining a real metropolis heart troublesome. Tokyo has over 20 wards, every comprising a number of totally different districts.

For this publish, we are going to use the long-lasting Shibuya Crossing in downtown Tokyo as our reference level. It is often called the busiest road on the earth, the place as many as 2,500 folks at a time cross a single intersection at sure factors within the day.

This is how the 2 airports stack up when it comes to journey time and the price of public transportation or taxi to this central level:

Getting downtown	NRT	HND
Distance (by automobile)	47 miles	13 miles
Time (by automobile)	1 hour and half-hour	40 minutes
Common taxi price	23,000 to 30,000 Japanese yen (roughly $150 to $200)	8,000 to 12,000 Japanese yen (roughly $50 to $78)
Public transit	Narita Skyliner Specific/Yamanote Line (2,630 Japanese yen/roughly $17)	Tokyo Monorail/Yamanote Line (690 Japanese yen/roughly $4.45)

Whereas ride-hailing apps like Uber and GO can be found in Tokyo, it is usually cheaper to hail a cab.

The map pictures under point out simply how a lot farther out of the town the Narita complicated is than Haneda:

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NRT to Shibuya. GOOGLE MAPS

Driving in from NRT will take a minimum of 60 minutes, if not longer, relying on site visitors as you close to the town. Whereas they don’t seem to be exhausting to seek out, remember that cab rides in Japan are fairly costly. A visit from Narita to the town will possible price you between $150 and $200 or extra. Public transit is less expensive by comparability, although the journey would require you to attach from the airport categorical line to Tokyo’s sprawling metro system to get to your last vacation spot, which can be intimidating for some.

Haneda is far nearer by comparability. It is positioned on a peninsula simply south of the town heart, about 8.7 miles south of Tokyo Station, the town’s central practice station. Not solely will you achieve some spectacular views when your flight is arriving/departing, however additionally, you will be rewarded with a a lot shorter journey into the town.

Driving to Shibuya Crossing will take between 30 and 45 minutes, relying on site visitors, although even a brief journey like this would possibly end in a $100-plus taxi invoice. Public transit will get you there in the identical period of time for lower than $5.

Winner: Saving time if you journey for enterprise or pleasure ought to at all times be your objective, particularly when visiting a metropolis like Tokyo, the place you may by no means have sufficient time to do and see all the pieces you need. HND’s proximity to the center of the town is why many vacationers select to fly out and in of that airport when visiting Tokyo.

Japan is the one nation with two Skytrax five-star airways, All Nippon Airways and Japan Airways, occupying spots of their high 10 carriers. Each function long- and short-haul flights out of NRT and HND — however each carriers are shifting extra of their long-haul operations to Haneda. Whereas NRT stays Japan’s largest airport, it providers fewer worldwide flights nowadays, pivoting to deal with medium-haul routes from All Nippon, Japan Airways and different airways as a substitute.

In the meantime, service from Haneda to the U.S. has tremendously expanded since 2019, as its nearer location to Tokyo has made it extra engaging to passengers. In response, the federal government has allotted extra slots for worldwide flights to fulfill demand. In 2023, HND noticed file highs in worldwide guests and flights.

American service United Airways has tremendously elevated its flight routes from Los Angeles Worldwide Airport (LAX) and Newark Liberty Worldwide Airport (EWR) to HND within the final 5 years whereas lowering the variety of flights it operates out of NRT. Delta Air Traces, in the meantime, closed down its NRT hub and shifted its complete Tokyo flight technique to HND.

As Haneda’s worldwide flight choices have elevated, so has the variety of airways that serve worldwide passengers there. However in lots of circumstances, even when a given airline does not fly to the airport you need, you will get there on a codeshare or alliance associate. For instance, Oneworld passengers flying between Japan and Sydney have two choices between Japan Airways and Qantas, each of which supply flights from HND and NRT.

Narita provides flights to 41 international locations and 14 U.S. states; by comparability, Haneda, regardless of its pivot towards long-haul choices, has flights to only 27 nations and 15 U.S. states. For vacationers to Tokyo coming from the U.S., although, this distinction might show considerably negligible.

Haneda’s clearest edge, for now, stays home flights inside Japan. As Tokyo’s predominant home airport, Haneda provides flights to 50 locations throughout Japan.

Winner: Haneda now has the higher hand for journey to and from the U.S., given the shift in flight choices from carriers like Delta and United within the final 5 years. It additionally maintains an edge for journey inside Japan, as there are a lot of extra choices to attach for flights to different elements of the nation. Nevertheless, Narita Worldwide nonetheless retains nice worth for its diverse choices of long-haul routes globally.

Airport facilities and perks

At each airports, you may discover first- and business-class lounges for Japan Airways and ANA, with minimal variations in design aesthetics and meals and beverage choices. Japan Airways’ first-class lounge at NRT is particularly well-known for the made-to-order sushi station it provides, whereas first-class passengers at HND can pattern a made-to-order teppanyaki bar.

Narita Worldwide can be residence to an array of lounges and golf equipment operated by worldwide companions, together with United International First and United Membership lounges, plus an American Airways Admirals Membership.

Haneda, in flip, has loads of its personal lounge choices and is residence to a Delta Sky Membership (opened in 2022) and the famed Cathay Pacific Lounge, amongst others. Later this 12 months, Haneda may also achieve an Amex Centurion Lounge.