Ryokan or luxury hotel in Japan: which should you book?
By Aspen Travel Advisors · Last verified · Counts drawn live from the Virtuoso-sourced atlas
Book both. A luxury ryokan is a single, scheduled experience: a set kaiseki dinner at an agreed hour, futons laid on tatami, and hot-spring baths with strict etiquette. It suits one or two nights in an onsen town such as Hakone. Tokyo and Kyoto are better done from a luxury hotel, where real beds, flexible dinners and English-speaking concierges make sightseeing easier.
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You'll hear back within 24 hours.A ryokan is a traditional Japanese inn, and at the luxury end it works more like a dinner party you are staying at than a hotel. The rate usually includes dinner and breakfast. You arrive in the afternoon, change into the yukata laid out for you, bathe, and sit down to a long kaiseki dinner of small seasonal courses, often in your room or a private dining room, at a time agreed at check-in. While you eat or soon after, staff clear the low table and lay futons on the tatami. Breakfast is early and set, and check-out is usually mid-morning. It is calm, beautifully run and quite structured, which is the point and also the catch.
A luxury hotel in Tokyo or Kyoto gives you the opposite: a western bed, room service at midnight, a concierge who can get you into a sushi counter, and no one waiting on you to come back for dinner. Most travellers are happiest using hotels for the cities, where the evenings are the best part of the day, and a ryokan for a night or two in hot-spring country, where there is nothing to do but bathe and eat. Our atlas tracks 47 properties in Japan, including 19 in Tokyo and 11 in Kyoto. The table below lists them smallest first, which brings the inn-scale places to the top.
Ryokan vs. luxury hotel, side by side
| Luxury ryokan | Luxury hotel in Tokyo or Kyoto | |
|---|---|---|
| Meals | Kaiseki dinner and Japanese breakfast usually included, served at set times | Room only or breakfast, eat wherever you like |
| Bed | Futons on tatami, laid out each evening. Some newer ryokan use low beds | Western beds |
| Bathing | Hot-spring baths, shared by gender, often a private open-air bath in better rooms | In-room bathtub, spa and pool |
| Schedule | Check-in mid-afternoon, dinner at an agreed hour, check-out mid-morning | Flexible, late check-out often possible |
| Space | Generous floor space, little room for large suitcases | Conventional layout and storage |
| Language | English can be limited at traditional family-run inns | English-speaking front desk and concierge |
| Dietary needs | Seafood-heavy set menus; restrictions must be given well ahead | Easy to work around |
| Tattoos | Often not allowed in shared baths; private baths solve it | Rarely an issue outside the spa and pool |
| Best for | One or two nights to slow down | City sightseeing and dining |
Neither is better. They are built for different days. The ryokan rewards a slow day with no plans, the hotel rewards a full one.
What to know before your first ryokan
The etiquette is not complicated, and staff at good ryokan are gracious with foreigners. Knowing it in advance simply means you relax sooner. The same goes for dietary needs: if you do not eat fish or have an allergy, it has to be passed to the kitchen in good time and clearly, which is where having an advisor relay it in Japanese can actually change your dinner.
- Shoes come off at the entrance, and slippers stay off the tatami. There are separate slippers for the toilet.
- Wear the yukata freely around the inn, to dinner and to the baths. Left side over right; right over left is for the dead.
- Wash fully at the seated shower stations before getting into a bath. The bath is for soaking, not washing.
- No swimsuits. The small towel stays out of the water, on your head or at the edge.
- Baths are usually separated by gender and the curtains may swap at set hours, so check before walking in.
- If you have tattoos, ask for a room with a private bath or a bath you can reserve for your party.
- Tell the ryokan your arrival time and keep to it. Dinner is timed and the kitchen plans around you.
- Send large luggage ahead by courier to your next hotel and arrive with an overnight bag. Japan's luggage forwarding is reliable and cheap, and ryokan rooms are not built for big cases.
How to combine them
Put the ryokan in the middle of the trip, not the first night. Jet lag and a 6pm kaiseki dinner do not mix, and you will enjoy the formality more once you have found your feet in a city hotel. Two nights is the sweet spot at a good ryokan: one night is mostly arriving and leaving, and the second day is the one where you actually unwind. A third night rarely adds much unless you love the baths.
Choose a ryokan in a hot-spring town rather than in a city. Kyoto's historic city ryokan are lovely, but they generally do not have natural hot springs, and Kyoto is a city you want to be out in at night.
- Tokyo hotel, two ryokan nights in Hakone, then a Kyoto hotel. Hakone is under two hours from Tokyo and sits on the way to Kyoto, so it costs no extra travel day.
- Tokyo hotel, Kyoto hotel, then a ryokan in the countryside near the end as a decompression before the flight home.
- If a full ryokan feels like too much, a ryokan-style hotel such as the Hoshinoya properties gives you tatami and Japanese service with more flexibility.
Japan properties in the atlas, smallest first
Every property in the atlas filed under Japan, sorted from the fewest rooms up, so the intimate inns and boutique hotels appear before the large city towers. Each links to its own page, where the benefits currently on file for it are listed in full.
| Property | Where | Rooms | Benefits listed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aman Kyoto | Kyoto, Japan | 26 | 4 |
| Nishimuraya Honkan | Toyooka, Japan | 26 | 4 |
| Amanemu | Shima, Japan | 30 | 4 |
| Shisui, a Luxury Collection Hotel, Nara | Nara, Japan | 43 | 4 |
| The Hotel Seiryu Kyoto Kiyomizu | Kyoto, Japan | 48 | 5 |
| Banyan Tree Higashiyama Kyoto | Kyoto, Japan | 52 | 4 |
| Rosewood Miyakojima | Miyakojima, Japan | 55 | 4 |
| Park Hyatt Kyoto | Kyoto, Japan | 70 | 4 |
| Six Senses Kyoto | Kyoto, Japan | 81 | 5 |
| Aman Tokyo | Tokyo, Japan | 84 | 4 |
| Hotel New Otani Tokyo EXECUTIVE HOUSE ZEN | Tokyo, Japan | 84 | 5 |
| Capella Kyoto | Kyoto, Japan | 89 | 6 |
| ANA InterContinental Beppu Resort & Spa | Beppu, Japan | 89 | 4 |
| The Ritz-Carlton, Nikko | Nikko, Japan | 94 | 4 |
| BELLUSTAR TOKYO | Shinjuku City, Japan | 97 | 9 |
Showing 15 of 47 matching properties in the atlas.
Frequently asked
Do I have to eat dinner at the ryokan?
Usually the rate includes it, and at a good ryokan the dinner is a large part of what you are paying for. Some offer room-only or breakfast-only rates, but in a small onsen town there are few places to eat late, so skipping it rarely makes sense.
Is sleeping on a futon uncomfortable?
Luxury ryokan futons are thick and well made, and most people sleep well on them. If you have back trouble, ask before booking: a number of modern ryokan now use low western beds on the tatami.
Can I visit an onsen if I have tattoos?
Shared baths often still refuse tattoos, though policies are relaxing. The simple answer is a room with its own open-air bath or a private bath you can reserve, which many luxury ryokan offer.