The Year Overtourism Got Expensive
I’ve climbed Mt. Fuji three times now. The first ascent happened in 2019, before the crowds became something that needed managing with spreadsheets and daily caps. The second time, in 2022, I noticed the trails were busier but still felt sacred. This past summer, I went again, and something fundamental had shifted. Not just the crowds, but the way Japan was responding to them. The Yoshida Trail gate closes at 4 PM during peak season now. There’s a daily climber cap of roughly 4,000 people. And the entrance fee doubled.
Japan welcomed 36.8 million inbound tourists in 2024, according to Japan National Tourism Organization visitor statistics. That number is both wonderful and troubling. Wonderful because it means the world has fallen in love with Japan the way I have. Troubling because you can only pack so many people onto a mountain before it stops being a mountain and becomes a line.
The new fees rolling out in 2025 and 2026 aren’t random price gouging, though they certainly feel like it when you’re handing over your cash. They’re a carefully calculated response to a country that’s starting to buckle under its own appeal.
Mt. Fuji: The Math Behind the Doubling
The Yoshida Trail, the most popular route up Mt. Fuji, now charges ¥4,000 per person to enter. That’s roughly $27 USD, exactly double what climbers paid in 2024. I stood at the gate in early August with my climbing partner, both of us staring at the fee board like it might change if we looked long enough. It didn’t. We paid.
What you’re actually funding with that fee makes more sense when you understand what’s happening on the mountain. The daily climber cap sits at around 4,000 people across the entire trail. That sounds like a lot until you realize that on a single day in August 2023, an estimated 6,000 people attempted to climb from the Yoshida trailhead. Trails eroded. Mountain huts became fire hazards. The experience became less about communion with nature and more about shuffling upward in a human chain.
Yamanashi Prefecture, which manages the Yoshida Trail, didn’t make this decision lightly. The doubled fee is part of a broader reservation system that now requires advance booking. You can’t just show up with your hiking boots and determination anymore. You book a slot months ahead, paying your ¥4,000, securing your place on the mountain. It’s algorithmic gatekeeping, and it’s working. Those 4,000 daily slots actually mean something now. Fujisan official climbing information and fees outlines the current system, and if you’re planning a climb, you’ll need to book through it.
Kyoto’s Lodging Tax: When Your Hotel Bill Becomes the Real Expense
If Mt. Fuji is Japan’s most climbed mountain, Kyoto is its most visited city. I spent six weeks there last year, living in a rented apartment in Nakagyoku ward, and I watched the overtourism fees roll out with the kind of detached fascination you get when you’re embedded rather than just passing through. The city introduced a revised accommodation tax in 2025, and the numbers are genuinely staggering for luxury properties.
The scaling system tops out at ¥10,000 per night for high-end accommodations. That’s roughly $68 USD added to your hotel bill, on top of the room rate itself. For a couple spending three nights in a luxury ryokan, you’re looking at an extra ¥30,000 in taxes alone. It’s among the highest municipal lodging taxes in Asia, and Kyoto isn’t apologizing for it.
What surprised me, living there month after month, was how little it actually changed the tourist flow. A 2025 survey by Booking.com found that 68% of travelers said overtourism fees wouldn’t deter them from visiting their top destination. People who’ve decided Kyoto is non-negotiable will pay whatever Kyoto demands. The fees exist to fund infrastructure repairs, maintain temples and shrines, and theoretically slow down the absolute flood of visitors. Whether they actually accomplish that last goal remains to be seen.
The Daily Reality: What It Feels Like When Pricing Becomes Policy
Sitting in a coffee shop near Kiyomizu Temple one afternoon, I watched a young couple from Australia calculate the total cost of their Kyoto stay on a calculator. They’d booked a mid-range ryokan for four nights. Before the accommodation tax, they would have paid roughly ¥60,000. Now they were looking at ¥80,000. The woman looked at her phone, looked at her partner, and then they shrugged and booked it anyway. That image stuck with me.
The fees hit hardest for budget travelers, for people stringing together multiple Mt. Fuji summits across different seasons, for backpackers who were already tight on funds. The ¥4,000 Mt. Fuji entrance fee eliminates casual day-trippers who were maybe thinking about climbing sometime. It creates friction. And friction, it turns out, is exactly what overcrowded places need.
What’s strange about living somewhere versus visiting is that you start seeing the fees as infrastructure investment rather than tourist gouging. The repairs to Mt. Fuji’s trails are visible. The expanded capacity of Kyoto’s waste management system is real. The money has to come from somewhere, and that someone is the people who love these places enough to visit them.
Planning Your Trip: The New Math
If you’re thinking about climbing Mt. Fuji or spending time in Kyoto in 2025 or 2026, budget differently than you would have two years ago. The fees are real. They’re not coming down. They’re part of the landscape now.
What I’d tell you, if you asked over coffee, is that it’s still worth it. Mt. Fuji is still transcendent even when you’re one of 4,000 people on the trail that day. Kyoto is still magic even when you’re paying a premium to experience it. The fees are a tax on love, essentially, and that’s not the worst thing.
Have you climbed Mt. Fuji recently or spent time in Kyoto? I’d genuinely like to hear how you navigated these new costs. Are you adjusting your travel plans because of them, or pushing forward anyway? Drop a note in the comments or reach out directly. These fees are changing the texture of travel to Japan, and I’m curious how other people are experiencing it.