Ginza

The bar on the eleventh floor of the Tokyo Ginza Shiseido Building, open from 15:00 to 23:00 from Tuesday to Saturday. It opens earlier than most bars in Ginza, and from 15:00 to 18:00 it serves an aperitivo list with non-alcoholic cocktails at ¥1,000 and a glass of champagne at ¥1,500.

Standard cocktails start at ¥1,850 and the bar's own at ¥2,000, with a ¥1,000 cover charge per person at any hour. Food is served from 16:00 to 21:45 and includes the house cream croquettes at ¥2,000 and a wagyu fillet cutlet sandwich at ¥4,500.

Good to know

• A cover charge of ¥1,000 per person applies at all hours.
• Guests under 20 cannot use the bar.
• Closed on Sundays, Mondays and public holidays.
• Food is only served between 16:00 and 21:45.

A basement bar in Ginza 1-chome that the house describes as a traditional bar in the Ginza style, serving classic cocktails in its own reading of them, with a deep stock of old bottles of whisky and rum.

Ice is the thing it is known for. The bar uses three kinds — its hand-cut "ninja ice", so clear it disappears in the glass, a brilliant-cut cube, and its own natural ice — and invites guests to taste the difference between them. A cover charge of ¥1,100 per person is taken, and every seat is non-smoking.

Good to know

• Opening hours are not published on the bar's own site, so call before you go.
• A cover charge of ¥1,100 per person is taken.
• All seats are non-smoking.
• Drink prices are not published.

A basement bar in Ginza 5-chome, open from 17:00 to 1:00 from Monday to Saturday, with the last entry at midnight. It is closed on Sundays and public holidays. The site and the menu are written in English first, down to the ingredients of each drink.

The house list leans Japanese: whisky with matcha liqueur and house-made matcha bitters, gin with sakura liqueur and roasted-tea bitters, cocktails built on sake and shochu, and a set of Japanese old classics including the Bamboo, the Million Dollar and the Yokohama. Fresh fruit cocktails change with the season.

Good to know

• Closed on Sundays and public holidays.
• Last entry is at midnight, even though the bar is open until 1:00.
• Drink prices are not published on the bar's site.

A standing bar in a Ginza 5-chome basement, two minutes from Exit A3, which opened in 1992 as what it describes as Japan's first standing bar. There is no table charge: you buy tickets when you arrive, at least three per person, each ticket ¥300 or ¥330 with tax, and exchange them for drinks and food.

Over 150 drinks are listed. One ticket covers a standard cocktail, beer, wine, shochu or plum wine; two cover the mojito the bar is known for, which carries a certification from the Cuban embassy, or a drink made with the bar's own craft gin. Until 19:00 a set of classic cocktails drops to one ticket.

Good to know

• You must buy at least three tickets per person on arrival; the minimum spend is therefore ¥990 including tax.
• There is no table charge, and tickets are valid at all three branches.
• This is a standing bar — there are no seats to book.
• Happy hour runs until 19:00.

The Corridor-street branch of the standing bar, in a basement in Ginza 8-chome two minutes from the Ginza exit of Shimbashi Station, holding up to 80 guests. Its own English page describes it by its corridor-street setting and its DJ events, which makes it the loudest of the three.

The ticket system is the same: at least three tickets per person on arrival, ¥330 each with tax, no table charge, exchangeable for any of the 150-odd drinks. One original cocktail, the NEO TOKYO at three tickets, is served only here. On Fridays, Saturdays and the night before a holiday it stays open until 2:00.

Good to know

• You must buy at least three tickets per person on arrival; the minimum spend is therefore ¥990 including tax.
• There is no table charge, and tickets are valid at all three branches.
• This is a standing bar — there are no seats to book.
• Happy hour runs until 19:00.

A sushi house in Ginza 8-chome that announced its 90th year in December 2025, spread across a main building and an annexe on the same block. Almost every seat is a counter seat: fourteen chairs on the first floor, fourteen at a sunken hearth counter on the second, and eleven at each of the two counters in the annexe.

Dinner is a set menu. The nigiri course is ¥16,500 and the sushi kaiseki courses are ¥25,300, ¥30,800 and ¥44,000, with a 10 percent service charge added in the evening. Bookings are taken by phone from 10:00, and also online through a service that works in English, Chinese and Korean.

Good to know

• Closed on Sundays and Mondays, including Mondays that fall on a public holiday.
• A 10 percent service charge is added at dinner.
• Cancelling a dinner booking on the day costs ¥10,000 per person.
• Phone bookings are taken from 10:00.

A tempura restaurant on Namiki-dori, part of a house that started as a small shop in Ningyocho in 1930 and opened in Ginza two years later, where it moved to frying in front of the guest at a counter. It serves without closing between lunch and dinner, from 11:30 to 22:00, every day of the year.

Dinner is three courses: ¥16,500, ¥22,000 and ¥27,500, with tax included and a 15 percent service charge on top. At lunch a tendon at a table is ¥6,000, and the counter courses run from ¥11,000 to ¥19,800.

Good to know

• A 15 percent service charge is added to the listed prices.
• Last orders are at 20:30 even though the restaurant is open until 22:00.
• Cancelling on the day costs the full price of the course.
• If you are more than 30 minutes late and cannot be reached, the booking may be treated as cancelled.

A tempura house that opened in 1885 and now sits in Ginza 8-chome with twenty table seats and ten at the counter. It is known for Edo-style tendon and for frying each piece in one go, and it serves the same all-day menu from 11:30 until last orders at 21:00.

Tendon runs from ¥2,860 for the vegetable bowl to ¥5,060 for the house kakiage bowl, tax included, and tempura platters from ¥2,860 to ¥4,950. Single pieces of tempura can be ordered one at a time, with rice and miso soup added as a set.

Good to know

• Closed on Sundays, but open on Saturdays and public holidays.
• Last orders are at 21:00, and the lunch menu stops at 15:00.
• The restaurant asks guests not to confuse it with similarly named shops: this is the main shop in Ginza 8-chome.

A tempura restaurant on the ninth floor a minute from Exit C8 of Ginza Station, serving lunch from 11:00 and dinner from 17:00 every day except 1 January. The main shop closed at the end of 2025 to move, and reopened at this address in May 2026.

Dinner is built around set courses: ¥3,960 for the standard eight-piece course with salad and chawanmushi, up to ¥7,700 for the eleven-piece course with a hassun, sashimi and dessert. Two courses are bookable only at the counter, at ¥6,600 for seven pieces and ¥8,800 for ten, each with an appetiser and a drink.

Good to know

• Last orders are at 21:00 in the evening and 14:30 at lunch.
• The two counter-only omakase courses must be booked for the counter.
• There is no car park.

The cheap end of the Hageten group, two minutes from Ginza Station, serving ramen and tendon side by side from 11:00 to 22:00 every day except New Year's Day. The sesame-tonkotsu ramen comes with five pieces of tempura on top, including char siu and pickled ginger fried in batter.

Bowls run from ¥1,290 to ¥2,600 with tax included, which makes it one of the few places in Ginza where a full meal costs under ¥1,500. Cards are not accepted, so bring cash.

Good to know

• Cash only — no credit cards.
• Closed on 1 January only.
• There is no car park.