Chinese tourist arrivals to Japan plunge 41% in January amid simmering tensions
Impact ripples through Japan’s retail sector, with falling duty-free sales at top department stores highlighting the pain for the industry
The decline in the number of Chinese visitors to Japan accelerated in January, fuelling the first monthly drop since Covid-19 restrictions were lifted, offering the clearest sign yet of economic fallout from tensions between the countries.
Arrivals from China shrank 61 per cent in January from a year earlier, compared with a 45 per cent decline in December, the Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO) said on Wednesday, citing a shift in the timing of the Lunar New Year holiday and warnings against travel to Japan. The fall dragged down the total number of inbound visitors by 4.9 per cent last month.
The slide was triggered by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comments late last year that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan could be considered an “existential threat”, a characterisation that could give Japan legal justification for deploying troops. Beijing subsequently cautioned its citizens against travelling to Japan, resulting in flight cancellations up to March 2026.
The impact has rippled through Japan’s retail sector. Duty-free sales at Japan’s top department stores fell again in January, highlighting the prolonged pain for the industry.
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Chinese tourists have been the backbone of Japan’s post-Covid recovery, accounting for about a fifth of ¥9.6 trillion (US$62.7 billion) in tourism revenue in 2025. But the strained ties between the Asian neighbours have exposed Japan’s reliance on China as a vulnerability, intensifying its efforts to diversify its visitor base.
Visitors from Hong Kong also fell 18 per cent in January from a year earlier; arrivals from South Korea, Taiwan and the US increased, but not by enough to offset the fall, according to JNTO data.
Total foreign visitors to Japan topped 40 million for the first time last year, with an influx of people from other regions making up for the shortfall from China, the government said last month.
Still, Japan’s leading travel agency forecast that annual foreign tourist arrivals would decline this year for the first time since the country reopened its borders after the Covid-19 pandemic, projecting 41.5 million visitors.