Visualise the yen you'll get — and the yen you'll lose
Enter the yen amount you want to walk away with and see how much each route — airport counter, downtown exchange shop, and Wise + convenience-store ATM — quietly takes off the top. The difference is a few hundred dollars per trip, and thousands of yen per year for frequent visitors.
Convenient, but typical rates are 3-5% worse than city counters.
Specialist counters like WCS Shinjuku-West. Rates are mid-market −1-2%.
Mid-market rate + ~¥220 per ATM pull, as a rough guide. Wise's fee-free allowance is up to ¥25,000/day (varies by your account's registration country).
Wise + convenience-store ATM could save you roughly ¥6,900 ($44) versus the airport counter — about 5-10 lunches, as a rough guide.
0% foreign-transaction fee, mid-market rate, and ATM withdrawals free up to ¥25,000 per day (the free allowance depends on your Wise account's registration country). Order it 2-3 weeks before your trip and withdraw from any 7-Eleven ATM on arrival — that's the standard playbook.
Get a Wise card ↗Loss rates are a rough guide based on observed medians: airport 5%, decent city shop 1.5%, Wise + ATM 0.4%. Daily FX moves can shift these by ±0.5%. Actual fees and FX markups vary by your card's issuing bank and country. Last updated: May 2026.
Wise and Revolut give you mid-market rates with transparent ~0.5% fees. Roughly ¥6,000 saved on a $1,500 trip. Order before you fly and you'll skip the counter queues entirely.
Also: get online the moment you land
Japan eSIMs from ~$10/week. Install before departure, connect 1 minute after landing.
Get an Airalo eSIM ↗