Luggage Forwarding Japan: The Practical Guide to Takkyubin for Self-Guided Travelers

What Is Takkyubin? Japan's Luggage Delivery Service Explained

Takuhaibin is a convenient, moderately priced service for sending parcels, luggage and other types of goods from door to door nationwide. Delivery is usually on the next day, except over very long distances, when it can take longer.

Yamato Transport started the service in the 1970s and remains the market leader with their Takkyubin (written TA-Q-BIN on the English site). Although it is a registered trademark, Takkyubin is commonly used to refer to takuhaibin services in general. Yamato Transport's main competitors are Sagawa Express and Japan Post.

You'll see Yamato Transport everywhere. The yellow logo with the black cat carrying her kitten is one of the most recognizable brands in the country. Ask any local for "Kuroneko" and they'll know exactly what you mean.

The service is domestic only. For sending souvenirs back home, you'll want Japan Post's international options instead.

Why Luggage Forwarding in Japan Makes Sense for Travelers

Japan's trains are efficient, but they weren't built for tourists lugging 28-inch suitcases.

While Japan's public transportation system is remarkably efficient, train platforms and carriages are often crowded. As for the shinkansen, although it offers more room, passengers traveling with luggage whose total dimensions exceed 160 cm are now required to reserve a designated oversized baggage space on the Tokaido, Sanyo and Kyushu lines — and pay ¥1,000 if they turn up without one.

Translation: your big case is a hassle on the train. You have to reserve special seats. You block aisles. You lift it overhead. And when you arrive at a busy station like Kyoto or Shin-Osaka, you're fighting through crowded stations with limited elevators.

Sending bags ahead solves this in one move. It is also why every one of our self-guided tours includes the transfers — more on that below.

How the Takkyubin Service Actually Works

The basic flow is simple.

You hand the bag to your hotel or a convenience store, it's scanned and trucked overnight, and delivered to your next hotel under your name and check-in date.

At the hotel front desk, you fill out a small waybill. You write your name, the destination hotel name and address, the guest name on that reservation, and a delivery date. The hotel staff take payment, hand you a receipt with a tracking number, and that's it. The delivery driver picks up from the hotel later that day.

That receipt matters. Keep it until the bag lands. You can check delivery status any time by entering the tracking number on Yamato's English website.

Where You Can Drop Off Luggage

You have several options for sending bags:

Hotel Reception

The easiest.

Most Japanese hotels — from budget business hotels to luxury ryokan — will forward your luggage to your next destination. Ask the front desk, fill out the same form, and your bags arrive at the next hotel before you do. Most hotels handle takkyubin daily. The reception team knows the drill even if the guest doesn't speak Japanese.

Convenience Store

Direct drop-off at a convenience store (any FamilyMart, 7-Eleven, or Lawson displaying the Yamato logo) is slightly cheaper — Yamato takes ¥100 off the rate when you bring the parcel to a counter, konbini or sales office yourself, and some hotels add a small handling fee on top.

If you spot the black cat logo on the storefront, they handle it. Bring the destination address written out, ideally in Japanese, since konbini staff usually can't help with translation. Note that some convenience stores cannot accept parcels larger than size 180.

Yamato Sales Offices and Luggage Counters

Standalone Yamato branches exist across cities, and there are baggage service counters inside the biggest stations, including Tokyo Station and Kyoto Station — handy if you're already passing through.

Airport Counters

Almost every arriving international traveler has the option of shipping bags direct from arrivals. Narita, Haneda, Kansai and Chubu — all the major airports — have Yamato (Kuroneko) or JAL ABC luggage-delivery counters in the arrivals halls.

Haneda Airport and Narita Airport: Shipping from Arrivals

Landing tired at 10 pm? Send the big bag straight to the hotel.

Takkyubin delivers suitcases from Narita or Haneda directly to your hotel for the normal rate plus a ¥660 airport fee — roughly ¥3,000–3,700 for a 160-size case depending on the counter — with next-day arrival standard for Tokyo-area hotels. Which airport you land at changes the maths; our Narita vs Haneda guide has the transfer options for both.

At Haneda specifically, Yamato runs counters in all three terminals with long hours, and offers a same-day service to central Tokyo: drop the bag at the counter in the morning (the published cut-off is 11:00) and it reaches the front desk of eligible hotels in Tokyo's 23 wards, Urayasu, Kawasaki and central Yokohama from 18:00 the same day. Yamato lists the same-day rate at ¥5,780 for a 160-size bag from Haneda to the 23 wards; standard next-day delivery is a third of that.

So Haneda in the morning = bag at your Tokyo hotel that evening. That's genuinely useful if you're going straight to a temple or a meal after landing. From Narita, next-day delivery is the standard, which is still faster than most guests will realize.

How Much Does Luggage Delivery Cost?

Pricing depends on two things: the size of the bag (measured length + width + height in cm, with a weight cap per size) and the distance between origin and destination. These are Yamato's published TA-Q-BIN rates, cash price per parcel, sent from the Kanto region (Tokyo):

Rough guide, then, for a normal check-in suitcase (size 140–160): same-region or short hop ¥2,200–2,500; Tokyo to Kyoto or Osaka ¥2,300–2,650; airport to hotel in the Tokyo area ¥3,000–3,700; long distance to Hokkaido or Kyushu ¥3,000+; Okinawa nearer ¥5,000. Same-day delivery, where it exists, is ¥3,500–6,000.

For a family of four moving between cities, you're looking at maybe ¥10,000–11,000 total. Split across a couple of shinkansen legs where you'd otherwise be stressed, sweating and lifting, it's very much worth it.

Delivery Time: What to Expect

Standard delivery is next day within Honshu (the main island). Takkyubin is next-day, not same-day, on any intercity route — and Yamato counts delivery days from the day after you send.

Two-day delivery applies for longer distances, roughly:

• Honshu ↔ Hokkaido: 2 days
• Honshu ↔ Kyushu: 1–2 days
• Anything involving Okinawa: 2+ days

Same-day delivery does exist but only in specific city zones and only if you drop off in the morning — Haneda to the 23 wards, or Kyoto Station to hotels in Kyoto city (¥3,470 for a 160-size bag). Don't plan on it for a normal hotel-to-hotel hop.

Choose your delivery date to match your check-in day. Most hotels are happy to hold your bags for a day or two either side if the dates don't line up perfectly.

When to Use Luggage Forwarding vs. Coin Lockers

Different tools for different jobs.

Use takkyubin for overnight city changes. Use coin lockers (or the hotel luggage hold) for same-day sightseeing. Lockers are not a substitute for shipping a bag to another city — locker sizes, prices and where to find them are in our luggage storage guide.

A Real Multi-City Itinerary Using Luggage Forwarding

Here's what a standard 10-day Japan trip looks like when you use forwarding properly:

• Day 1: Land at Narita. Drop the large suitcase at the Yamato counter, ship to your Tokyo hotel. Ride the Narita Express with a daypack.
• Days 2–4: Tokyo. The big bag lives in your hotel room; you carry nothing during the day.
• Day 4 evening: Ask the hotel front desk to ship your bag to your Kyoto hotel for next-day delivery.
• Day 5: Shinkansen to Kyoto with just a small overnight bag (see our Tokyo to Osaka guide for the train itself). The bag is waiting at the hotel when you check in.
• Days 6–8: Kyoto and day trips. Same drill.
• Day 8 evening: Ship the bag to your Osaka hotel — or send it directly to the airport for your last stretch if you're doing a shopping-focused last day in Osaka.
• Day 10: Fly home light.

This pattern works because Japan's rail network is fast enough that the bag basically travels alongside you, one night behind.

Sending Bags to the Airport for Departure

Great trick for the last day.

If you're leaving Japan, you can use Yamato's Airport TA-Q-BIN to send your bags directly from your current hotel to the airport. Just ask your hotel staff. They will help you with the forms, collect the fee, and facilitate the whole process. This means you can spend your last day in Japan exploring, shopping, or eating sushi, instead of lugging around your luggage. Your bag is waiting at the airport counter when you're ready to check in — bring your ID and the receipt to collect it.

Important: for delivery to the airport, Yamato requires the bag to be sent by two days before your departure date (three days in some areas), and the exact sending deadline depends on the counter you drop it at. So if your flight is Sunday morning, drop off Friday morning at the latest. Don't cut this close.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Sending the wrong bag. Don't forward the suitcase with tonight's medication, tomorrow's contact lenses or your passport. Keep essentials — and anything with a lithium battery — in a carry-on.
• Bad timing. If your next hotel check-in is tomorrow, ship today. Not the morning of.
• Wrong destination type. Can you send luggage to an Airbnb? Usually no — it must be a staffed reception or luggage desk. Small guesthouses without a front desk may not accept deliveries.
• Language friction at konbini. Convenience-store staff are efficient but rarely speak courier-form-level English. Have the destination address printed out.
• Forgetting the receipt. No tracking number = no tracing.
• Sending to the airport the day before. It won't be there. Two days minimum.

Hands-Free Travel: What Comfortable Travel Actually Feels Like

Japanese has a term for this: tebura kanko, or "hands-free sightseeing." It's marketed by Yamato as Hands-Free Travel, and once you try it, it's hard to go back.

Think about what a normal city-change day usually looks like. You wake up, pack, drag bags to the lobby, check out, wheel them to the train station, up the stairs, onto the platform, hoist them onto the shinkansen (or wedge them behind your seat), pull them off at the next station, and drag them across another city to the next hotel. That's an hour or two of physical effort right in the middle of your holiday.

With takkyubin, that hour becomes: walk to the station with a daypack, board train, get off, walk to hotel, keys please. Big difference.

Especially for parents with kids, older travelers, or anyone doing more than three cities in two weeks.

Regional Trips: Mount Fuji, Hakone, and Onsen Towns

The service is a lifesaver for detours to smaller destinations. If you're spending a night in Hakone or a ryokan near Mount Fuji, you don't need your large suitcase — you need a small overnight bag with a change of clothes and a toothbrush.

Ship the big case from your Tokyo hotel straight to Kyoto (or wherever's next). Take the small suitcase or a backpack to the mountains. Trains up to Hakone and around the Fuji Five Lakes are small, sometimes with switchbacks and steep steps, so the less you're carrying the better.

Same logic applies to onsen towns like Kinosaki, Kusatsu, or Yudanaka — you rarely want a large suitcase there — and to walking routes: on the Kumano Kodo and the Nakasendo, forwarding between inns is how everyone hikes with a daypack.

Practical Tips Before You Drop Off Your Bag

• Have your next hotel's name, full address and phone number written down — Japanese script helps
• Photograph your bag before drop-off
• Know your size: the standard limit is 160 cm combined and 25 kg for a size-160 parcel; sizes 180 and 200 go up to 30 kg but not every convenience store takes them
• Bring cash: konbini and counters increasingly take cards and IC cards like Suica, but cash is always safe
• Get a receipt and photograph it, in case you lose the paper
• Tell your next hotel a bag is coming — a quick email helps, especially for smaller inns

Do You Need to Speak Japanese?

Short answer: no, not really.

Airport Yamato counters and larger hotel front desks handle English constantly. The forms are standardized, and staff will fill in most of it if you show them your reservation on your phone.

At a convenience store, it helps to have the destination written down in Japanese, because the shipping label prints as it's entered. You can screenshot the destination hotel's address in Japanese from Google Maps and show it to the clerk. Works fine.

Alternatives: Sagawa Express, Japan Post, and Others

Yamato has the biggest network and the smoothest tourist experience, but it's not the only option. Sagawa Express, JAL ABC (at the airports), Japan Post, LuggAgent (through Klook), and ShipGo also provide similar services.

For most travelers, just use whichever counter is closest or whichever service your hotel already partners with. The difference in cost and speed between Yamato and Sagawa Express on a hotel-to-hotel route is minimal.

Building Takkyubin Into Your Japan Travel Plans

If you're planning a self-guided Japan trip and it's more than one city, budget for takkyubin as part of your transport spend. Roughly ¥2,500–2,700 per suitcase per city change. Two city changes for a couple = about ¥10,000–11,000. Money well spent.

The self-guided routes we build at selfguidejapan.com are designed with this in mind — and the luggage transfers between hotels are included in the price, along with 24-hour phone support and insurance. Hotels have front desks with English-friendly staff who handle luggage delivery daily, shinkansen bookings are made assuming you'll be light on train days, and rest nights are placed where they make sense so bags can catch up.

If you're not sure how to structure your first Japan trip around luggage logistics — or you want someone else to sort the hotels, trains and support — take a look at our self-guided packages. We'll handle the moving parts so you can focus on the sushi.

FAQ: Luggage Forwarding in Japan