Is Japan Kid Friendly? || Japan

This is going to sound confusing, but the answer is yes… and no. Here’s why.

Restaurants / Dining

In restaurants, we were surprised that even places that we didn’t think would have a kid's plate, bowl, and utensils, HAD. On the other hand, a lot of restaurant’s high-chairs were like in the picture above, where we couldn’t buckle her in and just had to trust that she wasn’t going to randomly slouch and slide off, and had to constantly remind her to “sit down nicely.”

There are some really cool ways that Japan has incorporated family life into everyday things. We were in Higashihiroshima at Fuji Grand Mall and they had this set up for our stroller as well as a built-in high chair for our toddler. At one point, she was straight-up lounging in it. If your toddler is already self-feeding, this particular setup may be uncomfortable for them to eat, since the table portion is at their waist level ( aka, a little too low ).

One restaurant in Higashihiroshima, the restaurant had a room for children to play. This was perfect for our toddler who was able to go with family and play in the room so the rest of us could finish eating. I wouldn’t consider this typical, as this was the only restaurant we encountered like this.

Unfortunately, I don’t have many photos to show you, but if you are staying in the city side, the reasons I mentioned above that are pluses, aren’t usually available. There were many restaurants in Osaka and Tokyo where your child would sit on a regular adult chair or on your lap, even if they had children's plates available. On top of that, in busy cities such as around Tokyo, the seating area is on the second floor, requiring you to leave your stroller somewhere on the first floor.

Many restaurants are very accommodating and try their best to assist you. McDonald’s in Akihabara let us leave our stroller off to the side so we could go upstairs to eat. Another restaurant let us put it behind their register. Most of the time we were able to fold our stroller down so it wouldn’t take up a lot of space. Our stroller is very compact and around the size of an airplane carry-on. You can read my blog post [ here ] on my mommy blog for the stroller we used.

Changing Stations / Restrooms

Daughter in child chair in women’s bathroom stall.

This was a bit of a culture shock for me. Many restaurants and establishments do NOT have a changing station. I found that most train station restrooms will have one, and bigger shopping malls and retail outlets will have a changing station somewhere. They aren’t always in the women’s restroom and are sometimes paired with handicap-accessible ones, which can be their own individual room outside of the men’s and women’s.

Many women’s restrooms however will have these little chairs for young toddlers to sit in, making it a lot easier for us to use the restroom. I loved these as I didn’t need to maneuver carrying my child or convincing her to stand up while I had to pee.

Navigating Train Stations and Subways

It can be hard to navigate the stations with a stroller and try to find the few elevators available. On top of that, not all subways have an elevator. One way we were able to help navigate this easier, was to use Google Maps and have the setting “wheelchair accessible” turned on. However, that does mean that sometimes your commute around will take longer and may require more walking. There were times that we took a route that wasn’t wheelchair accessible, and Brian had to carry the stroller up a few flights of stairs. There were also times when we gave up looking for the elevator or the correct elevator and Brian carried the stroller up/down the stairs or we would take her out of the stroller and use the escalator.

Hotel

If you’re looking for budget-friendly and near-the-train-station hotels, you’ll likely book a Japanese chain or local hotel brand. With that usually comes small rooms, not anywhere close to our American standard-size hotel room. We found it difficult to navigate being in our room with our young toddler who wanted space to move around. It was especially hard when it came time to unpack and repack - most of the time we sent our daughter over to my parent’s room to hang out so we could open the luggage without a toddler being forced to sit on a portion of the bed the entire time.

Overall

I think you can take your child, no matter their age, to Japan. You’ll have to be flexible and think on your toes sometimes but it will be worth it. The younger your child, the more research I suggest doing.

Have you taken your child(ren) overseas before? How’d it go?