Thanks to the strong US dollar, Japan feels 35% cheaper than it did five years ago.
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TThe US dollar is strong against many foreign currencies right now, which translates into bargains on international travel for savvy shoppers. One of the easiest ways for American travelers to get a “deal” on a trip abroad is to choose a destination where the comparatively strong dollar provides an automatic built-in discount for on-site costs such as hotels, restaurants and attractions.
Right now, a trip to many Asian countries is easier on the wallet than in recent years. Are Bangkok or Phuket on your bucket list? The dollar buys 8.5% more Thai baht than it did a year ago. The dollar also buys 8.5% more Vietnamese dongs and Indonesian rupiahs, 6.2% more Malaysian ringgits and 5% more Taiwanese dollars.
But by far the Asian currency most affected by the strong US economy is the Japanese yen. Today, one US dollar buys 156.36 yen, 15% more than a year ago, and a whopping 43% more than five years ago.
The weak yen helped propel Japan to be the most popular destination in Asia. In March 2024, the number of visitors to Japan surpassed three million foreign tourists in a single month for the first time, according to the Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO). This was 69.5% more than in the same month of the previous year and 11.6% more compared to March 2019.
While most of these visitors have come from neighboring Asian countries, American travelers are also getting the memo. In March, a record 290,100 Americans visited Japan in a single month – a 42% jump year over year and a 64% increase compared to the same month in 2019.
Not surprisingly, the weaker yen has spurred spending by tourists whose money goes further than it has in decades. Foreign visitors to Japan spent 1.75 billion yen ($11.2 billion) in the January-March period, according to JNTO data. This represents a 52% increase compared to pre-pandemic 2019.
Flight ticket to Japan
Japan is now so popular that it grabs 29% of all U.S. searches were for travel to Asia and 8% of all international searches for this year’s summer, according to airfare tracking site Hopper.
This huge demand has kept airfares rising. For departures in May, tickets from the U.S. to Japan cost an average of $1,281 per ticket, a 4% increase from the same period last year. Flights this summer cost an average of $1,379 per ticket, up 2% from last year and 26% from this time in 2019, according to data from Hopper.
Meanwhile, the additional supply is keeping airfare inflation in check as U.S. and Japanese airlines increase service between the two countries. Today, around 60 flights depart from the US to Japan every day, 6% fewer than before the pandemic. Still, this represents a huge improvement over this time last year, when just 49 daily flights departed to Japanese destinations.
From June to August, airlines will fly 9% more seats than last summer. And by mid-summer, the market between the US and Japan will be nearly restored to pre-pandemic capacity.
Four U.S. airlines currently fly to Japan: United Airlines, with 19% of seats; Delta Air Lines, with 10%; and Hawaiian Airlines and American Airlines, each with a 7% share of capacity. (Three Japanese airlines – Japan Airlines, All Nippon Airways and Zipair – account for more than half of all scheduled seats.)
Hopper data shows that 92% of U.S. travelers planning trips to Japan want to fly to Tokyo, but a finite number of flights are allowed in and out of Haneda Airport. The Japanese government determines how many slots will be made available to U.S. carriers, who must apply to the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) for the right to a route.
Last year, United Airlines and American Airlines petitioned the DOT to launch direct flights from the U.S. to Tokyo. United wanted a new direct flight from Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) to Haneda. Instead, it was granted a new Guam-Tokyo route, which launched on May 1, joining United’s other Tokyo-bound flights. from Newark, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Honolulu, Washington DC and other cities.
American Airlines’ newest route to Japan will launch on June 28. The flights from New York John F. Kennedy International Airport to Tokyo will be the airline’s fourth daily nonstop flight to Haneda, joining existing service from Dallas, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco and other cities.
