Tokyo never sleeps

My Japanese friend says:Tokyo never sleeps.Do you think, It is true or just kidding. Your opinion is highly appreciated.

It absolutely does.

It sure is quiet if you go for an early morning walk...

I would very much say it does. As the trains stop running around midnight much of the activity stops as people hurry home for their often long commutes. This is of course in relative terms to other cities where people linger longer in the nights.

Some parts of the huge prefecture, or even the huge city for that matter, sleep less than others. For example, the small district of Kabukicho is so-called the Sleepless Town, while 40% of Tokyo are forests.

http://mokuiku.metro.tokyo.jp/forest/3-1.html

Tokyo. The city that never sleeps.

Very common saying.

But totalling incorrect. Between midnight and 5am. The city is mostly stopped.

I live in Tokyo but I am originally from Istanbul. In my opinion: Tokyo definitely sleeps. In Istanbul, if you try to cross the bridges at 2am in the morning, there will still be a heavy traffic!

Even Seoul is a lot livelier than Tokyo at night, I thought - it is really hopping at 10PM. But then it is quiet in the mornings too.

I think it's likely that Tokyo has the largest number of 24-hour businesses in the world, so that's certainly one measure.

And there are definitely neighborhoods that don't shut down. In my own (central but relatively quiet) neighborhood there are a good number of places open at 2am, including restaurants, although it does taper off after that.

Even in the office-building district of Marunouchi, you can go to the Shin-Maru Building across from Tokyo Station and find a dozen izakayas and other restaurants that are open until 4am. So there are always places to go if you know where to look, and you can always hang out pretty late if you have taxi fare and don't have to get up too early.

Arigatou Gozaimasu.