JR Rail Pass. Are they worth it?

I am planning a trip to Japan in October and am trying to figure out if a JR rail pass would be worth buying with the recent price increases.

I have tried the online calculator and its showing that it would work out cheaper to buy individual tickets but have read on a previous thread that the calculators are not accurate.

If someone could help it would be much appreciated.
I will be staying in Japan for 21 days and this would be my itinerary.

Tokyo Haneda - Tokyo (4 days in Tokyo)
Tokyo - Takamaya (3 days in Takamaya)
Takamaya - Kyoto (5 days in Kyoto)
Kyoto - Nara -Nara - Kyoto (day trip)
Kyoto - Hiroshima (3 days in Hiroshima)
Hiroshima - Miryama - Miryama - Hiroshima (Day trip)
Hiroshima - Osaka (4 days in Osaka)
Osaka - Tokyo (1 day in Tokyo)
Tokyo - Haneda airport

Any help greatly appreciated.
We are considering taking a bus from Tokyo to Takamaya instead of the train.
Do I have to purchase the JR pass from online before travel or can I but it there at a station?

Try the JRP calculator on JG website.
At a quick glance and without doing any calculations your itinerary is �gtoo relaxed �g for the new JRP to pay off. You could have a look at JG section above it passes is some other pass could pay off. Maybe something for your portion after you leave Kansai and go towards Hiroshima. I am no expert at these passes as I don�ft qualify for them, but JRP now is only paying off for very high intensity far flung routes. Before you broke even with a Tokyo - Osaka return in a week. Now your need to do considerably more than that in a week which isn�ft really good advice for a reasonable itinerary.

@Likebike sums it up nicely with their comment "JRP now is only paying off for very high intensity far flung routes."
Your schedule would make a small saving IF covered within 7-days. Your relaxed travel and the fact you are not travelling very far means the longer duration (14 or 21 day) passes would be nowhere near paying off. And yes, Tokyo to Hiroshima and back is not a lot of distance.

Thank you for your help and advice.

The short answer is, after the massive 70% price increase last October, that the rail pass is a terrible idea for nearly everyone. Currently, the price for a 7-day JR Rail Pass is higher than for a 14-day pass under the old prices. I just hope JR will come to its senses and drop their pass prices later on - sooner or later people will wake up and demand will crash for them. I tend to doubt it though.
As for the rail pass calculators, some are better than others. You should avoid any calculator on a vendor's site - I've seen how the numbers get distorted and fudged, such as by adding the seat reservation charges into the fare, making a pass look more attractive than it really is. Most of the time, you do not need seat reservations at all, except at some peak travel times (plus a few trains require them). With a rail pass, seat reservations are free.
Nowadays, a pass would only make sense if you are doing some aggressive long distance day trips by bullet train multiple times. Instead, just get regular fare tickets, or look into some regional rail passes. Of course, JR East also raised their pass prices 50%, and JR West and JR Kyushu raised theirs 20%. For your plans, a JR West Kansai-Hiroshima Pass might work for you.
Regarding your plans, you don't go into detail, but 3 days in Takayama seems like a lot. It would be unfortunate if you missed Shirakawago. There is enough to see in the area, though if you rent a car your options improve greatly. Same thing for Hiroshima & Miyajima. You could branch out a bit, and see Iwakuni, Onomichi, Sandankyo Gorge, etc. I suggest you pull a couple days off of Osaka and visit Kanazawa en route to Kansai. If you're already seeing Tokyo, there is much less need for daytime in Osaka (evenings in Osaka though are when the city really comes alive). You could also consider doing an overnight side trip to Koyasan.

I�fm finding that the nationwide JR pass can still pay off for me costwise because one of the benefits I get from it is the ability to get lower rates on hotels that aren�ft located where everyone else stays, and then using the rail pass for relatively short hops to �gcommute�h to more interesting locations, plus for some more substantial day trips that are farther away but still reasonable as day trips. So for me, just looking at point-to-point ticket costs to popular cities and comparing them to the cost of a rail pass doesn�ft really work. Using a JR pass enables me to stay at nicer hotels than I could get in the major tourist destinations, for the same price or less, and I have the added benefit of not having to change hotels often, as well as a lot of flexibility, for example with regard to choosing or changing day trip destinations to suit the weather.

But I will say that this sort of strategy is more suited to people who have been to Japan a number of times, who are quite familiar with train travel and hotel pricing patterns there, and who may be more interested in some �gsecondary�h sightseeing destinations than first-timers who naturally want to go to a lot of �gmust-see�h places. I just point it out mainly for the benefit of travelers who have gotten JR passes in the past but are now having trouble figuring out how to get one to �gpay off.�h The price hike was indeed a gut-wrenching development for many of us.

Another strategy is to use one of the numerous passes for various areas in western Japan and either skip Tokyo (flying into Osaka or maybe Fukuoka) or additionally shell out for nozomi tickets to Kansai (or possibly use a Hokuriku Arch Pass and use it enough to make it worth the extra cost over a nozomi ticket). For my next trip I spent hours evaluating various options and the itineraries I could base on them, and I was very attracted by some of the JR West passes (which allow you to take Nozomi and Mizuho trains with no surcharge). Those passes all saw a recent price increase, but nothing like the jump the nationwide JR passes (and JR East passes) saw. But in the end I actually ended up deciding on a nationwide pass. Just based on the calculator, it does easily �gpay off,�h and my itinerary and hotel lineup are quite appealing (to me, at least).

So I would tell people who already have experience planning Japan trips not to be too disheartened by the gigantic price increases of last fall. If you can think outside the box, and not just use a simple cost comparison without considering possible other benefits, it can still be possible for a JR pass to be �gworth it.�h (Of course, there are some downsides to using a JR pass, especially if you don�ft get it through the official JR pass site that allows you to make and change reservations online.)

I have always based my trip planning around rail passes and what I can do with them, rather than coming up with a fixed itinerary and then trying to find passes that �gpay off,�h but admittedly it does help to have years of experience (and to enjoy traveling on trains, or at least not hate it). I think it would be overwhelming for a Japan newbie, so in most cases they should just follow the conventional advice and �gdo the math,�h which in most cases will now lead them to buy point-to-point tickets (and an IC card), and also to consider domestic air travel for longer distances.

JR will not care if demand for passes drops to zero. The old pricing and decades of no price increases made them rather unusual in terms of the prices for their regular services.
There are still routes I take where a pass would save some money (especially in the Tohoku region), but in terms of time and usefulness, I don't touch them any more because it is not worth the hassle.

I agree about JR having no interest in ever dropping the prices. They clearly stand to make more money the way things stand now. I�fm surprised they kept the prices as low as they did for so many years.

One thing that concerns me is that the pricing of the nationwide rail passes will encourage foreign tourists to limit their train travel, and to concentrate even more on a small number of the most popular destinations. This will effectively keep them from being a little more adventurous and perhaps visiting some other areas that could really use the tourism dollars. So an even greater percentage of tourist spending will now be concentrated in Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, and Hiroshima, plus a few other places such as Takayama and Hakone. I would guess that a lot fewer people are going consider taking a day trip to Sendai (or nearby sites) from Tokyo, for example, or to take several days getting to Sapporo by train, stopping at two or three places in Tohoku. But I guess that region was never high on the priority list of �gtypical�h Japan tourists, so maybe they won�ft take too much of a hit.

I bought a 21 day rail pass recently for Osaka - Hiroshima - Kyoto - Tokyo - Nosawa - Hikone - Nara - Osaka. Now that i have planned my trip in detail i can see the JR pass is probably costing me more than if i bought individual tickets. The thing that annoys me more is that i can't use the Nozomi or Mizuho Shinkansen on Tokyo - Kyoto - Osaka - Hiroshima line. The shinkansen i can use come much less often so have to plan more carefully. If i do use Nozomi they charge a large surcharge. Much bigger than the difference is if you just buy individual tickets. If i had my time again i would not buy JR pass.

@Bob , if you haven�ft started the pass yet, maybe look into getting a refund.

Regarding Nozomi trains (the faster and more frequent ones), I thought that with the new JRP you can now take them. Paying �ga bit�h extra.
But yes, your trip doesn�ft sound far flung enough fir a pass to pay off.

@Bob, have you considered getting a refund? Even with the cancellation fees, it might end up cheaper than keeping your pass.

I find the 7 day JR pass calculator is inaccurate to what I've seen online. For me, I think buying individual tickets is cheaper but the convenience of a pass may be worthy to pay a little extra. My itinerary is Haneda >Tokyo>Hakone>Kyoto>Nara>Kyoto>Osaka>Hiroshima>Osaka>Tokyo>Haneda. Yes, I know you can't use JR pass for Haneda but included it to show my itinerary. Anybody have any thoughts? Thanks.

@LikeBike @Mellye
I actually hadn't thought about getting a refund. I will look into it. Thanks.

@LikeBike Regarding the surcharge for the Nozomi. The cost of the JR railpass Nozomi supplement for Tokyo to Kyoto is 4960 JPY. However the difference between the Hikari and Nozomi ticket price is only a few hundred JPY. So yes they say you can upgrade but the surcharge is very high when you look at the difference in ticket price. Someone let me know if i got that wrong but i am pretty sure thats right. To be honest it doesn't bother me using the Hikari from Tokyo to Kyoto and Osaka since there are quite a lot of Hikari. However from Osaka to Hiroshima there are not so many trains you can use. The Sakura runs much less often than the Nozomi and Mizuho. Its just annoying since you are already paying a premium price for the rail pass.

@John. If you are doing that itinerary in 7 days then you are probably not paying much more by buying the rail pass. As you say you also have convenience of not buying tickets. Although that is a pretty busy itinerary to do in seven days.

@John
If your itinerary is fixed, the JR pass won't bring you much convenience (see Bob's comment on the Nozomi).

IMO, the only perk that might be worth paying more for a pass, compared to individual tickets, is that they allow you to change your plans while you're in the train. Theoretical example: you were planning to go directly from Osaka to Hiroshima, but once in the train, you see an ad for a festival in Takamatsu. You decide to make a detour, and change trains at Okayama. That's "free" with a pass, but if you had bought a point-to-point ticket, you would lose the Okayama-Hiroshima section of your ticket.

By the way, you can use the JR pass from Haneda to Tokyo.

Thanks @Bob for your info. I'm trying to use a 7 day pass but over our 14 day itinerary.

Thanks @ Mellye. I forgot that I could use the JR pass from Haneda by way of Tokyo Monorail and JR Yamanote line. I was thinking only of using the Keikyu line paying for that route but the JR might save us some money but might take longer.

I just want to point out, I joined a FB group on family travel to Japan and you see a lot of people who still insist they want/or need a JR Pass despite it not paying off. I think it is just a mindset in many people that they want or need a pass. I have been joking with my family I am going to buy the URL NoyoudonotneedaJRPass because of how often I see people posting about wanting to get one despite their itinerary being Tokyo to Kyoto to Osaka with a Nara day trip and back to Tokyo. Heck, I was arguing with someone about how they didn't need a 2 week pass, because they are doing Tokyo to Osaka to Hakuba to Tokyo and they want the pass for potential "day trips."

I do think that increasing the price of the JR East Pass (and getting rid of TEP in September) is a detriment to getting people to visit places outside of Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka and Hiroshima. You don't see a lot of people looking to go to Tohoku and raising the price is not going to really help. There are definitely a lot of places that want more tourism in Tohoku.

I admit, I'm planning to just pay out of pocket to go to Koriyama and then renting a car to do a 1 week plus trip with TEP over the Summer. Is it faster to travel North on the shinkansen and just rent cars as I go and return them, sure. But then you are also locked into a 5 day only trip, and I'd really prefer 7-8 days.

I'd also like to point out that depending on where you live, trying to fly into Osaka or Fukuoka or Sapporo is a PIA. I live in the US. If you live in CA or Hawaii you can fly into Osaka, but otherwise I need to either fly from my home airport to one of those places first and then make a connection or make a connection at Narita or Haneda. I've done both in the past, and it's just really not all that fun, when the flight is already long enough. I'd rather just pay more and take the train to Kyoto and not have to worry about missing connections and being stuck. If you live somewhere with direct flights, that is awesome, but many of us do not.

@John
You seem to be seeing only the convenience of the JRP even if it doesn�ft pay off. But there are inconveniences to it as well:
- you can�ft really take Nozomi / Mizuho trains (you can but as Bob pointed out the surcharge is ridiculous )
- you need to actually get the pass at an office. Specially if you want to start using it from Haneda that means queuing up there to exchange the pass. Maybe now the queues are shorter but buying individual tickets over smartEx app or at a machine is going to be faster
- you need to squeeze your trip in 7 CONSECUTIVE days
- you need to stick to your plan. Let�fs say you are traveling and weather down in Hiroshima looks dreadful for the next entire week, you still �gneed�h to go there. You can�ft remove it and stay longer in Kyoto. (Yes you get the ability to add more daytrips but within a 7 day period of a trip that already includes all major sights between Tokyo and Hiroshima how many day trips could you possibly fit in?
- you need to stay with JR trains. But for example to Hakone depending on where you are in Tokyo Odakyu line can be more convenient. Same goes for Kintetsu line to Nara.
-

Regarding the point about tourists only visiting the same places on the Golden Route, I would disagree. Certainly most first time visitors hit Tokyo and Kyoto and maybe Osaka and Hiroshima, but there are a lot of other interesting places along the way.
Also, when factoring in a pretty typical two-week trip and the cost of trains, that would be around 60,000 yen for some pretty extensive exploration between Tokyo and Hiroshima and back again. You can easily include spots like Kanazawa, Takayama, Nagano, Matsumoto, and even Nikko (Sendai gets a bit more expensive). Place that 60k yen into context of the overall trip - equivalent to the cost of a few nights of hotels, a fraction of an air ticket and probably about 10% of the overall cost.
Repeat visitors usually have different plans and do seek out some of the less visited spots, but they are potentially also not trying to cover from one end of the country to the other in seven days.

Thanks @ LikeBike. Good advice. I'm still in the early planning of transportation and forums like this one are very helpful.

@Japan Custom Tours, I'm not sure where you are getting 60,000 yen from. It's either 50,000 yen for 1 week or 80,000 yen for two. I think for 1 week unless you want to do a lot of single nights or long day trips, it's very hard to just get very far. I think for two weeks, it's just hard to spend that 80,000 yen. If the price for a 2 week had gone up to 60,000 yen, sure I could definitely still see its value, but at 80,000 yen, I think it's a lot rougher. If you want to go to Hiroshima or explore areas west of Osaka, you can just get one of the JR West passes which went up in price but not like JR East or JR Nationwide and pay out of pocket to get between Tokyo and Osaka (which is overall better because you can use the Nozomi and unless you specifically want a Hikari stop. Yes, it's much nicer to take a train that is running every 10 minutes and has a shorter trip than one that runs every 30 minutes and takes longer.)

I think it's very hard to get that 50,000 yen in 1 week unless you are actively planning an itinerary around making it work, which generally is going to involve making a lot of day trips or max 2 night stays and you are also then sort of always locked into making sure you get your value. I certainly could plan a trip that gets my 50,000 yen worth, but the question is, is that a trip I want to do? I prefer to plan an itinerary of what I want to do vs. planning an itinerary to make a pass pay off.

I've noticed that even repeat visitors, tend to skip Nagano city, they just go to Jigokudani or to Hakuba or to Magome and Tsumago. I have seen a lot of 2nd and 3rd time visitors posting both in FB groups and when I was using Reddit. Nagano itself or even Matsumoto are just not on people's lists. Takayama and Shirakawa Go are quite popular, but this is all still very much Chubu and not Tohoku. On Reddit, where more people without kids post, I saw more interest in Yamadera and occasionally Morioka for the soba challenge, but that is pretty much it for Tohoku. For people with kids, most of the more northern interest seems to be Hokkaido for skiing.

And yes, paying 20,000 yen per adult on train fare you don't need in the grand scheme of things is a small percentage, but it does add up, especially as your group gets larger. Why should I want to pay 40,000 yen more than I need to for 2 passes and be consigned to slower less frequent trains when I could use that money for 4 nice dinners out, or a shopping spree at Takashimaya , or a night at a nice hotel. Plus then I am no longer locked into 7 days.

And in the case of the JR East Pass, I could pay 32,000 yen for 2 round trips, and then have as many days as I want in Tohoku using a rental car and TEP (for now) especially since I would want to rent a car for some of the trip any way because some locations just have limited or challenging public transit. If I want to go to Yudono-san, I am doing it by rental car or taxi, cause there are no more buses.