Booking Hotels in Advance? How early?

Hi guys,

I'm planning to travel to Japan in December/January, I've posted some questions here before.

I am now finalising my plans of where I want to go etc .. and where I'm going to stay. I was just wondering how early must I book the hotels in advance in order to secure my plans? I was thinking booking in August/September would be sufficent, I can't book any earlier as I need to organise leave from work, and can't do that until around that time.

So would booking hotels for a December/January stay in August/September be enough time to allow me to basically choose any days/nights I wanted?

Thanks a lot for your help guys :)

I have found that it is okay to book as latest as one month before your traveling date.However it depends on the place,the time of the year you are planning to go,too.Two months in advance would be safer.

2 years ago when i moved here i spent a considerable amount of time in a hotel. They had a few days where they closed to renovations in January and i was forced to check out and into another hotel. It is a VERY busy period of the year and i found it exceptionally hard getting adequate accomodation with a months notice so i suggest the early the better.

Booking real early is not always possible as many hotels only allow booking within 3 months at most. You may check a couple of hotels you like and choose the one with the earliest booking possible as it matters a lot to you. I would fax a reminder(with the confirmation number from the hotel)1 month before the arrival date, just to be safe.

Thanks everyone.

So I take it booking during August/September would be fine :)