Value Village ／ Before you come to Japan
This answer is a draft. It stays unpublished until legal review and source verification are complete.
Japan has about 35,000 km of coastline and a short, intense beach season. Visitors are surprised that "the sea is closed" outside a few summer weeks, that lifeguards whistle swimmers back within metres of shore, and that everyone leaves the water at the same time in mid-August. There are reasons for each.
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Beach season | Designated beaches open mid-July to late August (Okinawa from April; Hokkaido a few weeks). Outside these dates: no lifeguards, no facilities, and often signs prohibiting swimming |
| Designated beaches | Around 1,000 official bathing beaches with water-quality testing, lifeguards, buoyed swim zones, showers and lockers (¥300–500). Swim inside the buoys |
| Flags | Red: no swimming. Yellow: caution. Green/white: swim. Lifeguards will whistle you back from the boundary — comply |
| Drownings | Roughly 700–800 water deaths and disappearances a year in Japan (760 in 2025; about 46% at sea, 37% in rivers); rip currents are the main cause at beaches, and alcohol is present in a large share of adult cases |
| Rip currents | Fast channels of water flowing out to sea, often where the surf looks calmer. Do not swim against it: float, raise an arm, swim parallel to the shore until out of the current |
| Jellyfish | Andon-kurage (a small box jellyfish, *Carybdea brevipedalia*) appear in Honshu waters from around Obon (mid-August) — the folk reason "don't swim after Obon". Okinawa's habu-kurage (Chironex) from June: beaches use nets; sting first aid is vinegar at those beaches, sea water elsewhere |
| Other hazards | Sea urchins on rocks, stonefish (oni-okoze) in sand, blue-ringed octopus in the south. Wear sandals on rocks; don't touch animals |
| Tattoos | A few beaches and most beach-side pools and showers restrict visible tattoos; the sea itself is public |
[Verify] Annual water-death figures with National Police Agency statistics; number of designated beaches with the Ministry of the Environment; jellyfish first aid with Okinawa prefectural guidance.
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https://www.kaiho.mlit.go.jp/e/
https://www.env.go.jp/water/
https://www.pref.okinawa.jp/english/
⚠️ Editorial note: the source URLs above were identified by search. Our working environment cannot reach go.jp domains, so the contents have not been checked against the text. Verify every source before publication and record who checked it and when.
What we share here are ideas and everyday practices passed down among people living in Japan, together with general information drawn from public sources. They are not official recommendations, and they are not professional instruction. Practices vary between households and regions.
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