Odaiba is an artificial island in Tokyo Bay with some of the strangest attractions of the entire city on display: from psychedelic light installations and huge robots to a museum completely dedicated to unko. You’ll find out what that last thing is soon enough.
A visit to Odaiba is like going on a day trip outside Tokyo without actually having to leave the city. Everything feels somewhat different here compared to the rest of the capital. It’s a bit less chaotic, there’s more open space and you’ll even get to enjoy the occasional sea breeze once in a while. Sea breeze, yes, because you’re on an island now. An artificial island even.
Why visit Odaiba? And why does it feel nothing like the rest of Tokyo?
Odaiba (together with five other manmade islands) was only reclaimed from the sea in the mid-19th century. Its main purpose was to protect Tokyo Bay from all possible sea invasions. For more than a century, Odaiba was just a maritime fortress with a bunch of cannons looking out over the water (“daiba” literally means battery in Japanese).
When WWII showed everyone coastal fortresses have little use when the enemy can simply take a bunch of firebombs and fly right over them, the islands were abandoned and quickly fell into disrepair. It took until the early nineties for the government to come up with a new master plan for Odaiba and the surrounding area. The island would be made into the Tokyo of the future: high-tech, sustainable and liveable. A model city, combining residential areas with offices and leisure facilities, was to rise from the reclaimed land. Fantastic idea, but an idea doesn’t always work out as planned.
In 1993, an important first hurdle was cleared with the opening of the monumental Rainbow Bridge, finally connecting Odaiba to the mainland. Unfortunately, the rest of the plan didn’t work out as smoothly. This was mostly due to the main construction work coinciding with the Japanese stock market imploding. As a result, many investors suddenly ran out of money, causing delays and eventually empty buildings.
It took the better part of a decade for this to visibly change. The model city never truly materialised. Not too many people live on Odaiba even now, especially compared to the rest of the city. The island did however, found a new role. Odaiba became a place for entertainment, events and spectacle. Large hotels and modern shopping malls opened, several Olympic events were held here in 2021, and the area is now home to museums, Japanese onsen, indoor amusement parks and large-scale digital art installations. Even the famous Tsukiji Market tuna auctions eventually moved to nearby Toyosu due to lack of space.
Before you get on a train to Odaiba: is this your first time in Tokyo? You might want to read my Complete Tokyo Neighbourhood Guide first. In it, I go over every important area, its biggest sights & activities, its hidden gems and its most convenient hotels.
Things to do in Odaiba
Today, Odaiba is still one of Tokyo’s most curious districts: futuristic, a little strange, sometimes half-empty – but very interesting nonetheless. Not everyone manages to get here on a first trip to the capital, but those staying in Tokyo for a longer time will find the change of scenery quite refreshing. And it comes with a couple of unique attractions as well. These are some of the main ones.
1. Odaiba Marine Park: spend an afternoon on a Tokyo beach
When someone books a trip to Tokyo, there’ll be plenty of things on the schedule. Spending a day at the beach will most likely not be one of them. Still: it’s perfectly possible, and we owe it to the reclamation of Odaiba. The Odaiba Marine Park is an 800m long sandy beach bordered by a wooded park, a promenade and a few hotels that could have come straight from Antalya: immediate holiday mood achieved.
Swimming is prohibited – the water quality around the world’s biggest metropolis is seldom fantastic – but there’s plenty of space for beach sports and wind surfing & paddle boarding are apparently allowed. When I was there, the beach was almost empty (normal on a late November morning), but in summer it can get quite busy. You have great views on the Rainbow Bridge and the Tokyo Skyline from here. The white beach combined with the impressive panorama across the water makes for one of Tokyo’s most unexpected scenes. There’s plenty of bay-view restaurants and bars to enjoy as well – so no need to get hungry while you watch the sun set over the city.
2. The Rainbow Bridge and the Japanese Statue of Liberty
Speaking of unexpected views: on Odaiba, you can squeeze a bit of San Francisco and New York into the same photo. To do so, head up the elevated promenade running along the water between the trees. At some point you’ll suddenly spot an exact — though slightly smaller — copy of the Statue of Liberty standing on the beach. It’s a moment that feels a bit like the ending of the original Planet of the Apes.
Speaking of unexpected views: on Odaiba, you can squeeze a bit of San Francisco and New York into the same photo. To do so, you’ll have to head up the elevated promenade running along the water between the trees, until you suddenly end up spotting an exact but slightly smaller copy of the Statue of Liberty standing on the beach (a bit like the ending of the original Planet of the Apes, be it a little less dramatic).
The statue was donated to Japan by France in 1998 for a commemorative event, and became so popular it was never removed. Choose your angle well and you can get the Rainbow Bridge (which looks like San Fran’s Golden Gate) in the same frame. Go stand with your back to the Aqua City Mall and you can get the “LOVE” sign on it as well. For the best effect, come after sunset. Both the bridge and the statue are illuminated at night. The bridge is usually lit in white, but in December it cycles through all the colours of the rainbow: hence the name.
3. The Fuji Television Building: a retro-futuristic Tokyo landmark
Tokyo’s skyline is impressive, be it mostly due to its incomprehensible scale. Compared to cities like Shanghai or Hong Kong however, the number of truly distinctive showstopper buildings is relatively limited. One of the exceptions is the Fuji Television Headquarters built opposite the Odaiba pier in the late nineties.
This delightfully whacky structure is best described as retro-futuristic — as in: this is how people in the nineties imagined the future would look. Without its most striking feature, the building would be fairly ordinary. That feature is a giant metallic sphere that appears to have been slammed straight into the structure.
This delightfully whacky building is best described as “retro-futuristic” (as in: this is how people in the nineties imagined the future would look). Without its most striking feature, the building would be fairly ordinary. That feature though, is a giant metallic sphere that appears to have been slammed straight into the structure.
The sphere houses the Hachitama Spherical Observation Room, which you can visit for panoramic views over Odaiba and Tokyo Bay. Parts of the building can also be explored on a guided tour, which includes a rooftop garden and offers a glimpse into the inner workings of Japanese television.
4. The Unicorn Gundam: Odaiba’s giant transforming robot
The Unicorn Gundam in front of the DiverCity Tokyo Plaza is one of the crazier “only in Japan” things you’ll find in Tokyo: an almost 20 meter high robot that was unveiled in 2017 and actually transforms a few times a day. It’s one of many robots featured in Gundam: an anime series first broadcasted in the late seventies, that later became a franchise that expanded into dozens of series, movies, games and comics.
Every few hours the Gundam morphs from Unicorn to Destroy mode, accompanied by his own heroic theme song and lots of glowing and moving parts – quite impressive. The transformation takes place at 11 am, 1pm, 3pm and 5pm. At 7 and 9.30pm they take it up a notch with a special audiovisual show, with clips from the anime projected on the mall. There a bit too early? No worries, there’s a whole food court right inside, ane on one of DiverCity’s top floors you’ll find a Gundam Base: a store selling thousands of the franchise’s action figures – some of them quite rare.
5. The Unko Museum: possibly Tokyo’s strangest museum
Inside the same mall, you’ll soon encounter another unmistakable “only in Japan” attraction. DiverCity is also home to the Unko Museum: one of the country’s more remarkable museums. It has only one mission, and that is to make poop cute. Indeed: Japan can kawaii-ify everything, as long as someone wants it bad enough. Here’s a small quote from their original sales pitch:
“Poop will make your everyday, the streets of Tokyo, and the entire world cuter than ever. Come and enjoy this unique unko kawaii world and look at, touch, photograph, and play with poop, for a unique experience that can be found nowhere else.”
This of course sounds quite unappetizing, but in reality the Unko Museum is a hilarious place for pictures. At the entrance, you’re immediately put on a cotton-candy coloured toilet, after which you get your personal turd on a stick used to operate all kinds of attractions inside. These range from funny sets and backgrounds to interactive projections and poop-focused video games. All of course accompanied by the most obnoxious shit-themed Christmas-at-the-mall music imaginable.
It’s a bit silly, but I genuinely enjoyed myself and afterwards you can take all kinds of poop souvenirs home with you. Go buy granny a nice gift. Tickets can be bought here.
6. Other museums in and around Odaiba
Odaiba and its immediate surroundings are surprisingly rich in museums, many of them focused on technology, science or visual spectacle. These are some of the main ones worth checking out.
–TeamLab Planets (on Toyosu): immersive digital art experience featuring large-scale, psychedelic installations. You wade through warm rainbow coloured water, walk through a misty field of luminous silver eggs or play in a room filled with gigantic balloons stacked to the ceiling. It’s best to order your tickets online and well in advance (here for example). I was too late to get one myself, otherwise I would have had better pics.
–Tokyo Trick Art Museum: Decks is another one of Odaiba’s huge malls, and it holds a small and somewhat old-fashioned but charming museum full of optical illusions. Themes range from the Edo Period to all sorts of Hollywood classics. The incredibly sweet staff will happily help you take your pictures.
–Miraikan: This is Japan’s National Museum of Science and Innovation, where you can learn about AI, space travel, robotics and sustainable development. You can interact with a humanoid robot and there are several interactive exhibits to try out.
–Museum of Maritime Science: Learn about Japanese maritime history in a building that looks like a giant ship. Inside you’ll find lots of model ships, instruments and simulators. Bit of a niche visit, but a fitting one given Odaiba’s origins.
7. Tokyo Big Sight: Japan’s largest convention centre
Odaiba is – I said it before – one of the few areas in Tokyo where architects were given room to be genuinely bold. Tokyo Big Sight is one of the best examples of that freedom. Officially called the Tokyo International Exhibition Centre, it’s the largest convention and exhibition venue in Japan.
Several major trade fairs and events are held here every year, but beyond those there’s not much for the casual visitor to actually do inside. There’s a train stop right across from it though, so you can easily go have a look and admire the building – which is quite impressive. It looks like an intergalactic giant needed a little coffee table and put four huge pyramids upside down to make one. Impressive venue, and for some reason there’s a huge saw planted in the lawn right next to it. Two nice pics in one go!
Practical travel tips for Odaiba & Tokyo
**There are a couple of affiliate links to interesting activities or hotels in this article. These were personally selected to make sure they actually add value. If you’re already planning to book a tour or hotel in Tokyo, consider doing so via one of my links. Doesn’t cost you an extra dime and I’ll get a small compensation for my efforts. Thank you in advance.**
How to get to Odaiba?
Getting to Odaiba is easy and part of the fun. The most popular option is the Yurikamome Line: an elevated, driverless train that runs from Shimbashi Station across the Rainbow Bridge. Sit at the front for great views of Tokyo Bay along the way.
If you’re based in the west side of the city (Shinjuku, Shibuya, Ikebukuro), you might get there quicker by taking the Rinkai Line after transfering in Osaki Station. There are water buses running from central Tokyo to Odaiba as well, which make for a scenic but slightly slower approach.
Is Odaiba worth visiting?
Yes, but for the right reasons. Odaiba doesn’t feel like “real” Tokyo, and that’s exactly the point. It’s spacious, futuristic and a little odd, as you’ve seen above. You don’t come here for traditional neighbourhood life or hidden alleyways, but for spectacle, views and some of the city’s quirkiest attractions. If you’re in Tokyo for more than a couple of days, Odaiba makes for an excellent half-day trip – especially close to sunset. If you’re only in the capital for a few days as part of a longer Japan itinerary, it might be better to tick of the more “essential” neighbourhoods first (Asakusa, Akihabara, Shibuya, Shinjuku, et cetera).
Where to stay on Odaiba?
I personally wouldn’t stay on Odaiba for a first visit to Tokyo. The rest of the city is a bit too far away to serve as a convenient homebase, so you’ll lose a lot of time going back and forth each day. There are plenty of hotels to choose from however. Here are two of them:
–Grand Nikko Tokyo Daiba (midrange to high end): beach resort with a panoramic view of Tokyo Bay, close to DiverCity.
–La Vista Tokyo Bay (midrange): another beach resort, not on Odaiba, but on a nearby island next to the Toyosu Fish Market (where they hold the tuna auction now).
Activities in and around Odaiba
-a cruise in Tokyo Bay on a traditional houseboat (food and dancers included).
-tickets for teamLab Planets.
Want to take an even bigger break from the city? Go for a guided day trip to Mount Fuji and Hakone.
Getting around Tokyo
Buy a Suica Card (or Welcome Suica Card for tourists) to use trains, subways and buses smoothly. The card also works as an electronic wallet in convenience stores, vending machines and even some restaurants. Suica Cards work all over Japan. No need to buy a different one for the next city you’re visiting.
Mobile data is essential in Tokyo. Google Maps will tell you exactly which train to take, which carriage to board and which exit to use. Without it, getting lost is almost guaranteed. Buy a local eSIM card before you get to Japan, you’ll need it. I’ve been using Airalo for years. This is an app that lets you buy data in almost every country on the planet. It just takes a couple of clicks. Install the sim at home and activate it after landing: that’s it.
Japan Rail Pass or individual tickets?
If you plan to visit a lot of different cities with the Shinkansen bullet train, it’s best to buy a Japan Rail Pass (book it here directly). You’ll have to do this from home and long before your departure, because they’ll actually send you the pass by mail and you can’t buy one in Japan. If you’re only visiting three or four cities like I did, it might be better to buy separate tickets on the spot – you’ll have to do the math to see which option is preferable. JR-passes can be booked here.
Don’t want to bother with all of this and looking for a tailor-made trip (either individually or in a group) instead? Check out Japan Experience: they offer plenty of wonderful itineraries throughout the entire country.
Further reading
Ready for more Tokyo? Read my articles on Shinjuku & Roppongi, Shibuya, Harajuku, Akihabara, Ginza, Asakusa, Ueno and Marunouchi next.
Looking for another Asian Trip? Read my blog posts on Seoul, Beijing, Shanghai, Singapore and Hanoi. Would you rather go to Texas? Read my posts on Dallas, Austin and San Antonio.
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