Refund JapanThis page is written for English-speaking travellers going to Japan.
About Refund Japan
An independent reference for one change to one tax, written for travellers rather than for shops.
What this site is
Refund Japan is an independent reference for one thing: the change to Japan's consumption tax refund for travellers on November 1, 2026. It is written for people who are going to Japan and will be buying things there.
We are not a refund operator. We cannot process, chase or pay a refund, and we do not take a percentage of one. We are not part of the Japanese government and we do not speak for it.
Why it exists
The change is unusual in that it makes the traveller do something they did not have to do before, and it arrives with several important details still unpublished. Most English-language coverage fills those gaps with plausible-sounding numbers. This site keeps them empty and says which are empty.
Who writes it
The Refund Japan editorial desk. We do not put invented bylines or invented credentials on pages, and we do not claim experience we have not had. What you can check instead is mechanical: every page carries the date it was last checked, and the primary sources are listed in one place.
How it is paid for
The site carries no advertising, no affiliate links and no trackers. Nothing on any page loads from another company's server. We are building an app for travellers shopping in Japan, and that is the intended business.
The four editions
Refund Japan publishes in English, Korean, Traditional Chinese and Japanese. They are not translations of one another. Readers in each market arrive with different background knowledge and search in different words, so each edition is written for its own readers.
Corrections
If something here is wrong, tell us and we will fix it and say that we did. Write to press@refund-japan.com. There is no form on this site, because a form would mean loading something from somewhere else.