Best Luxury Hotels in Japan

Japan’s luxury hotel scene divides less by geography than by tradition, and this collection is built to show both sides: the modern city hotel and the ryokan, plus one genuine outlier built entirely around art.

For a Tokyo base

Four properties on this list sit within the same Otemachi financial district, each with a distinct approach: Aman Tokyo’s washi-paper-lantern serenity, Hoshinoya Tokyo’s tower-block ryokan (the first of its kind), the Imperial Palace views from Palace Hotel Tokyo, and Four Seasons Hotel Tokyo at Otemachi’s more intimate scale. Any one works as a Tokyo base; the choice comes down to whether a genuine onsen floor, a moat view, or a smaller room count matters most.

For the ryokan tradition

Gora Kadan, a former imperial villa in the hot-spring town of Hakone, is the collection’s clearest ryokan choice, roughly ninety minutes from Tokyo by train and built around private in-room onsen baths and kaiseki dining.

For art and architecture

Benesse House, on the island of Naoshima in the Seto Inland Sea, is unlike anything else on this list: a Tadao Ando-designed museum you can sleep inside, part of a wider network of art installations across several small islands. It suits a dedicated two-to-three-night detour rather than a quick stop.