Visiting Aokigahara Forest: Hours, Tickets and Access
The forest is free and open at all hours. The caves inside it are not, and the difference decides how you spend the day.
TicketsWhat it costs to walk in
The forest itself charges nothing. The marked trails carry no fee, no permit and no closing time, and you can start walking at any hour of any day of the year.
The three lava caves are separate businesses inside it, and each sells a ticket at its own door: 350 yen for an adult and 200 yen for a child. A combined ticket covering Narusawa Ice Cave and Fugaku Wind Cave is sold at whichever of the two you reach first — buy it there and keep it for the second. Bring coins; the kiosks are small.
HoursOpening hours, and the one closure that catches people out
| Place | Hours | Adult | Closed | Time inside |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The forest and its marked trails | Open at all hours | Free | Never | As long as you like |
| Narusawa Ice Cave | 9:00–17:00, shorter in winter | 350 yen | No closing days | About 15 minutes |
| Fugaku Wind Cave | 9:00–17:00, shorter in winter | 350 yen | No closing days | About 15 minutes |
| Saiko Bat Cave | 9:00–17:00 | 350 yen | 1 December – 19 March | About 20 minutes |
The winter closure at Saiko Bat Cave is for the hibernating colony and it is kept to. If the longest of the three is the reason for your trip, come between late March and November and you will find it open.
How long to allowHow long the forest actually takes
An hour covers the signed loop near the cave car parks at a gentle pace. Half a day links all three caves on foot with time to stand still in between, which is the version most people enjoy most. A guided walk from the lake runs three hours door to door.
Coming out from Tokyo turns any of those into a nine to eleven hour day, because roughly four hours of it are road. That is the single number worth checking before you commit to a date.
Pick the walk that fits your day
Three-hour cave walks from the lake, private half days and full days out of Tokyo, all with a full refund up to 24 hours ahead. Fares start at From $51 per person.
What to bring, and what the cold does
Closed shoes with a grippy sole matter more here than anywhere else in the region, because wet lava is genuinely slick and the trail is uneven for its whole length. A fleece belongs in your bag in August: Fugaku Wind Cave holds close to zero degrees all year and Narusawa Ice Cave stays below freezing.
Coins for the cave kiosks, water, and a downloaded map complete the list. Signal is patchy under the canopy and absent underground, so load the route before you leave the station.
Access, and who these walks do not suit
None of the three caves is adapted. All have stairs, wet uneven floors and stretches where an adult stoops, and the guided caving trips add a ladder descent on top of that. Where a trip is ruled out for you, the ground above it is not: the signed forest trail is flat, wide and walkable at any pace.
Two of the private car days here are listed as wheelchair accessible for their above-ground stops, with accessible transport and infant seats, so the lookouts, the lake shores and the forest edge stay open. Confirm the detail with that operator when you book. Full trail conditions and the marked-path rule are set out on the safety page.
Everything else sits on Aokigahara Forest Tours, where the comparison table puts every departure side by side. How to Get There covers the trains and the buses, and the FAQs answer the short questions. Aokigahara Forest ticket prices are set by each cave and by each operator, never here.