--- title: "Station stamps in Japan: the free souvenir kept by the ticket gate" description: "Japan's station stamps are rubber stamps that travelers press into a notebook for free. What they show, how they began at Fukui in 1931, and where to find them." url: https://kama-meshi.com/en/articles/station-stamps language: en published: 2026-11-11 category: "Travel basics › Rail travel" tags: ["TrainTravel"] author: "Oginoya Editorial Team" publisher: "Oginoya Co., Ltd." translations: zh-TW: https://kama-meshi.com/zh-tw/articles/station-stamps ko: https://kama-meshi.com/ko/articles/station-stamps zh-CN: https://kama-meshi.com/zh-cn/articles/station-stamps zh-HK: https://kama-meshi.com/zh-hk/articles/station-stamps th: https://kama-meshi.com/th/articles/station-stamps de: https://kama-meshi.com/de/articles/station-stamps fr: https://kama-meshi.com/fr/articles/station-stamps es: https://kama-meshi.com/es/articles/station-stamps --- # Station stamps in Japan: the free souvenir kept by the ticket gate ![Two hands pressing down the arm of a stamp press on a wooden stand lettered 駅スタンプ 奈良駅](https://kama-meshi.com/_astro/station-stamp-nara-2014.D65G7HQ1_7jQHj.webp) A station stamp, *eki sutanpu* in Japanese, is a rubber stamp kept at a railway station for travelers to press into a notebook as a record of the trip. Each station has its own design, made from the station's name and the sights or specialties of the place, and pressing it costs nothing. The custom is said to have begun at Fukui Station in 1931. ## What a stamp shows Japan has long used personal seals, and stamps for visitors are set out at tourist sites as well as stations. JR East keeps a stamp at many of its stations, each stamp showing sights or products from the area around the station. The stamps at 78 JR East stations in Tokyo were redesigned on July 8, 2020, for the first time in 17 years. Each new design joins one character from the station's name to a symbol of the station or its neighborhood. Ueno has a panda from Ueno Zoo, and Shibuya a paw print for the dog Hachikō. The stamp at Narita Airport Station shows the Narita Express and a plane taking off. ## Fukui, 1931 The stamp set out in 1931 at Fukui Station, on the Hokuriku Main Line, was the stationmaster's idea. It showed Eihei-ji, a Sōtō Zen temple nearby. Newspapers reported it, and the travel magazine *Tabi* wrote it up in its June 1931 issue. *Tabi* went on printing station stamps in every issue until about 1935, probably more than 500 stamps in all. From 1933 it added a note to each: the design, the date the stamp was set out, the color of the ink and the person who had thought it up. The people named were stationmasters, station staff, town notables and switchmen. Private railways followed: Odakyū's Katase-Enoshima Station set out a stamp on May 25, 1933. Also in 1931, the Ministry of Communications drew on the fashion for stamping at tourist spots and introduced the *fūkei-in*, a postmark with a picture. ## Discover Japan and My Journey In October 1970 Japanese National Railways launched Discover Japan, a campaign to keep people traveling by rail after that year's Osaka Expo. It ran until December 1976. Stamps were set out at about 1,400 stations, on stands with a round table, and a stamp book was made for collecting them. ![A red round table under two hexagonal boards lettered DISCOVER JAPAN, with a panel between the boards reading 旅のしるしにスタンプを!!](https://kama-meshi.com/_astro/discover-japan-stamp-stand-2018.C8PqW8Ah_ZWER1c.webp "A Discover Japan stamp stand at the Railway Museum, 2018.") With long use the faces of the stamps wore faint, some stations withdrew them, and a traveler could arrive to find nothing to press. In 1980 the national railway began *Watashi no Tabi* (My Journey) and placed stamps of a matching design at about 740 stations, for collecting as well as for remembering a trip. Earlier stamps had carried a station name and a picture. The My Journey stamps added a short phrase about the place. The My Journey stamps came in four shapes and three colors, and each of the twelve combinations told what a station was known for. A purple circle meant hot springs, a purple pentagon a local taste, and a black hexagon a station that was number one at something on the national railway. The stamps had their own wooden stands with a peaked roof. ![A wooden stand with a peaked log roof and a sign reading わたしの旅スタンプ台, with stamps on chains on its green tabletop](https://kama-meshi.com/_astro/watashi-no-tabi-stamp-stand-furano-2011.Dvg7-s0m_qHOwL.webp "A My Journey stamp stand at Furano Station, 2011.") ## Finding the stamp At JR East, most stamps stand outside the ticket gates, where anyone may press them. Some are kept in the ticket office or inside the gates, and a traveler asks the station staff for them. Morioka Station has two: one in the passage outside the gates, the other inside the Shinkansen gates, where a platform ticket is needed to reach it. JR West lists its stations with stamps on its website, with each design and its location. Its stamps can be used during station hours while staff are on duty. All a collector needs is paper or a notebook. People who collect station stamps are called *oshi-tetsu*, and JR East sells stamp books for them through its online shop. In December 2024 JR East's Chiba branch put on sale a stamp book designed by its station staff, who had watched visitors press stamps onto notebooks and scraps of paper. ## Stamp rallies and stamps on a phone In a stamp rally, a railway sets out stamps at chosen stations for a fixed period, and there is usually a prize for collecting the full set. JR East holds rallies from time to time, some of them tied to anime or manga. From February 1 to March 6, 2022, it ran a rally at 50 stations in and around Tokyo. Thirty-four stations had reproductions of their My Journey stamps of 1980, and the 16 stations that had no stamp in 1980 had new stamps made for the event. Stamps can also be collected on a phone. With the app Ekitag, a smartphone held to an NFC tag at a station puts that station's stamp into a stamp book inside the app. JR West has Ekitag tags at stations in Shiga Prefecture. ## Temple seals and postmarks A *goshuin* is received at a temple or shrine as proof of a visit. The name of the temple or shrine, the name of its deity and the date are written in ink, a seal is pressed in vermilion, and the visitor makes an offering. The *fūkei-in* that began in 1931 shows a famous sight or historic site and is used all year by post offices connected with that place. A clerk applies it to postage stamps stuck on a card or on mail. Of the three, the station stamp is the one that travelers press with their own hands. ## What else a station sends home A stamp is one of the things a Japanese station gives travelers to take home. At [Yokokawa Station](https://kama-meshi.com/en/articles/yokokawa-usui), Tōge no Kamameshi went on sale on February 1, 1958, in [an earthenware pot of Mashiko ware](https://kama-meshi.com/en/articles/the-kama-pot), and Oginoya publishes recipes that use the empty pot. At Takasaki Station, [Daruma Bento](https://kama-meshi.com/en/articles/daruma-bento) went on sale in 1960, and its red container becomes a coin bank once the meal is eaten. ## References - [JRE Media: How to collect station stamps (archived)](https://web.archive.org/web/20251217084846/http://media.jreast.co.jp/articles/3515) - [JRE Media: Morioka Station stamps and Ekitag](https://media.jreast.co.jp/articles/5253) - [JRE Media: Station stamp book designed by station staff, Chiba branch](https://media.jreast.co.jp/articles/2429) - [JR West: Station stamps](https://www.jr-odekake.net/navi/stamp_eki/) - [Toretabi: Station stamps at 78 JR East stations in Tokyo redesigned](https://www.toretabi.jp/news/topics/entry-2559.html) - [Toretabi: The My Journey stamps return as a stamp rally](https://www.toretabi.jp/railway_info/entry-7291.html) - [Toretabi: Looking back through the timetable, vol. 1](https://toretabi.jp/column/nippon_vol01/01.html) - [Shinchōsha, Nihon Tetsudō Ryokō Chizuchō blog: Station stamps, old and new](https://www.shinchosha.co.jp/railmap/blog/sden/2014/06/12.html) - [Shinchōsha, Nihon Tetsudō Ryokō Chizuchō blog: Matching prewar stamps](https://www.shinchosha.co.jp/railmap/blog/sden/2014/08/13.html) - [National Geographic Traveller (UK): A practical guide to collecting Japan's eki stamps](https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/practical-guide-to-collecting-japans-eki-train-station-stamps) - [Kotobank: “Fūkei-in”](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E9%A2%A8%E6%99%AF%E5%8D%B0-3193106) - [Kotobank: “Goshuin”](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%BE%A1%E6%9C%B1%E5%8D%B0-501354) - [Japan Post: Postmarking services for collectors](https://www.post.japanpost.jp/enjoy/culture/stamp/philately/) - [Oginoya: Company timeline](https://www.oginoya.co.jp/tougenokamameshi/history/) - [Takaben: Daruma Bento](https://www.takaben.co.jp/obento/ekiben/daruma.html) Image credits (resized for display): - [othree / Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:%E5%A5%88%E8%89%AF%E9%A7%85_2014_%E9%A7%85%E3%82%B9%E3%82%BF%E3%83%B3%E3%83%97_(14003064021).jpg), [CC BY 2.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), 2014 - [Xexex-xexion / Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:DiscoverJapan-Stump-Stand.jpg), [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0), 2018 - [Tzuhsun Hsu / Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:%E3%82%8F%E3%81%9F%E3%81%97%E3%81%AE%E6%97%85%E3%82%B9%E3%82%BF%E3%83%B3%E3%83%97%E5%8F%B0_2011_(6017697989).jpg), [CC BY-SA 2.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0), 2011