July foreign entries to Japan at 2.3 mil, 78% of pre-pandemic level

Japan saw an estimated 2,320,600 foreign visitors in July, the highest number since arrivals began to plummet due to the COVID-19 pandemic and about 78 percent of the level in July 2019 before the outbreak, government data showed Wednesday.

The figure was up 16-fold from a year before and topped 2 million people for the second straight month as schools across many countries entered the summer holidays and Japan’s eased COVID-related border restrictions continued to attract travelers, the Japan National Tourism Organization said.

Even excluding visitors from China, where restrictions on Japan-b...