This model is cheaper in Japan. That one is not.

We look up one specific model at a time — the Japanese price, the price where you live, the tax, the duty and what you give up — and we put the date we collected each number next to it.

Frequently the answer is “buy it at home”. We publish that answer too.

What we do differently

We quote the source, not a summary of it. Where a tax authority, a manufacturer or a shop has written something down, we print their words and link the page. Where we do arithmetic, we show the arithmetic.

And we date everything. A price without a collection date is worthless — while we were writing one of these pages we watched a lens price expire three days later. Any comparison that does not tell you when it was measured cannot be checked.

Start here

The warranty does not travel
Buy in Japan and the manufacturer’s warranty in your country generally does not come with it — and for the one manufacturer whose terms we read, you cannot buy that coverage back later. Four sources, quoted in full.
Applies to every category on this site

Buying tax-free in Japan

You can no longer buy tax-free and have it shipped home
Japan abolished separate shipment of tax-free goods on 31 March 2025. Most English guides have not been updated. What the National Tax Agency published, quoted verbatim from their own English leaflet.
Already in force — not a future change
Tax-free shopping does not give you 10% back
Japanese shelf prices include the tax, so removing it is dividing by 1.1 — 9.0909%. Some shops then charge a handling fee. We checked eight retailers and quote what each one publishes.
One department store publishes its own net rate: 8.45%

Getting it home

Six countries, six different answers
Some countries tax only the amount above your allowance. Others tax the whole purchase once you cross the line. That difference costs more than the size of the allowance. Quoted from six customs authorities.
Also: why a parcel is not treated like a suitcase

Models

Our model pages are withdrawn while we check a source

We published two of them and then found that we had not read the licence terms of one of the sources they relied on. That was our mistake. The pages are still there, but the figures are not, and they will not come back until we have finished checking. See Models.

More models in preparation
We publish a model only once we have the Japanese price, at least two overseas prices, and the shipping and duty treatment for it. That takes time per model, and some models never make it — because the honest answer turns out to be “no”.

How we choose what to cover

We only cover a category when both the Japanese side and the overseas side have real price variation between shops. If either side is a fixed list price, there is nothing for us to add that you could not read off the manufacturer’s own page — so we do not write it.

We tested that rule on watches and it failed: in Japan the model we checked is sold at one published price through boutiques only, and two US authorised dealers quoted the identical figure. So there is no watch section here.

Where our numbers come from

FigureSource
Japan, new and used⚠ Under review. We are checking the licence terms of the source we were using, and are not naming or quoting it until we have finished.
Japan, tax-free rulesNational Tax Agency of Japan — their own English publications
Japan, shop policiesEach retailer’s own published page, quoted and linked
Overseas pricesNamed retailers, checked at two independent sellers where possible
ShippingJapan Post official rate table, by weight band and zone
Duty and allowancesOfficial tariff schedules and customs authority pages, per country
Exchange rate⚠ Under review. Same reason. No currency conversions are shown on the site at present.

What we will not do

We will not estimate a number we could not obtain. It stays blank and we say why.
We will not translate a government document that has an official English version. We quote theirs.
We will not tell you Japan is cheap when it is not.