The Tsukiji Outer Market and Your Toyosu Fish Market Morning
Almost every guided morning finishes here, about three kilometres west of Toyosu, and most travellers arrive believing they are going to a fish market. They are going to something better and quite different: a street of retail shops, knife-makers and small restaurants that stayed put when the wholesale trade left. Toyosu Fish Market tuna auction tours cover both in one morning.
What is still at Tsukiji, and what left
The wholesale market moved to Toyosu in October 2018 and took the auctions with it. What remains is the Tsukiji Outer Market, the retail district that grew up outside the old market walls to serve it. There is no tuna auction here and there has not been one since 2018.
What there is: fishmongers selling to the public, knife shops with three generations behind them, dried bonito and kombu counters, tamagoyaki stands, tea and pickle shops, ceramics, and perhaps a hundred small places to eat. The district calls itself Japan's food town and it is not overstating the case.
Tsukiji Outer Market opening hours
The outer market runs on three different clocks in a day, and which one you arrive in changes the experience completely.
| When | Whose hours these are |
|---|---|
| 6:00 to 9:00 | Professional buyers' hours. The trade has priority until nine |
| 9:00 to 14:00 | Public buyers' hours |
| 14:00 onward | Flexible; each shop sets its own closing time |
It follows the Tokyo Central Wholesale Market calendar, so it closes on broadly the same days Toyosu does, and individual shops set their own hours on top of that. A tour that reaches Tsukiji at seven finds the lanes quiet and about half the shutters still down; one that arrives at ten finds everything open and a great many people.
The eight rules the outer market asks you to follow
These are published by the outer market's own association, and they are short, sensible and worth reading before you go rather than after.
Give way to the trade before nine — professional buyers are working, and they are the reason the shops are worth visiting.
Eat where you bought it — inside the shop or in front of it, not while walking.
Leave big bags in a locker — the lanes are narrow. Strollers can be left at the Plat Tsukiji information centre for ¥500.
Move in small groups — and hold a child's hand.
Ask before you photograph a shop — some display a sign asking you not to.
Do not touch the food — handling raw produce lowers what a shop can sell it for.
Do not haggle — prices here are wholesale and bargaining is not the custom.
Smoke only in the marked areas — and never while walking.
What to buy that is not a meal
Knives. The reason a great many people come. Carbon and stainless, single and double bevel, and shops that will engrave a name while you wait and pack a blade for a flight.
Dried bonito and kombu. The two halves of dashi, sold by weight, and the lightest useful thing in Tokyo to take home.
Tamagoyaki. Bought hot on a stick and eaten in front of the stall, which is where the rules say to eat it.
Ceramics and kitchen tools. Grater plates for wasabi, drop lids, donabe pots, and the aprons the trade wears.
Tea, pickles and seaweed. The quiet shops at the edges of the district, which are the ones the local cooks are in.
Eating your way along the lanes
The district works best as a series of small things bought from different counters rather than one sit-down meal: a skewer of grilled scallop, a piece of tamagoyaki, a strawberry daifuku, a bowl of chirashi at a counter with eight seats. Bring cash, because the smallest and best stalls are the least likely to take a card.
Eat where you bought it. That rule is on the outer market's own published list and it is the one visitors break most often. The lanes are far too narrow for a crowd walking and eating.
Getting between Toyosu and Tsukiji
about three kilometres, and the quickest way at that hour is a bus or a car, which takes about a quarter of an hour. Several of these departures include the transfer and one names the bus fare specifically in its inclusions. By train it is slower than it looks on a map, because the two sit on different lines.
| Station | Line | Walk |
|---|---|---|
| Tsukijishijo | Toei Oedo line | 1 minute |
| Tsukiji | Tokyo Metro Hibiya line | 1 minute |
| Higashi-ginza | Toei Asakusa and Tokyo Metro Hibiya lines | 3 minutes |
Plat Tsukiji, the district's own information centre, is the place to ask anything and will hold a stroller for a small fee.
December, and the New Year shopping season
Through December the outer market asks visitors to hold back on sightseeing and group tours so New Year shopping can run safely. That request is published on its own site. It is worth respecting rather than working around: the lanes in late December are full of Tokyo families buying for the New Year table, which is the single most Japanese thing that happens in this district all year, and a tour group standing in the middle of it is in the way.
Come in the morning, come in small numbers and buy something. That is all the district asks.
Where to go next
The history page explains why the market split in two, what happens here covers the Toyosu half of the morning, and Toyosu Fish Market Tours lists the departures that take in both.