On my first time-crunched layover in Tokyo, one of my biggest regrets was not getting to explore Akihabara. So, when I finally had a more extended stay in Japan’s capital on my second trip to Japan, Tokyo’s most famous otaku neighborhood was high on my sightseeing list.
Stepping out of Akihabara Station for the first time, the area was exactly as I expected: crowded, colorful, and jam-packed with electronics and otaku shops stacked on top of each other.
Walking from one end of Akihabara to the other, in any direction, only took me about 10 minutes. But what I found in between—from the electronics district and otaku culture around Chuo-Dori to the retro arcades and even shrines & temples a few blocks over—felt like four different neighborhoods sharing a single train station.
Here’s how I’d explore Akihabara again as a first-time visitor, and what I wouldn’t miss next time around…
How to explore all of Akihabara’s different sides
Akihabara Electric Town
If there was one place I knew I needed to see on my first stop in Akihabara, it was Akihabara Electric Town. And the second I exited Akihabara Station, I realized it was impossible to not see it.
Long before anime and gaming swept in, Akihabara was an electronics district built out of desperation. After World War II, demobilized soldiers and displaced workers set up makeshift stalls under the train tracks, selling salvaged radio parts and vacuum tubes scavenged from American military surplus.
By 1948 and 1949, Akihabara Electric Town turned into a full-on informal economy. A 1949 government decree forced the makeshift open-air stalls into organized, permanent structures.
The result, Akihabara Radio Center (map), still stands today under the tracks, selling components and retro gadgets that trace straight back to the district’s founding.
Located across the street, Akihabara Radio Kaikan (map) is the more polished version of that same idea. The original building came down in 2011, and reopened in 2014 as a ten-story tower with two basement levels.
More than 30 specialty stores fill Akihabara Radio Kaikan now, filled with everything from hobby goods to one of the area’s largest trading card shops. Although I often had no idea what I was looking at (I’m not a collector myself), it was one of my favorite stops in the area. In my opinion, Radio Kaikan is well worth a wander while planning out what to do in Tokyo, even if you’re not into electronics or manga.
Walking through Akihabara Electric Town, it’s the density that got to me. I wandered through shop after shop of components, gadgets, and secondhand electronics stacked floor after floor, with barely a gap between one storefront and the next.
(Knowing that this whole modern district grew out of black-market radio parts changed how I look at the buildings now, even the newer, glossier ones.)
Otaku & anime culture
When I stepped onto Chuo-Dori Street, I saw the neighborhood’s identity flip entirely. Chuo-Dori is Akihabara’s main drag, lined with anime and manga shops. The billboards overhead push whatever series is airing that season, and let you know immediately exactly where you are.
Located on Sotokanda a few blocks off the main street, Mandarake (map) is the one shop I’d recommend as a short detour for first-time visitors. And I’d budget more time for it than for anywhere else in the neighborhood, even if you’re not into the otaku scene. Mandarake features floor after floor of out-of-print manga, old figures, and collectibles I hadn’t seen anywhere else in Tokyo.
Maid cafes form the other half of the area’s otaku scene. Akihabara is where this now-famous concept started.
Cure Maid Café (map), open since 2001, is generally considered the original. It’s tucked into the fourth floor of the Onoden Main Store building, and it still runs regular anime collaborations.
On my visit to Akihabara, I only peeked my head into a maid cafe. Although it’s not my usual scene (I’d rather go to a cat cafe, to be honest), it’s something I’d be sure to add to my bucket list next time around.
(Hey, when in Tokyo…)
Aside from anime shops and maid cafes, Gachapon Kaikan (map) rounds out Akihabara’s otaku scene with close to 500 capsule toy machines under one roof, the largest concentration of them in the city.
It’s easy to feed one a few hundred yen just to watch the capsule drop at Gachapon Kaikan, even if you didn’t plan on buying anything.
(Droppin’ a few yen at a toy machine or pachinko parlor is practically a rite of passage on any first trip to Tokyo.)
Retro gaming and arcades
This part of Akihabara has changed more since my first trip to Tokyo than any other. As an 80s kid who grew up with a Genesis controller in my hand, much to my chagrin, SEGA no longer runs arcades in Japan. The company sold most of its arcade business to Genda in 2020, and every SEGA-branded game center in the country got rebranded to GiGO.
Akihabara’s original SEGA flagship, a 33-year landmark and one of the buildings that caught my eye most in the area, closed for good on August 31, 2025. GiGO still runs Buildings 2, 3, and 5 in the area.
GiGo Building 3 (map) even has a floor called RETRO:G, built specifically to recreate the 1990s arcade feel the old SEGA buildings were known for.
(Yep, that’d for sure be my jam.)
Super Potato (map) is the other essential stop in Akihabara for retro gamers. And it hasn’t changed much. It features three floors of retro consoles, cartridges, and secondhand games, with a small arcade and snack counter on top.
Out of all the retro gaming attractions in Akihabara, Super Potato is the one I’d check out first, if only because it’s the one thing in the area that hasn’t moved or closed. (Or gotten caught up in a lawsuit.)
In the past, one of the coolest things to do in Akihabara was to take a go-kart tour through the neighborhood’s streets dressed up as Nintendo characters. (If you grew up playing Mario Kart like me, you’ll know exactly why this was so popular with first-time visitors.)
Unfortunately, Nintendo sued the original operator over unauthorized Mario costumes and won all the way up to Japan’s Supreme Court. Go-kart tours still run around Akihabara, but they can no longer legally dress you as your favorite Nintendo characters like Mario, Luigi, Toad, or Princess Peach.
(Lawyers ruin all the fun, eh?)
Historic Kanda
What surprised me most about Akihabara was how much the neighborhood quiets down just a few blocks from the arcades and gachapon machines.
One of Tokyo’s most beautiful shrines & temples, Kanda Myojin Shrine has stood in some form since 730 AD, nearly 1,300 years. Tokugawa Ieyasu himself is said to have paid his respects here before the shrine moved to its current site during the Edo period.
Kanda Myojin Shrine hosts Kanda Matsuri, one of Japan’s Three Great Festivals alongside Gion Matsuri in Kyoto and Tenjin Matsuri in Osaka.
Admission to Kanda Myojin Shrine is free, and the grounds are open every day of the year. Standing in the courtyard, it’s easy to forget the arcades and gachapon machines are a five-minute walk behind you.
A short walk away, on the far side of the Kanda River, Nikolai Cathedral, with its characteristic green dome, is the area’s least expected historic landmark.
(I know: A working Russian Orthodox cathedral in the middle of Tokyo’s electronics district wasn’t on my bingo card either.)
PRO TIP: Nikolai Cathedral’s interior visiting hours have been unreliable since 2020. I’d be sure to check the day of my visit rather than building my schedule around getting inside. I’d treat the exterior view of the dome as the sure thing, and the interior as a bonus if it happened to be open during my Akihabara itinerary.
Yushima Seido (map) sits just 400 meters from the cathedral, connected to Chiyoda City by a bridge called Hijiribashi (The Sacred Bridge). Yushima Seido was built by shogun Tsunayoshi Tokugawa in 1690. This Confucian temple became the direct predecessor of Japan’s modern education system.
The grounds of Yushima Seido are free to walk. The interior of the main hall opens for a small fee, on weekends and holidays only.
After spending most of my day in electronics, otaku, and gaming shops, stepping into this part of Kanda felt like crossing into a completely different city.
How to get to Akihabara
The Electric Town Exit at JR Akihabara Station puts you right in the middle of the electronics district and the otaku shops on Chuo Dori. It’s about as central a starting point as exists in the neighborhood.
The Hibiya Line on the Tokyo Metro also stops at Akihabara Station if you’re coming from Marunouchi, Yurakucho, Ginza, or Roppongi.
For the historic Kanda sites, I’d skip Akihabara Station entirely. Get off at Ochanomizu Station instead, on the JR Chuo/Sobu lines or the Metro Marunouchi and Chiyoda lines. Nikolai Cathedral is right outside the station, and Yushima Seido is a two-minute walk across the Hijiribashi bridge.
If Gachapon Kaikan is the priority, Suehirocho Station on the Ginza Line drops you two minutes from the door. It’s closer than walking from Akihabara Station itself.
