J.League Autumn-Spring: 10→72 December Matches, 7 Cold-City Markets

Posted: 2026.08.31

From the 2026/27 season, the J.League has completed its shift to an “autumn-spring” calendar, opening in August and closing the following June. The change itself is a matter of competition scheduling, but seen from the accommodation market the question narrows to one point: home matches will now be staged in December, in cold-region host cities where matches had almost never been played. Using the J.League’s official match data, we recounted December 2025 and December 2026 and set the results against room stock, December occupancy and winter rates in the cities concerned.

Metric Definitions Used in This Article

ADR (estimated settled ADR): An estimated transacted rate (tax-excluded equivalent) calculated by applying a property-type correction factor to the cheapest plan level each property publishes on OTAs and similar channels (double occupancy, per room, tax included). Cross-checked against property-level results disclosed by listed hotel REITs, the median error is 6.6% (covering the verified categories of business hotels, city hotels, resort hotels, ryokan and capsule hotels). It is an estimate and differs from any individual property’s actual transaction prices or accounting figures. Area-level ADR is the median across the properties covered — the level of a typical property in that area.
Listed price: The average of all plans published on OTAs and similar channels (room-only through meal-inclusive, double occupancy, per room, tax included). This is a separate metric on a different basis from estimated settled ADR, and this article always labels it explicitly as “listed price” to keep the two distinct.
Occupancy: Room occupancy by prefecture as published (actual results) in the Japan Tourism Agency’s Overnight Travel Statistics Survey. This article does not use our own estimated occupancy.
Room stock: Total guest rooms across the accommodation properties tracked by MetroEngines Research (municipality level). Because it includes properties not currently listed on OTAs, it is larger than the property count behind the price data.
Data sources: MetroEngines Research / J.League official website and J.League Data Site / Japan Tourism Agency, Overnight Travel Statistics Survey

Key Takeaways

— December 2026 brings 72 matches across seven match days in J1 to J3. December last year had just one match day and 10 matches, so December football is now on an entirely different scale.
— Nine of those matches fall in the seven cold-region host cities (Sapporo, Sendai, Tendo, Matsumoto, Toyama, Nagano and Iwaki), where the equivalent figure for December last year was zero.
— December occupancy in the prefectures concerned sits low even by their own annual standards: Yamagata 43.2% and Nagano 33.3%, Fukushima 45.0% and Toyama 48.8% (all 2025 actuals).
— December estimated settled ADR runs from a high of ¥19,600 in Tendo to a low of ¥9,600 in Toyama, a 2.0x spread. Only three markets — Sapporo, Tendo and Yamagata — rise from November.
— Away-supporter room demand is estimated at 55 to 460 rooms per match, or roughly 1,100 to 2,800 room-nights for December as a whole (about 1,900 room-nights in the mid case).

December 2026: seven match days, 72 matches — against one day and 10 matches a year earlier

Start with the primary source on scheduling. According to the J.League’s official website, the 2026/27 season opens on Friday 7 August 2026 and closes with the final round on Sunday 6 June 2027 for J1, and Sunday 23 May 2027 for J2 and J3. Rounds 1 to 20 of J1 and rounds 1 to 22 of J2 and J3 are played within 2026, after which the winter break begins.

We therefore took all 1,140 matches of the 2026/27 season (380 each in J1, J2 and J3) and all 1,140 matches of the 2025 season from the J.League Data Site, and pulled out December alone. The result is unambiguous. December 2025 had a single match day, Saturday 6 December, carrying only the 10 matches of J1 round 38, because J2 and J3 had finished their schedules during November. December 2026, by contrast, has 72 matches across J1 to J3 spread over seven days: Friday 4, Saturday 5, Sunday 6, Saturday 12, Sunday 13, Wednesday 16 and Saturday 19 December.

Source: J.League Data Site (all matches, 2025 season and 2026/27 season); compiled by the HotelBank Editorial Team

The breakdown: 16 matches on 5 December (six in J1, six in J2, four in J3), 13 on 6 December (three in J1, four in J2, six in J3), 15 on 12 December and 15 on 13 December. J1 goes into the break after the nine matches of round 20 on Saturday 19 December, and January 2027 has no fixtures at all. Play is concentrated into the first three weeks of December, and January empties out completely — a shape the Japanese football calendar has never had before.

Nine matches in cold-region home cities — against zero a year earlier

Next we isolate the matches among those 72 that are staged in cold-region clubs’ home cities. In the 2026/27 J2 and J3, the relevant clubs are Hokkaido Consadole Sapporo, Vegalta Sendai, Blaublitz Akita, Montedio Yamagata, Iwaki FC, Albirex Niigata, Kataller Toyama and Vanraure Hachinohe in J2, and Fukushima United FC, Matsumoto Yamaga FC, AC Nagano Parceiro and Zweigen Kanazawa in J3. The qualifying December home matches number nine.

The nine home matches staged in cold-region clubs’ home cities in December 2026 (J2 and J3; compiled from the J.League Data Site)
Date	Division	Home	Away	Host city
Sat 5 Dec	J2	Hokkaido Consadole Sapporo	Albirex Niigata	Sapporo
Sat 5 Dec	J3	Matsumoto Yamaga FC	Kochi United SC	Matsumoto
Sun 6 Dec	J2	Montedio Yamagata	Iwaki FC	Tendo
Sun 6 Dec	J2	Vegalta Sendai	Shonan Bellmare	Sendai
Sun 6 Dec	J2	Kataller Toyama	RB Omiya Ardija	Toyama
Sun 6 Dec	J3	AC Nagano Parceiro	Zweigen Kanazawa	Nagano
Sat 12 Dec	J2	Hokkaido Consadole Sapporo	Kataller Toyama	Sapporo
Sat 12 Dec	J2	Iwaki FC	Tokushima Vortis	Iwaki
Sun 13 Dec	J2	Montedio Yamagata	Vanraure Hachinohe	Tendo

Source: J.League Data Site (2026/27 season fixture list); compiled by the HotelBank Editorial Team. N = 9 matches staged in cold-region clubs’ home cities

By contrast, the 10 matches played on 6 December 2025 were staged in Hiroshima, Tokyo (Chofu), Suita, Osaka, Kameoka, Kashima, Shizuoka, Toyota, Saitama and Kashiwa — not one of the cold-region cities listed above. For those cities, in other words, the travelling demand that comes with a December league fixture builds from a prior-year base of zero.

Note that Albirex Niigata, Zweigen Kanazawa, Blaublitz Akita, Vanraure Hachinohe and Fukushima United FC have no December home matches. Niigata and Kanazawa are in fact on the other side of the equation, travelling as the away side to Sapporo on 5 December and Nagano on 6 December.

Circle size represents municipal room stock (number of guest rooms). Source: MetroEngines Research

December is the cold-region trough — Yamagata 43.2%, Nagano 33.3% (2025 actuals)

So what kind of month are these nine matches landing in? Lining up prefectural room occupancy month by month from the 2025 actuals in the Japan Tourism Agency’s Overnight Travel Statistics Survey, December in the prefectures concerned sits low even by their own annual standards. Yamagata is at 43.2%, its annual low, and Nagano at 33.3%, second only to March (32.9%). Fukushima at 45.0%, Toyama at 48.8% and Miyagi at 57.4% are each roughly 7 to 15 points below their November levels.

Source: Japan Tourism Agency, Overnight Travel Statistics Survey (2025, room occupancy, all accommodation types); compiled by the HotelBank Editorial Team

The November-to-December drop is steepest in Toyama, from 64.0% to 48.8% (−15.2pt), followed by Yamagata at 52.6% to 43.2% (−9.4pt), Miyagi at 65.5% to 57.4% (−8.1pt) and Fukushima at 52.4% to 45.0% (−7.4pt). The national average also falls, from 65.4% to 59.5% (−5.9pt), so December softness is itself a nationwide phenomenon; what distinguishes these prefectures is that the level they fall to stays in the 30s and 40s.

Hokkaido, on the other hand, rises in December, from 54.2% to 59.5%, as ski-season and year-end demand comes in. Sapporo’s December therefore has a different character from the other cities covered here — a point that shows up clearly in the rate data below. For reading the structure of this trough, our earlier piece organising the effect of winter demand on rates at prefecture and municipality level, Snow as Cost or Asset: Winter RevPAR 53% vs Winter ADR 2.66x, is also useful.

Room stock and winter rate levels across the seven cities

Here we line up room stock and price levels for the seven cities hosting December home matches. Stock is the total guest rooms across properties tracked by MetroEngines Research; rates are the same source’s city-level aggregates. Because Sapporo and Sendai are government-designated cities, their price data is aggregated at ward level, and we use the values for the central ward where accommodation is concentrated (Chuo Ward in Sapporo, Aoba Ward in Sendai).

Room stock and rate levels in the seven cities hosting December home matches. The year-on-year listed-price difference sets December 2025, a confirmed actual, alongside December 2026, a listing snapshot as at the time of survey — a directional indicator drawn from different observation conditions
City (price aggregation unit)	Properties	Room stock	Nov 2026 est. settled ADR	Dec 2026 est. settled ADR	Jan 2027 est. settled ADR	Dec 2026 listed price	Dec 2025 listed price	Listed-price difference
Chuo Ward, Sapporo	483	44,431 rooms	¥12,974	¥16,449	¥15,179	¥30,173	¥24,449	+23.4%
Aoba Ward, Sendai	257	21,403 rooms	¥11,211	¥11,041	¥10,110	¥19,765	¥16,198	+22.0%
Tendo	34	1,772 rooms	¥15,250	¥19,559	¥20,525 *	¥45,174	¥24,725	+82.7%
Yamagata	162	5,436 rooms	¥12,563	¥14,568	¥19,119 *	¥30,743	¥24,302	+26.5%
Matsumoto	342	7,886 rooms	¥13,984	¥12,252	¥12,368	¥28,468	¥25,310	+12.5%
Toyama	175	8,807 rooms	¥10,494	¥9,645	¥9,209	¥18,183	¥15,735	+15.6%
Nagano	285	6,899 rooms	¥12,846	¥12,463	¥12,147 *	¥24,529	¥23,579	+4.0%
Iwaki	241	6,996 rooms	¥8,760	¥9,728	¥9,604 *	¥16,377	¥15,261	+7.3%

Source: MetroEngines Research (room stock on a tracked-property basis; prices aggregated by city. Property counts behind the December 2026 prices: Chuo Ward, Sapporo 192; Aoba Ward, Sendai 73; Tendo 16; Yamagata 59; Matsumoto 111; Toyama 54; Nagano 86; Iwaki 66)

* The January 2027 figures marked with an asterisk rest on a thin sample, with property counts below 60% of the median for the same series (Yamagata 33 properties, Nagano 42, Iwaki 42, Tendo 13). Treat them as directional only, not as a basis for asserting a level.

Source: MetroEngines Research; compiled by the HotelBank Editorial Team

Three things stand out. First, December estimated settled ADR is highest in Tendo at ¥19,600, followed by Chuo Ward, Sapporo at ¥16,400; the lowest are Toyama at ¥9,600 and Iwaki at ¥9,700. Even among “cold-region home cities,” winter rates differ by a factor of 2.0.

Second, the markets where estimated settled ADR rises from November into December are Chuo Ward, Sapporo (¥13,000 to ¥16,400), Tendo (¥15,300 to ¥19,600) and Yamagata (¥12,600 to ¥14,600) — all markets carrying ski and onsen demand. Toyama (¥10,500 to ¥9,600), Matsumoto (¥14,000 to ¥12,300), Nagano (¥12,800 to ¥12,500) and Aoba Ward, Sendai (¥11,200 to ¥11,000) run flat to softer.

Third, the year-on-year listed-price differences are large in Yamagata (+26.5%), Chuo Ward, Sapporo (+23.4%) and Aoba Ward, Sendai (+22.0%), and modest in Nagano (+4.0%) and Iwaki (+7.3%). That said, the December 2026 figure is a snapshot of what was listed on OTAs and similar channels at the time of survey, observed under different conditions from December 2025, whose results are confirmed. It should be read as a directional reference, not as a settled year-on-year comparison. For the same reason — past months resting on a confirmed basis and future months on an estimated basis derived from listings at the time of survey — this article does not calculate year-on-year comparisons for estimated settled ADR.

Estimating away-supporter rooms — 55 to 460 per match, roughly 1,100 to 2,800 room-nights in December

The question of how many rooms sports travel actually moves is handled within the same framework in NPB Postseason 2026: October Rates Flat in 8 of 11 Ballpark Markets. Here we estimate how much room demand these nine matches could generate, working from published attendance figures. The assumptions are set out below, and each is explicitly an assumption.

Attendance: lower bound = average home-match attendance in the 2025 season (19 matches per club); upper bound = average home-match attendance so far in the 2026/27 season (one to two matches, J.League Data Site, as at 23 August 2026)
Away-supporter share: the share of attendees supporting the away side is assumed at 5% at the lower bound and 10% at the upper bound
Overnight rate: 50% of away supporters are assumed to stay overnight in the host city area
Conversion to rooms: converted to rooms at two guests per room

None of these are measured values, and the actual ratios swing widely by club, fixture and travel distance. Home-side attendees who travel from a distance and stay overnight also exist but are not counted here, which makes the estimate conservative in that respect.

Estimated room demand from away supporters (based on the assumptions of a 5–10% away share, a 50% overnight rate and two guests per room)
City	Club	Dec home matches	2025 average attendance	2026/27 recent average	Estimated rooms per match	Share of room stock	Estimated December room-nights
Sapporo	Hokkaido Consadole Sapporo	2	14,470	16,922	181–423 rooms	0.4–1.0%	362–846 room-nights
Sendai	Vegalta Sendai	1	13,760	18,323	172–458 rooms	0.8–2.1%	172–458 room-nights
Tendo and Yamagata	Montedio Yamagata	2	11,068	14,674	138–367 rooms	1.9–5.1%	276–734 room-nights
Matsumoto	Matsumoto Yamaga FC	1	7,573	11,241	95–281 rooms	1.2–3.6%	95–281 room-nights
Toyama	Kataller Toyama	1	5,635	8,713	70–218 rooms	0.8–2.5%	70–218 room-nights
Nagano	AC Nagano Parceiro	1	4,373	6,475	55–162 rooms	0.8–2.3%	55–162 room-nights
Iwaki	Iwaki FC	1	4,372	5,575	55–139 rooms	0.8–2.0%	55–139 room-nights
Total (9 matches)							1,085–2,838 room-nights

Source: attendance from the J.League Data Site (19 matches per club in the 2025 season; 2026/27 matches played up to 23 August 2026); room stock from MetroEngines Research. Room counts are estimates based on the assumptions of a 5–10% away share, a 50% overnight rate and two guests per room

Source: J.League Data Site and MetroEngines Research; compiled by the HotelBank Editorial Team

Estimated rooms per match are largest in Sapporo at 181 to 423, followed by Sendai at 172 to 458 and Tendo and Yamagata at 138 to 367. Measured against each city’s room stock, Tendo and Yamagata are highest at 1.9 to 5.1%, followed by Matsumoto at 1.2 to 3.6%, Toyama at 0.8 to 2.5% and Nagano at 0.8 to 2.3%. Sapporo is largest in absolute terms but represents only 0.4 to 1.0% of a stock of 44,431 rooms.

The nine matches together come to roughly 1,100 to 2,800 room-nights. That is not a scale that moves a whole market, but the significance lies in demand of a few hundred rooms landing on specific weekends in a month when occupancy sinks into the 30s and 40s. Note in particular that Yamagata’s December occupancy is its annual low at 43.2%, and two of the matches fall there.

Three cases and their sensitivity

The estimate above is set as two points, a lower and an upper bound, and the width between them comes from three inputs: the attendance basis, the away-supporter share and the overnight rate. Holding the same formula and adding a mid case gives the following.

Three cases for away-supporter room demand (total across nine matches, room-nights). All use the same formula: attendance x away share x overnight rate ÷ two guests per room
Case	Attendance basis	Away-supporter share	Overnight rate	December total (9 matches)
Pessimistic (lower bound)	2025 season average	5%	50%	approx. 1,085 room-nights
Mid	midpoint of the two averages	7.5%	50%	approx. 1,877 room-nights
Optimistic (upper bound)	2026/27 season average	10%	50%	approx. 2,838 room-nights

Source: attendance from the J.League Data Site; room stock from MetroEngines Research. Shares and overnight rates are this article’s assumptions

Running the sensitivity shows where the robustness of the conclusion lies. The table below fixes the mid-case attendance basis and varies only the away-supporter share and the overnight rate.

Sensitivity of away share x overnight rate (total across nine matches, room-nights). Attendance is fixed at the mid case (midpoint of the two averages, 100,154 across the nine matches)
Away share \ overnight rate	40%	50%	60%
4%	801 room-nights	1,002 room-nights	1,202 room-nights
5% (this article’s lower bound)	1,002 room-nights	1,252 room-nights	1,502 room-nights
7.5%	1,502 room-nights	1,878 room-nights	2,253 room-nights
10% (this article’s upper bound)	2,003 room-nights	2,504 room-nights	3,005 room-nights
12%	2,404 room-nights	3,005 room-nights	3,606 room-nights

Source: calculated by the HotelBank Editorial Team from attendance figures on the J.League Data Site. Shares and overnight rates are assumptions, not measured values

Raising the overnight rate from 50% to 60% still leaves the December total at 1,502 room-nights if the away share is 5%. At the other end, a 12% share combined with a 60% overnight rate takes it to 3,606 room-nights. The range is wide, but even at the bottom it does not fall below 1,000 room-nights. The reading that “a few hundred to a few thousand room-nights, on confirmed dates, land in a trough month” does not change direction however the assumptions are set — and that is as far as this calculation can be taken.

A catchment opening in the low season — how to take the smoothing upside

For accommodation in cold regions, this change means that demand on confirmed dates now lands on weekdays and weekends in the first half of December, a period that previously offered nothing to work with. December brings year-end party demand on the banqueting side, but the guest-room side stays in a trough until the New Year period, and the effect of adding several weekend anchors there is not small.

Possible directions for capturing it include the following.

Four points worth considering when capturing December demand
Point	Detail
Date-led inventory design	In the cities concerned, 5, 6, 12 and 13 December have a different demand structure from an ordinary December weekend. Distinguishing them on the calendar in advance makes it easier to allow for a spread than simply applying the standard December rate. On the separate question of how late the winter selling season itself starts, December Listings 56–83% of August: Japan’s Winter Inventory Timing measures the pattern across 13 prefectures.
Designing around next-morning checkout	Because kick-offs are mostly in daytime rather than at night, both night-before and same-day stays are plausible. There is room to design around length of stay, through breakfast service hours and late checkout.
Packaging consecutive matches	5 December (Sapporo, Matsumoto) and 6 December (Tendo, Sendai, Toyama, Nagano), and 12 December (Sapporo, Iwaki) and 13 December (Tendo), fall on consecutive days. Nearby pairings on consecutive days can support a two-night design.
Connecting to winter experiences	Sapporo, Tendo and Yamagata are markets where estimated settled ADR rises in December, overlapping with ski and onsen demand. There is room to design a match-driven visit as an entry point into winter leisure.

Conversely, Niigata, Kanazawa, Akita, Fukushima and Hachinohe, which have no December home matches, are on the sending side this December. But when the league restarts in mid-February 2027, matches return to February, previously part of the off-season. The effects of the autumn-spring calendar do not stop at December; they carry through into the demand calendar from the new year onwards in the same way.

Summary

With the full shift to an autumn-spring calendar, December 2026 brings 72 matches across seven days in J1 to J3. Set against one day and 10 matches in December last year, December football has changed in kind. Nine of those matches are played in the cold-region home cities of Sapporo, Sendai, Tendo, Matsumoto, Toyama, Nagano and Iwaki, and for these cities December builds from a prior-year base of zero.

December in the prefectures concerned is low even by their own annual standards on room occupancy: Yamagata 43.2%, Nagano 33.3%, Fukushima 45.0% and Toyama 48.8% (all 2025 actuals). Into that lands demand estimated at 55 to 460 rooms per match, or roughly 1,100 to 2,800 room-nights for December as a whole. It is not a scale that lifts a whole market, but demand that falls on confirmed dates, in a trough month, is a manageable input when thinking about smoothing occupancy.

January 2027 has no league fixtures at all, with play restarting in mid-February. The winter demand calendar looks set to settle into a new shape over the next few years, and for accommodation in cold regions this is an occasion to rework the design of both December and February.

⚠ Note on rates and inventory for future dates: The prices in this article for November and December 2026 and January 2027 are estimates based on selling prices published on OTAs and similar channels as at the time of survey (August 2026), and they move as the check-in date approaches. Rates set high at present may fall at the last minute, and the reverse may also occur. This article makes no assertion that inventory on future dates will “sell out” or “definitely fill”. On fixtures, please also note that the J.League states officially that “the schedule may be added to or changed in future”.