Hotel rates peak in different months depending on the prefecture. When MetroEngines Research lined up monthly ADR (estimated settled rate) for all 47 prefectures over the 12 months from October 2025 to September 2026, the most expensive month of the year was August in 16 prefectures, November in 10, December in 9 and January in 6 — and October was the peak only in Osaka. The cheapest month, by contrast, fell in June 2026 for 39 prefectures, so the trough is almost uniform nationwide. This article sorts the peak months into four types and maps them, then examines the peak-to-trough ratio, how peaks shifted versus the prior two years, and how prices line up with occupancy.

Hotel Rates Peak in August in 16 Prefectures, November in 10, December in 9 — the Cheapest Month Is June in 39

Start with the distribution of peak months. Picking the single month with the highest monthly ADR for each prefecture over October 2025–September 2026, August was the most common with 16 prefectures, followed by November (10), December (9) and January (6). The remaining six were Ibaraki and Chiba (May), Tokyo (April), Aichi (September), Osaka (October) and Miyazaki (February). Only about a third of prefectures peak in the August summer holidays; more prefectures reach their peak between autumn and winter.

The trough month, on the other hand, is almost uniform. In 39 of the 47 prefectures June 2026 was the cheapest month, with June ADR at a median 0.87x of each prefecture’s annual average. The eight prefectures whose trough was not June were Tokyo in August (¥11,800), Hokkaido in April, Aomori and Akita in March, Toyama in February, Ibaraki in July, Tokushima in October and Okinawa in November — in each case the trough sits on the flip side of the local tourist season.

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research (number of prefectures by annual peak month, N=47 prefectures, 17,136 hotels)

Note, however, that this distribution describes “this period” only. Running the same aggregation for the prior-year period puts the number of August-peak prefectures at 36, and at 20 two years earlier. The drop to 16 this period reflects summer 2026 rates falling below the previous year. The 47-prefecture median YoY change was −1.8% in June 2026, −3.0% in July and −2.2% in August, against +12.1% in November 2025, +9.7% in December and +11.8% in January 2026 — strong autumn/winter growth that moved many prefectures’ peaks from summer to autumn/winter. The Japan Tourism Agency’s Overnight Travel Statistics also show summer lodging demand below last year: guest-nights in August 2026 were 62.68 million, −6.7% YoY, of which foreign guests were 12.64 million, −10.3% (1st preliminary).

Are Hotel Rates High in October? Only Osaka Peaks Then; Tokyo Ranks 5th and Kyoto 4th of 12 Months

How far does the data support the sense that “hotels are expensive in October”? Ranking October 2025 ADR within each prefecture’s 12 months, only Osaka ranked first, and only four prefectures made the top three — adding Ishikawa (2nd) and Gifu and Shiga (both 3rd). October’s level relative to the annual average was 0.98x at the 47-prefecture median, making it roughly an average month nationally.

Even so, October clearly exceeded the average in major cities and the old capitals. Eleven prefectures were at least 1% above their annual average, led by Osaka at 1.34x, Kyoto at 1.17x and Ishikawa at 1.12x, with Tokyo at 1.07x. Tokyo (¥15,600) ranked 5th of 12 months and Kyoto (¥19,200) 4th — not the peak, but near the top. The feeling that “October hotels are expensive” is most likely when staying in cities like these.

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research (ratio to annual average = October 2025 level vs the October 2025–September 2026 average)

In the most recent month, October 2026, the 47-prefecture median was +7.1% YoY, with 44 prefectures above last year. Tokyo reached ¥17,600 (+12.5%), close to this period’s April peak of ¥17,800, and Aomori, Hiroshima, Fukuoka and Nagasaki exceeded every month of this 12-month period. October is not the “annual peak” in most prefectures, but 2026 was a year when autumn rates rose nationwide. Which autumn month (September–November) carries the price peak is analyzed in detail in our article classifying the 47 prefectures into September, October, November and flat types.

Peak-Month Map in Four Types — Summer 16, Autumn-Foliage 10, Winter 16, Spring/Event 5

Grouping peak months by season splits the 47 prefectures into four types: “Summer” (peak in July–August) with 16 prefectures, “Autumn-foliage” (November) with 10, “Winter” (December–February) with 16, and “Spring/Event” (April–May and September–October) with 5. The type names are convenient labels for the season of the peak month and do not identify the composition of demand itself.

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research (types by annual peak month, Oct 2025–Sep 2026, N=47 prefectures). Map created by processing MLIT National Land Numerical Information (administrative boundaries)

On the map, the types cluster by region. The Summer type spans Hokkaido and three northern Tohoku prefectures (Aomori, Iwate, Akita), Toyama, Gifu and Shizuoka in Chubu, Shiga and Wakayama in Kinki, six prefectures from the Seto Inland Sea to Shikoku (Okayama, Hiroshima, Yamaguchi, Tokushima, Kagawa, Kochi) and Okinawa — overlapping with areas where rates rise in the beach and summer-festival season. The Autumn-foliage type includes prefectures with famous foliage spots such as Kyoto, Nara, Ishikawa and Tochigi, plus three Kyushu prefectures (Fukuoka, Nagasaki, Kumamoto), Saitama, Kanagawa and Shimane.

The Winter type mixes prefectures of different character. The nine December-peak prefectures include snow-and-onsen prefectures such as Yamagata, Gunma, Niigata, Yamanashi and Nagano, while the six January-peak prefectures include Fukui, Saga and Miyagi. Miyazaki, which peaks in February, also peaked in February in both prior periods, coinciding with spring training camps for professional baseball and other sports. According to Miyazaki Prefecture, spectators at sports camps in spring 2026 (January–March) totaled 886,755, up 34.7% from the previous year, and February ADR was ¥9,000, +11.4% YoY. The five Spring/Event prefectures are discussed individually below.

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research (peak/trough months for Oct 2025–Sep 2026; hotel counts as of September 2026, N=17,136 hotels)

Peak-to-Trough Ratio — Kyoto 2.18x, Ibaraki 1.09x; 47-Prefecture Median 1.36x

Next, the ratio of peak-month ADR to trough-month ADR. The 47-prefecture median was 1.36x, slightly wider than 1.30x a year earlier. The largest was Kyoto at 2.18x: ¥24,800 in November 2025 versus ¥11,400 in June 2026, so even a typical hotel in the same prefecture charges more than twice as much depending on the season. Aomori was 2nd at 1.81x, followed by Nara 1.69x, Osaka 1.66x and Aichi 1.57x.

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research (top 10 and bottom 10 ratios, Oct 2025–Sep 2026, N=47 prefectures)

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research (Kyoto monthly ADR, 562–607 hotels)

The top 10 fall into three groups: prefectures where demand concentrates in the foliage season (Kyoto, Nara, Ishikawa), those with a summer peak (Aomori, Hokkaido, Shizuoka), and those where events or spring travel demand lifted rates (Osaka, Aichi, Tokyo). In high-ratio regions, raising rates in peak months is widely practiced. At the same time, the gap to the trough months is large, so lifting the trough translates directly into upside for annual revenue.

At the other end, the smallest ratios were Ibaraki at 1.09x, Fukushima and Saitama at 1.13x, Kagoshima at 1.16x and Nagasaki at 1.20x. In Ibaraki, the May peak was ¥7,300 and the July trough ¥6,700, so rates barely move through the year. This reflects a strength — stable year-round pricing. That said, if even the peak month is only 10–20% above the trough, there may still be upside in pricing targeted at specific high-demand dates such as holidays and events.

Note that the ratio compares monthly medians; the spread between daily highs and lows is larger. Also, 16 prefectures had a gap of under 3% between their highest and second-highest months — Fukushima’s January and August were nearly identical, and Kumamoto’s November and January differed by 0.2%. In such prefectures, the peak month can easily switch from year to year.

Why Tokyo Peaks in April, Osaka in October and Aichi in September — Matching Against Events Reveals One-Off Factors

Among the Spring/Event type, April is a recurring peak for Tokyo. The peak was April 2024 (¥14,000) two years earlier, April 2025 (¥17,000) a year earlier and April 2026 (¥17,800) this period — April three periods running, with the level stepping up. According to the Tokyo Regional Headquarters of the Japan Meteorological Agency, Tokyo’s cherry blossoms opened on March 19, 2026 and reached full bloom on March 28, so the spring travel season from cherry-blossom time into April coincides with the price peak. Tokyo’s trough, conversely, is August (¥11,800), the opposite of regions where rates rise in the summer holidays.

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research (Tokyo monthly ADR, 1,067–1,151 hotels)

Osaka’s October peak is largely a one-off. This period’s peak, October 2025 (¥13,400), was the closing month of Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai (April 13–October 13, 2025). ADR during the Expo months of April–October 2025 ranged from ¥11,900 to ¥13,800, while the same months in 2026 were ¥8,100–¥10,600, −21% to −33% YoY. The peak month was also different each time — April 2024 two years earlier, September 2025 a year earlier — so Osaka’s “October peak” can be seen as reflecting the Expo, a once-only event. Which baseline to use when reading the post-Expo YoY figures is explored in our article reading Osaka’s finalized September against a 2024 baseline.

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research (Osaka monthly ADR, 623–661 hotels)

Aichi’s September can likewise be read as an event month. September 2026 ADR jumped to ¥12,400, +45.9% YoY, and October stayed high at ¥11,100 (+26.8%). The 20th Asian Games (Aichi-Nagoya) ran from September 19 to October 4, 2026, matching the price peak. Since Aichi’s peak was April two years earlier and August a year earlier, September will not necessarily be the peak in future periods. For how to build event-month results into next year’s baseline, see also our Aichi settled-ADR analysis of the Asian Games September.

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research (Aichi monthly ADR, 495–520 hotels)

17 Prefectures Peak in the Same Month Every Year; 26 Switched From Last Year

Lining up the peak months for three periods, only 17 prefectures had the same month in all three. August in 13 (Hokkaido, Aomori, Iwate, Akita, Gifu, Shizuoka, Wakayama, Okayama, Hiroshima, Tokushima, Kagawa, Kochi, Okinawa), November in Kyoto and Shimane, April in Tokyo and February in Miyazaki. In these prefectures the seasonal peak is entrenched and easy to build into an annual pricing plan.

Adding Ibaraki (May), Toyama and Yamaguchi (August) and Fukui (January), where this period and the prior-year period matched, gives 21 prefectures whose peak month did not change over the last two years. The remaining 26 switched peak months from a year earlier. Most of them had peaked in August in the prior-year period; this period Tochigi, Kanagawa, Ishikawa and Fukuoka moved to November, Nagano, Niigata, Yamanashi and Oita to December, and Miyagi, Fukushima and Kagoshima to January. Where summer and autumn/winter rates are close, the peak month moves with that year’s demand, so last year’s peak should not simply be carried forward.

Do Price Peaks and Occupancy Peaks Fall in the Same Month? Six Major Prefectures, June–October 2026

Are high-rate months also high-occupancy months? For six prefectures — Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, Aichi, Fukuoka and Okinawa — we set occupancy (OTA listed-inventory basis, estimated) for June–October 2026 alongside ADR. Occupancy is a monthly average calculated from remaining rooms as of the day before the stay date (lead time 1 day).

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research (ADR = estimated settled rate; occupancy = estimate based on OTA listed inventory, as of lead time 1 day)

In Tokyo, Osaka and Aichi, the peaks and troughs of price and occupancy fell in the same months. Tokyo’s August 2026 was the lowest of the five months for both ADR (¥11,800) and occupancy (88.2%), and October the highest for both at ¥17,600 and 95.5%. Osaka bottomed in June at ¥8,100 / 77.6% and peaked in October at ¥10,600 / 89.5%, while Aichi recorded its highs on both measures in September, the Asian Games month, at ¥12,400 / 90.4%.

In Kyoto, Fukuoka and Okinawa, by contrast, price and occupancy moved differently. In Kyoto, occupancy was nearly flat at 80.7–81.8% in June–August while ADR alone rose from ¥11,400 to ¥13,100; in Fukuoka, occupancy held steady at 87.8–89.6% in June–September while ADR moved from ¥10,300 to ¥11,600. Okinawa’s ADR peak is in August (¥14,700), yet occupancy was higher in July (89.3%) and October (90.1%) than in August (85.5%). October in Okinawa had the highest occupancy of the five months while ADR was ¥12,200, about 17% below August — suggesting room to grow autumn rates.

* Occupancy (OTA listed-inventory basis, estimated) is an estimate based on how inventory sold on OTAs is absorbed and differs from a property’s actual overall occupancy. Hotel and room counts are shown in the right-hand column of the table (major booking sites, varies by month).

Implications for Operators — Filling the June Trough and Setting Caps for Peak Months

Putting this together, the issues for operators narrow down to two: the June trough and the ceiling in peak months. First, June is the annual trough in 39 prefectures, with ADR falling to 0.87x the annual average (median). Yet among the six major prefectures, Tokyo’s June occupancy was 90.5%, no different from July–September (88.2–91.1%), and Fukuoka and Kyoto were also at nearly the same level as the summer months. Where occupancy holds but only the rate falls, operators should prioritize holding rates on high-occupancy days rather than discounting to fill rooms.

Specifically, an effective approach is to track booking pace separately for June weekdays and weekends and bring the lowest-plan rate closer to July levels on dates that fill early. Instead of cutting rates, designing value-added plans such as multi-night stays or breakfast-included plans to lift spend per guest is another option. In regions like Osaka and Aichi where June occupancy itself is lower than in other months, building an occupancy base through early sales is likely a precondition for holding rates.

We simulated how far June rates could be restored in the six major prefectures (Table 4). Using the ADR gap to July as the benchmark, we compared June RevPAR (ADR × occupancy) at June 2026 occupancy under three cases: a pessimistic case that “cuts rates to add 2pt of occupancy”, a middle case that “recovers half the gap to July”, and an optimistic case that “returns to July levels”. In the pessimistic, discount-for-occupancy scenario, June RevPAR falls 2.6–2.9% in all six prefectures. Conversely, the uplift from returning to July levels is largest in Okinawa (+20.7%) and Osaka (+8.6%), where the gap to July is widest.

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research. ADR = estimated settled rate; occupancy = estimate based on OTA listed inventory (as of lead time 1 day, June 2026). Middle and optimistic cases hold occupancy at June 2026 levels. Impact on annual average ADR is the change versus the 12-month average for October 2025–September 2026.

Which lever — rate or occupancy — changes June revenue, and by how much, is easiest to judge on two axes. Table 5 shows the sensitivity of June RevPAR starting from Tokyo’s June 2026 (ADR ¥12,146, occupancy 90.5%). Raising ADR by 2% with a 1.5pt drop in occupancy leaves June RevPAR roughly flat (+0.3%), while cutting ADR by 5% to gain 3pt of occupancy still lands at −1.9%, below the current level. In a market where occupancy is stuck high around 90%, there is little room to add occupancy through discounts, and moving the rate side is more effective for June revenue.

Source: Compiled by HotelBank Editorial Team from MetroEngines Research. RevPAR = ADR (estimated settled rate) × occupancy (estimate based on OTA listed inventory, June 2026, as of lead time 1 day). Blue shading = current level; red shading = cells below the current level.

For peak months, start by comparing your prefecture’s ratio with the national median of 1.36x. In prefectures where the ratio stays around 1.2x, there is room to raise ceiling rates on holiday and event dates within the peak month. Conversely, in regions like Kyoto where the ratio exceeds 2x, peak rates are already high, so lifting the trough months is likely to contribute more to annual revenue.

Finally, whether the peak month is the same every year also shapes planning. The 17 prefectures that peaked in the same month in all three periods can build pricing calendars on prior-year results. By contrast, the 26 prefectures whose peaks switched, and prefectures like Osaka and Aichi whose peaks were created by events, should identify the peak month by watching that year’s event calendar and booking pace rather than copying last year’s peak.

Summary

Aggregating October 2025–September 2026, the most expensive month for hotels was August in 16 prefectures, November in 10, December in 9 and January in 6, and October was the peak only in Osaka, the month the Expo closed. The cheapest month was June in 39 prefectures, and the peak-to-trough ratio ranged from 2.18x in Kyoto to 1.09x in Ibaraki. That said, peak months move from year to year — a year earlier, August was the peak in 36 prefectures. Only 17 prefectures peaked in the same month in all three periods; Tokyo’s April, Kyoto’s November and the August peaks of Hokkaido and Okinawa can be considered entrenched seasonality, while Osaka’s October and Aichi’s September are best read as one-year, event-driven peaks. Checking which type your prefecture falls into, and where its ratio sits nationally, is the starting point for building next period’s pricing calendar.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. Which month are hotels most expensive?
A. It depends on the prefecture. Aggregating October 2025–September 2026, August was the most common peak month (16 prefectures), followed by November (10), December (9) and January (6). Tokyo peaks in April, Osaka in October and Aichi in September.

Q. Are hotels expensive in October?
A. Nationally, October is about average (0.98x the annual average at the 47-prefecture median), but it was above average in Osaka, Kyoto, Ishikawa, Tokyo and others. In October 2026, 44 prefectures were above the same month last year.

Q. Which month are hotels cheapest?
A. June was the cheapest month in 39 prefectures. Tokyo’s trough is August, Hokkaido’s April and Okinawa’s November.

Q. How big is the gap between the most and least expensive months?
A. The ratio of peak-month ADR to trough-month ADR had a 47-prefecture median of 1.36x for October 2025–September 2026. The largest was Kyoto at 2.18x (November ¥24,800, June ¥11,400) and the smallest Ibaraki at 1.09x.

Q. Is occupancy also high in high-rate months?
A. Across six major prefectures in June–October 2026, Tokyo, Osaka and Aichi saw price and occupancy peak and bottom in the same months. Okinawa, however, has its ADR peak in August while occupancy (OTA listed-inventory basis, estimated) was higher in July (89.3%) and October (90.1%) than in August 2026 (85.5%), so the two do not always coincide.

Related Articles