Decode Japan

Change log

What changed, and when

This site claims to be current on rules that are published only in Japanese. This is the evidence for that claim: every guide publication, every re-check against a source, every batch of bars added, with the date each happened.

25 entries Sources checked weekly No fixed schedule
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An editorial arrangement of dated source documents

Two lists, separate consent: Rule Alerts carries a confirmed change to a rule tracked here, and Field Notes carries new guides, tools and material revisions. Neither runs to a schedule, and the feed needs no address at all.

  1. New tool

    A tool for the refund that replaces tax-free shopping on 1 November

    Five conditions decide whether the consumption tax reaches you after 1 November 2026 — including the customs confirmation that has to happen before you check your bags. Static, and it collects nothing.

    The guide explains the procedure; this is the version you read while queueing. Every condition on it is a documented way to lose the refund.

  2. Reference

    A second reference, for the bar rather than the bottle

    Ten pages on what a Tokyo bar may add to your bill, what it has to accept when you pay, who may not be let in, and why it is still open at two in the morning. US$12, or US$29 with the whisky label reference.

    Most of this site is about Tokyo bars and the only thing for sale was a whisky label reference. That was the gap this closes.

    The venue records stay free. What a named bar actually charged on a dated visit is on the directory, where it belongs, and is not for sale. What is for sale is the rule behind the charge, in one document you can open at the door.

  3. New tool

    A ready-reckoner for what a Tokyo bar costs before you order

    A static table built from the twenty-six recorded bars: what each one charges to sit down, what a service charge adds to a bill, and which bars take a card. No account, no input collected, and nothing to run in the browser.

    The numbers come from the same visits as the directory, and carry the same dates. Nothing here is an average of anything: a bar appears with the charge that was observed on one night.

  4. Site

    This log, and a feed

    Every dated change to the guides, the directory and the rules they track is now published on one page with an RSS feed, so following the site no longer requires giving it an email address.

    The email lists stay as they are. This is the other half of the same promise: the work of re-checking a source is only worth anything if someone outside can see when it happened.

  5. Bar directory

    Sixteen more bars, twenty-six in total

    The Tokyo directory grew from ten recorded bars to twenty-six, each with its own page and a dated record of what it charges and what it accepts.

    The rate is set by how fast bars can be visited, not by how fast pages can be generated. That is the intended constraint: the directory is worth reading only because nothing enters it without someone paying the bill first.

  6. Rule watch

    Three watched documents changed; one of them was worth following

    The weekly source check flagged edits to a House of Councillors written answer, a Seven Bank page and the spirits association's labelling page. All three were navigation changes rather than changes to the text this site relies on — but the association had added a page on the Japanese whisky logo mark, which is now cited and has sharpened what the whisky guide says about it.

    What actually moved: the House of Councillors rebuilt its site furniture, Seven Bank added two items to a menu, and the association added a menu entry. The passages the guides cite — the answer on the legal-tender question, the ATM conditions, the labelling code — are unchanged.

    The association’s new entry led to a page the site had not seen before, and that page states two things the March 2025 press release did not: what the mark looks like, and that it is applied only by member companies that have signed an agreement and filed a notice of use. Both are now in the whisky labelling guide, and its review date has moved because those claims were checked against the association’s own page rather than against the announcement of it.

    The other two guides were re-read and needed no amendment, so their review dates have not moved. A review date is a claim that the page was checked; moving it because a footer changed would make it worth less.

    3 sources
  7. New guide

    Japan tax-free shopping becomes a refund on 1 November 2026

    From 1 November 2026 a tax-free shop in Japan charges you the tax-inclusive price and refunds the consumption tax after customs confirms, at departure, that the goods are leaving with you. What you have to do differently, and where the refund can still be lost.

    4 sources
  8. Re-checked

    How to tell real Japanese whisky from a bottle that only looks Japanese

    Every claim on this page was checked against the primary documents it cites. Where the documents had not moved, nothing on the page changed — which is what the review date is asserting.

    5 sources
  9. Bar directory

    The first ten Tokyo bars were published

    Ten bars, each visited and paid for in person, with the cover charge, accepted payment methods, seating, door rules and opening hours recorded on the date of the visit. Each one also got its own page with an illustration of the walk from the station.

    Every figure came from a visit. None of it is aggregated from review sites, because the two facts that matter most — what the cover charge actually was and whether the card was accepted — are the two nobody publishes.

  10. Reference

    The whisky label reference went on sale

    The thirteen-page reference became purchasable at US$24, with the PDF delivered immediately after a Stripe-hosted checkout.

    The free guides were not changed to make this worth buying, and nothing was moved behind it. It exists because a page written to answer one question cannot also be a term-by-term reference.

  11. Rule watch

    Three watched documents changed; no guide needed amending

    The weekly source check flagged edits to a Kyodo PR Wire release and two Metropolitan Police pages. All three turned out to be changes to navigation and related-links blocks, not to the rules the guides rely on.

    Recorded because “we checked and nothing had changed” is part of what a review date is claiming. A monitoring system that is only visible when it fires is indistinguishable from one that is not running.

    1 source
  12. Site

    Two separate lists, two separate consents

    Rule Alerts (a sourced change to a rule tracked here) and Field Notes (a new guide, tool or material revision) became separate double opt-in subscriptions. Joining one never joins the other.

    The alternative was one list and a promise to use it sparingly. A single list means the reader who wants to hear about a tax change also receives notice of a new tool, and the only way to stop one is to stop both.

  13. New guide

    Junmai, ginjo and daiginjo: what the sake names actually guarantee

    The eight regulated sake designations are not a simple quality ladder. Here is what the rice-polishing percentage, added alcohol and “special” wording establish—and what they leave open.

    3 sources
  14. Re-checked

    Buying whisky in Japan and flying it home

    Every claim on this page was checked against the primary documents it cites. Where the documents had not moved, nothing on the page changed — which is what the review date is asserting.

    5 sources
  15. Site

    The site became findable

    Sitemaps submitted to Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools, and new pages now notify Bing through IndexNow on every deploy.

    Allowing a crawler is not the same as being indexed. Until this date the guides were published and reachable, but nothing had told a search engine they existed, which also meant no assistant that reads a search index could quote them.

  16. New guide

    Buying a bottle from a Tokyo bar: why the answer is usually no

    A bar can pour you a glass of something you will never find at home. Selling you the bottle is a different licence, and most bars do not hold it. The rule turns on where the drink will be consumed, not on what is in it.

    3 sources
  17. New guide

    Paying in Tokyo bars: no law makes a bar take your card, and cash has one legal limit

    Japanese currency law says what counts as money, not who has to accept it. Bank of Japan notes are legal tender without limit and coins only twenty per denomination — and the government has confirmed it does not require any business to accept cash, which is the same reason none has to accept your card.

    5 sources
  18. New guide

    Tokyo bars after midnight: the licence decides how dark the room may be

    A bar serving alcohol after midnight files a notification. A venue dimmer than ten lux, or seating you where you cannot be seen, or whose staff sit down with you, needs a licence instead — and a licensed venue must close at midnight. That is why the bar still pouring at two in the morning looks the way it does.

    3 sources
  19. New guide

    Buying whisky in Japan and flying it home

    An aviation rule caps what you may fly home with and bans anything over 70% ABV outright. From 1 November 2026 the tax refund is collected at the airport, before your bags are checked. Both matter before you buy, not after.

    5 sources
  20. New guide

    Age statements and grade words on Japanese whisky: which ones mean something

    A number of years on a Japanese whisky label has a defined meaning and refers to the youngest spirit in the blend. The English words printed beside it — deluxe, reserve, select — have no defined meaning at all, and the industry code says so explicitly.

    3 sources
  21. New guide

    How to tell real Japanese whisky from a bottle that only looks Japanese

    The labelling standard that decides what may be called Japanese whisky is voluntary, not law. Here is what it requires, what the JSLMA mark means, and which words on a label tell you nothing at all.

    5 sources
  22. New guide

    Single malt, blended, pure malt: what Japanese whisky type names permit

    Single malt has a real definition on a Japanese label. Blended has a wider one than you would expect — the industry glossary puts malt-and-grain blends and heavily alcohol-extended whisky under the same word.

    2 sources
  23. New guide

    What a Japanese whisky back label must tell you, and what it never has to

    Japanese law requires five things on a bottle of whisky. An ingredient list is not one of them, and the word ウイスキー can legally be applied to a bottle that is nine-tenths added alcohol. Here is how to read the block of small print.

    3 sources
  24. New guide

    Smoking in Tokyo bars: the sign on the door tells you, and under-20s may be barred

    Tokyo bars are smoke-free in principle, but a transitional exemption still lets some allow smoking indoors. In Tokyo the exemption applies only to bars with no employees at all — and where the whole bar is a smoking room, nobody under 20 may enter.

    3 sources
  25. New guide

    Cover charges in Tokyo bars: why you cannot look the price up beforehand

    A Tokyo bar can add a cover charge, a seating fee, a small dish you did not order and a service percentage. Japanese law obliges a venue to display a tax-inclusive price only if it displays a price at all — which is the whole reason you cannot find out in advance.

    2 sources