From 1 October 2026, 55 buses a day run from Busta Shinjuku through to Kawaguchiko Station, roughly one every ten minutes through the morning, and the site you book on depends on which company runs your bus. Keio departures are sold on Highway Bus dot com. Fujikyu departures are sold on Fujiyama Connect. Highway Bus dot com lists every departure on the route, so that is the place to see the whole timetable, but check the operator against the time you want before you pay, because that decides which site takes your money.
I live in Fujiyoshida, one stop before Kawaguchiko on this route, and the highway bus to Kawaguchiko is the one I take to Tokyo and back. The timetable change is good news: more buses, and a ten-minute headway most of the morning. The booking change is the part that will catch people out, because at the morning peak the bus ten minutes after yours is on a different website, and getting it wrong is not something you can fix with an edit.
What changes on 1 October 2026
The Shinjuku to Kawaguchiko bus is run by Keio Bus and the Fujikyu group together, and on 1 October they do two things at once: they add buses, and they split the reservation system by operating company. The change applies from the moment a bus leaves its origin, so a service that departs on 30 September is on the old rules even if it arrives after midnight.
The service increase is real. The route currently advertises 49 departures a day; from October it is 55 each way through to Kawaguchiko Station, and the operators say they will keep adding unscheduled relief coaches on top of that when demand requires it. Fares do not change on the same date.
| Until 30 Sept 2026 | From 1 Oct 2026 | |
|---|---|---|
| Departures a day | 49 advertised | 55 each way to Kawaguchiko Station |
| Morning frequency | Varies | Every 10 min, 06:45–11:25 |
| Booking a Keio bus | Highway Bus dot com | Highway Bus dot com |
| Booking a Fujikyu bus | Highway Bus dot com | Fujiyama Connect |
| Switching between the two | A normal change | Cancel and rebuy, with a fee |
| Fare | ¥2,200 | ¥2,200, unchanged |
Which site do I book on?
This is the whole question, so here is the short version. Of the 55 daily departures from Shinjuku, 23 are Keio and 32 are Fujikyu. Most of the buses on this route are now Fujikyu buses, which means most visitors will end up on Fujiyama Connect, a site almost no English guide mentions.
Highway Bus dot com
Keio’s site, and the one every existing English guide points at. It lists every departure on the route, but it only completes a booking for the 23 Keio ones. Pick a Fujikyu departure and it hands you off to the other site.
Fujiyama Connect
The Fujikyu group’s own site, at fujiyamaconnect.jp/bus/. It sells all 32 Fujikyu departures, plus a limited allocation of Keio seats, so do not assume every Keio bus appears here. Mobile web only, no app.
The rule to remember
Browse the timetable on Highway Bus dot com, where every departure is listed. Then look at which site the payment screen belongs to before you pay, because that is the company you have a contract with.
The two operators describe the overlap slightly differently. Fujikyu’s August press release says all services on the route can be searched, booked and paid for on Fujiyama Connect. Keio’s route-specific notice says only that all services are displayed on Highway Bus dot com and that Fujikyu ones link out. Fujikyu’s own route FAQ splits the difference: it holds a limited number of Keio seats and you may be able to book a Keio bus there. Treat that as “sometimes”, not “always”, and check the site you have actually landed on.
Why this matters more than it sounds. Through the morning peak the two companies alternate strictly. The 8 o’clock hour from Shinjuku is Fujikyu at :05, Keio at :15, Fujikyu at :25, Keio at :35, Fujikyu at :45, Keio at :55. If you book blind, you have close to a coin-flip chance of being on the site that cannot sell you the bus you actually wanted.
Switching buses costs money now
Before October, moving from one departure to another on this route was a change. From October, moving across the two sites is not a change at all: you cancel the first booking, pay the cancellation fee, and buy the second one on the other site. Keio’s notice is explicit that this applies even if you go to a staffed counter and ask a human to do it. Changes within the same site still work the way they always did.
The dividing line is the site, not only the company. Fujikyu’s FAQ notes that because Fujiyama Connect holds a limited allocation of Keio seats, a booking made inside Fujiyama Connect may be changeable to another Fujiyama Connect service under that site’s own rules, even across operators. What you cannot do is move a Highway Bus dot com booking onto a Fujikyu bus.
Fujikyu Bus publishes the following schedule, which is its standing policy as of 1 September 2026. Each site handles its own cancellations under its own terms, so read the rules on the site you actually booked with rather than assuming both are identical:
| When you cancel | What you pay |
|---|---|
| Up to 23:59 two days before | ¥100 |
| From 00:00 the day before, until 11 minutes before departure | 50% of the fare |
| From 10 minutes before departure | No refund |
One more silo worth knowing if you are a repeat visitor: Highway Bus dot com’s bus miles and multi-ride coupons work on Keio departures only. They are worth nothing on a Fujikyu bus.
The Kawaguchiko bus timetable
The October timetable is published as a one-month document covering 1–31 October, so check again if you are travelling later in the year. Within October, the shape of the day is clear and it favours anyone going out in the morning and coming back in the evening.
| Direction | To Kawaguchiko Station | Dense band | Last departure |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shinjuku → Kawaguchiko | 55 a day | Every 10 min, 06:45–11:25 | 22:25 |
| Kawaguchiko → Shinjuku | 55 a day | Every 10 min, 15:00–18:50 | 20:15, arriving Busta 22:00 |
The first bus out of Busta is 06:45, arriving Kawaguchiko Station at 08:30. Coming back, services from the Kawaguchiko side start early enough for a morning return, but the useful thing to fix in your head is the last one, not the first.
One thing to check before you book. The October timetable lists 57 departures from Busta Shinjuku, and 55 of them run through to Kawaguchiko Station. The other two terminate at Fuji-Q Highland: the 07:25, which runs daily, and a 07:05 that runs on designated days only. Every Kawaguchiko-bound bus calls at Fuji-Q Highland first, so the stop order is never a problem, but if the lake is your destination, read the destination on the departure you are about to buy.
Beyond Kawaguchiko the buses fan out. Some terminate at Kawaguchiko Station, some carry on to Lake Yamanaka and Hirano, and some climb to the Fuji Subaru Line 5th Station. All of them serve Kawaguchiko Station on the way, so for the lake it does not matter which you take. If you are coming for the autumn leaves festival in November, note that the sightseeing bus from the station back from the festival site stops running at 18:32. The ten-minute chain in the morning is unbroken for 29 consecutive departures: the pattern runs through 11:25, the 11:35 slot is the first one missing, and the next bus is 11:45.
If you are on a day trip, the 20:15 from Kawaguchiko Station is the last bus. The one before it is 19:55, and between 19:10 and 19:55 there is nothing at all.
That last-bus time is the single most useful number in this article. Sunset over the lake in autumn is beautiful and it is very easy to watch it, walk back to the station, and find the day is over. If you would rather not run for it, staying a night by the lake removes the deadline entirely, and the mountain is usually clearest first thing in the morning anyway. We compare the two approaches in day trip or overnight, and the two towns in Kawaguchiko or Fujiyoshida.
What it costs
The standard adult one-way fare from Busta Shinjuku to Kawaguchiko Station is ¥2,200. That is the figure on the fare table, stamped 1 September 2026 for the 102 km run, and on Keio’s English page. You will also see ¥2,000: Fujikyu advertises that as the online-payment price on its services, and it sits inside the roughly 2 to 10 per cent internet discount that Highway Bus dot com states for this route. Budget ¥2,200 and read the price on the payment screen before you confirm. Child fares are shown on both sites once you set the number of passengers.
Either way the bus is roughly half the price of the train, which matters less than people expect once you have factored in that the train cannot be delayed by traffic. More on that below.
Booking, step by step
Seats go on sale one month before departure, on the same date of the previous month. Phone bookings open at 09:00 on that first day. If your dates are not showing yet, that is why.
The deadline for buying is not the same on both sites, which is easy to get wrong. Highway Bus dot com lists online booking, changes and payment as open until 10 minutes before the bus leaves your boarding stop. Fujikyu’s route guidance says reservations are taken until 30 minutes before the service leaves its first stop. Do not carry one site’s cutoff over to the other.
1. Find the departure
Search the date on either site. Both list every service. Note the operator against the time you want.
2. Follow the handoff
If you started on the wrong site for that bus, it will send you across. Let it. Do not try to find “the same bus” back on the first site.
3. Pay immediately
An unpaid reservation is cancelled automatically within three days of booking, and from two days before departure payment is required outright. Booking from abroad and paying later loses the seat silently.
4. Keep the ticket live
Fujiyama Connect issues a live QR web ticket. Open the actual ticket page on the site to board. A screenshot is explicitly not valid, so make sure you can get online at the terminal.
Fujiyama Connect has an English layer, though it is a machine-translation overlay and the Japanese text is what legally applies. You do not need an account, guest purchase works, and it takes Visa, Mastercard, JCB, Amex and Diners as well as PayPay, Alipay+ and WeChat Pay. The operator warns in its own guidance that some overseas cards may be declined, which is the most likely thing to go wrong for a foreign visitor. Convenience-store payment exists but is members-only and carries a ¥500 handling fee plus a ¥500 fee to refund it. Those handling fees are not returned even if the bus itself is cancelled; the fare follows the site’s ordinary refund rules.
If you are buying an October ticket during September. The Busta Shinjuku ticket window cannot issue Fujikyu tickets for 1 October onwards until 24 September, and the Busta ticket machines not until 1 October itself. Book a Fujikyu bus by phone before those dates and you cannot collect it at Busta; Fujikyu’s own advice is to take a Keio departure instead. Windows on the Yamanashi side, at Kawaguchiko Station, Fuji-Q Highland and Asahigaoka, have been handling them since 1 September. Travel on or before 30 September is unaffected: the old rules still apply.
At Busta Shinjuku
Buses leave from the fourth floor of Busta Shinjuku, the terminal built on top of the south side of Shinjuku Station, and they arrive back into the third floor. That catches people out on the return leg. Boarding starts about ten minutes before departure, and the bay number can be changed on the day, so read the boards rather than relying on what your booking said. The JR Shin-Minami gate below is open from 05:45 to midnight, which covers the first and last buses.
One exception worth knowing, because this route runs relief coaches: extra services are not always at Busta. Highway Bus dot com warns that additional departures can leave from stops 26 and 28 at Shinjuku’s west exit instead, which is a different building on the other side of the station. Read the boarding stop printed on your ticket, not just the departure time.
Ten minutes is not much of a buffer either. Busta is straightforward once you have been there, but it is four floors up in a station that moves millions of people a day, and the way up is not obvious the first time. Give yourself twenty.
Luggage
The underfloor hold is first come, first served. The operators state plainly that hold space cannot be reserved and is not guaranteed, and that if the hold is full your bag may not be loaded. In practice this bites on the busiest morning departures and in ski season. Portable batteries have to travel with you in the cabin, not in the hold.
Seating is four across, which is standard for this kind of route and noticeably tighter than the three-across night coaches. For a 1 hour 45 minute run with no rest stop it is fine.
Where the bus actually stops
Going down from Shinjuku, the intermediate stops between Nodajiri and Kawaguchiko Station are marked alighting only. You cannot join the bus part-way along the route in that direction. Coming back up, the reverse applies. This matters if you were planning to stay near Otsuki or at Fuji-Q Highland and pick the bus up on its way past: on the outbound leg, you cannot.
Every Shinjuku departure calls at Fuji-Q Highland, which makes the park about as easy to reach as it gets from Tokyo, and two early departures are dedicated to it. If that is where you are heading, buying the admission ticket before you go saves you the queue at the gate. If you are going on to the lake afterwards, take one of the 55 buses that continues to Kawaguchiko Station rather than one of the two that terminates at the park.
Three companies operate the route between them, Fujikyu Bus, Fuji Express and Keio Bus, with some Keio runs subcontracted to Nishi-Tokyo Bus. The coach that turns up may not carry the livery you expected. The reservation is what counts.
Coming back is the harder direction
Thirty-one of the 55 return departures leave between 14:00 and 19:00, which is exactly when everyone else is going home too. Two things make that worse than it sounds: the return sells out before the outbound does, and there is no standby. If a bus is full you do not travel, and the last one is at 20:15. Book the return when you book the outbound, even if your plans are loose, because ¥100 to cancel two days out is cheap insurance.
Traffic is the other risk, and it runs one way. The bus is not refunded if it arrives late, and the Chuo Expressway on a Sunday evening in autumn can add an hour without trying. If you have a flight or a shinkansen to catch that evening, take the train.
If the bus is full, or you would rather not deal with any of this
The Shibuya bus
The Shibuya–Kawaguchiko line is not part of the split and still books entirely on Highway Bus dot com. Keio itself offers it when Shinjuku is sold out. Worth knowing.
Other Tokyo-area buses
Fujiyama Connect already handles the Fuji Five Lakes routes from Tokyo Station, Yokohama, Omiya and Kaihin-Makuhari, so the site is worth learning anyway.
The train
The Fuji Excursion limited express runs Shinjuku to Kawaguchiko in about 1 hour 54 minutes for ¥4,200. Four round trips a day, plus a seasonal extra.
Bus or train?
| Highway bus | Fuji Excursion | |
|---|---|---|
| One-way fare | ¥2,200 | ¥4,200 |
| Time | About 1 h 45 min | About 1 h 54 min |
| Departures a day | 55 each way | 4 round trips, plus 1 seasonal |
| Affected by traffic | Yes | No |
| Seats | All reserved, no standby | All reserved, no unreserved cars at all |
| Where to book | Two sites, by operator | JR East, from 10:00 one month ahead |
There is one rail-pass trap worth stating clearly, because it is wrong on a lot of English pages. The Japan Rail Pass does not cover the whole journey. The Fuji Excursion runs through onto the Fujikyu Railway at Otsuki, and that section is not JR: pass holders pay ¥1,170 fare plus a ¥600 limited express charge, ¥1,770 each way. The JR TOKYO Wide Pass does cover it end to end, including a reserved seat on the limited express, and costs ¥16,000 for adults and ¥8,000 for children for three consecutive days.
The catch for pass holders is that the Fuji Excursion has no unreserved cars at all, so a pass does not by itself get you a seat. Reserve one as soon as your dates are fixed; on autumn weekends they go. If you end up without an assigned seat, ask JR staff before boarding rather than assuming you can stand. That is often how people end up on the bus anyway. If you are weighing a rail pass for a longer trip, our Mt. Fuji guide sets out where it pays for itself, and passes are sold online before you fly.
Once you arrive
Kawaguchiko Station is the hub for local sightseeing buses around the lakes, and a one or two day pass on those is usually worth it. The ferry to Oishi Park is a better way to reach the north shore than the bus on a busy day. If you are heading up the mountain itself, the fifth station has its own night bus, and the local railway line has a train worth catching if you like that sort of thing.
Before you commit to a date, it is worth looking at whether the mountain will be out. I photograph it every morning from Fujiyoshida, and in summer it is hidden more often than visible. A clear morning in October is a much better bet than a clear afternoon in August.
Common questions
Do I have to know which company runs my bus before I book?
No, but you have to notice it before you pay. Both sites list every departure and tag it. If you pick a Fujikyu bus on Highway Bus dot com it will send you to Fujiyama Connect to finish. The thing to avoid is booking one company’s bus and later deciding you want the other one, because that is a cancellation, not a change.
Can I just turn up and buy a ticket?
You can, if there is a seat, and on a weekday in low season there usually is. On weekends, in autumn, and through the morning peak, do not count on it. There is no standby: if the bus is full, you do not travel. Note too that the Busta window cannot sell Fujikyu tickets for October travel until 24 September 2026.
How far ahead can I book, and when do sales close?
One month ahead, on the same date of the previous month. The closing time depends on the site: Highway Bus dot com takes online bookings until 10 minutes before the bus leaves your boarding stop, while Fujikyu’s guidance for its own services says 30 minutes before the bus leaves its first stop. Check the site you are booking on.
Is a screenshot of my ticket enough?
Not on Fujiyama Connect. The ticket is a live QR page and screenshots are explicitly invalid, so you need to open the real page at the terminal. Have mobile data or the station Wi-Fi sorted before you get there.
Will my foreign credit card work?
Usually. Fujiyama Connect takes Visa, Mastercard, JCB, Amex and Diners, and also PayPay, Alipay+ and WeChat Pay. The operator’s own guidance warns that some overseas cards are declined, so have a second card or a wallet app ready rather than discovering it at the payment screen.
Can I get on the bus at Fuji-Q Highland going towards Kawaguchiko?
No. On the outbound leg the intermediate stops from Nodajiri onwards are marked alighting only. You can get off, not on.
What is the last bus back to Shinjuku?
20:15 from Kawaguchiko Station, arriving Busta at about 22:00. The one before it is 19:55. If you miss both, the Fuji Excursion has already finished for the day too, and you are looking at the local line to Otsuki and the JR Chuo line back.
Does the bus stop at a service area?
No. It is a straight run of about 1 hour 45 minutes with no scheduled break, so sort yourself out at Busta before you board.
Which buses actually reach Kawaguchiko Station?
Fifty-five of the 57 Shinjuku departures in the October timetable run through to Kawaguchiko Station. The two that do not are the 07:25, which runs daily, and a 07:05 that runs on designated days, and both terminate at Fuji-Q Highland. Check the destination shown against the departure before you pay. Buses that continue to Lake Yamanaka, Hirano or the Fuji Subaru Line 5th Station all call at Kawaguchiko Station on the way.
Sources
- Keio Bus, 【新宿～富士五湖線】座席予約方法の変更について, press release dated 24 August 2026, and the October 2026 route timetable dated 25 August 2026.
- Fujikyu Bus route information and reservation FAQ for the Shinjuku–Fuji Five Lakes line, 24 August 2026.
- Highway Bus dot com line page and fare table for the Shinjuku–Fuji Five Lakes line, consulted 1 September 2026.
- Fujiyama Connect booking and ticket guidance, consulted 1 September 2026.
- JR East, JR TOKYO Wide Pass; Japan Rail Pass scope of validity; Fujikyu Railway, Fuji Excursion fares.
Join 1,000+ travelers discovering Japan's hidden side
Weekly dispatches from off-the-beaten-path Japan — spots and stories you won't find in guidebooks.
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Welcome aboard!
You're in. See you in your inbox soon.
