Tofukuji Temple, Kyoto: Tsutenkyo Bridge, Autumn 2026 Hours, Fees and Access

Kyoto · Higashiyama · Tofukuji · Tsutenkyo Bridge · Hojo gardens · autumn 2026

By Nobu · sources checked 16 October 2026 · a researched guide · Sources at the end

Tofukuji is a Zen head temple in south-east Kyoto, best known for the view of maples from Tsutenkyo, a covered wooden bridge. Its autumn period runs 14 November to 6 December 2026, when the bridge opens at 8:30 and costs adults ¥1,000; the Hojo garden is ¥600 from 1 November, and no combined ticket is sold. Keihan gives mid-November to early December as the usual peak. JR Tofukuji Station is one stop from Kyoto, then about 10 minutes on foot.

JR Inari, the station for Fushimi Inari Taisha, is the next stop south, 2 minutes from Tofukuji; a timed half-day route is below. In the autumn period (14 November to 6 December 2026), a weekday train that reaches Tofukuji around 8:05 puts you at the Tsutenkyo gate before it opens at 8:30; the Hojo garden opens at 9:00.

What Tofukuji is

From the temple’s history page: Tofukuji is the head temple of the Tofukuji branch of Rinzai Zen. The regent Kujo Michiie built it as the largest temple complex in Kyoto, taking the character to from Todaiji and fuku from Kofukuji, the two great temples of Nara; construction ran 19 years, from 1236 to 1255. Its founding abbot was Enni Ben’en, known as Shoichi Kokushi, who had studied in Song China from 1235 to 1241. He was the first Zen monk in Japan to be given a national-teacher title by an emperor, and he died here in 1280, aged 79. Before the fire of 1334 the temple was already ranked among Kyoto’s Five Mountains (Gozan), the ranking of the city’s leading Zen temples.

Fires in 1319, 1334 and 1336 burned most of the early buildings. A fire in December 1881 took the Buddha hall, the Dharma hall, the Hojo and the kitchen hall; the Hojo was rebuilt in 1890 and the present main hall finished in 1934. Among the medieval buildings that escaped the fires are the Sanmon, the Zendo, the Tosu latrine and the bathhouse. Kyoto City’s tourism site quotes an old saying about the scale of the complex: “Tofuku no garan-zura”, Tofukuji’s face is its buildings.

The precinct, place by place

The outer grounds are free and open every day, says Kyoto City’s official tourism site. The paid areas are Tsutenkyo with the Kaisando and the Hojo garden, plus the Sanmon upper floor and Ryuginan when they open (see below). There is no re-entry, the temple warns, so see everything you want in each paid area before you leave it. Below, facts are from the temple’s visitor guide unless another source is named.

Sanmon: the oldest Zen main gate

The two-storey gate south of the main hall dates from 1405. Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs database records that ink inscriptions found during the 1969–1977 dismantling repair date the roofing and upper storey to between 1405 and about 1413; it was designated a National Treasure on 29 March 1952. The temple calls it the oldest sanmon in Japan, one of the largest in Zen, and the first of its type made a National Treasure. Inside the upper floor, Buddhist figures sit under ceilings painted by Mincho and his pupils.

The upper floor opens only in special periods. Keihan’s 2026 autumn page lists a Sanmon and Ryuginan opening from 7 November to 6 December 2026, 9:00 to 16:00 (last entry), adults ¥1,000. The temple had not posted its own 2026 notice when checked on 16 October 2026; in 2025 it sold separate ¥1,000 tickets for the Sanmon and for Ryuginan, each with its own entrance, and warned that the Sanmon stairs are high-stepped and steep.

Hondo, the main hall

The present Hondo combines the Buddha hall and the Dharma hall in one building, finished in 1934 after the 1881 fire. At the spring Nehan-e ceremony (14–16 March in 2026), Mincho’s large painting of the Buddha’s death is shown here. The set of 47 Five Hundred Arhats paintings (45 by Mincho, dated 1386, and two replacement copies by Kano Takanobu) was raised from Important Cultural Property to National Treasure, the temple announced on 27 March 2026.

Hojo gardens: Shigemori Mirei’s four gardens

The garden designer Shigemori Mirei made these between 27 June and 11 November 1939. They surround the Hojo, the abbot’s hall, on all four sides, which no other Zen hojo garden does, and in 2014 they were designated a national Place of Scenic Beauty. The one condition Shigemori was given was to throw nothing away and reuse every material already in the compound. The garden page ties the checkerboards and the Big Dipper to that rule:

Shigemori called it the “Garden of the Eight Aspects” (Hasso no Niwa): eight motifs, matching the eight events of the Buddha’s life. Moss, fed by moist air from the valley, has since spread over the white gravel that once edged the North garden.

Tsutenkyo and the Sengyokukan valley

Tsutenkyo is a roofed corridor bridge across the Sengyokukan, a small wooded ravine, linking the main buildings with the Kaisando on the far side. It is believed to have been built in 1380 by the monk Shun’oku Myoha. From it you look down on the maples filling the valley; Keihan counts about 2,000 maples in the grounds. One maple here turns gold, not red: the three-lobed maple that the temple says is believed to be the Tang maple Shoichi Kokushi brought back from Song China.

In 1859 Utagawa Hiroshige II included Tsutenkyo in his series One Hundred Famous Views of the Provinces, with red maples on both sides of the gorge:

Kaisando and Fumon-in

Across the bridge, the Kaisando stands on the highest ground of the precinct. It enshrines a statue of the founder, but the building’s interior is not open. Shoichi lived in the neighbouring Fumon-in and watched the temple being built from there; the garden in front of Fumon-in dates from the mid-Edo period, and Shigemori measured its checkerboard sand pattern in February 1938, a year before he designed the Hojo gardens. Entry is on the Tsutenkyo ticket.

Gaunkyo and Engetsukyo

With Tsutenkyo, these make up the temple’s “three famous bridges”. Gaunkyo, a prefecture-designated cultural property, crosses the same valley and looks across at Tsutenkyo. The temple asks cyclists and motorcyclists to get off and push on it, and in the autumn period the photo rule below covers Gaunkyo too. Engetsukyo, further up the Sannohashi stream, is a roofed wooden bridge of 1603 and an Important Cultural Property.

Zendo, Tosu and Yokushitsu

All three are seen from outside. The Zendo, rebuilt in 1347, is the oldest and largest meditation hall in Japan and the only one surviving from the Middle Ages. The Tosu, nicknamed the “hundred privies”, is an early-Muromachi latrine, the oldest in Japan. The Yokushitsu is a steam bathhouse, the second oldest in Japan after Todaiji’s, with a roof tile dated 1459. Sunday zazen in the Zendo (6:30–7:00, free) is not held from 1 November to 6 December 2026.

Visiting in 2026: hours, fees and booking

All figures are from the temple’s visitor guide and its 1 July 2026 fee notice, read on 16 October 2026. The temple notes that the autumn dates change every year; the 14 November to 6 December dates match Keihan’s 2026 page.

Children here means elementary and junior-high pupils: ¥300 for the Hojo garden and, outside autumn, for the bridge. For the bridge in the autumn period the sources differ: the temple’s 1 July 2026 notice and Kyoto City give ¥300, while the temple’s visitor-guide table and Keihan’s 2026 page give ¥500, so have the higher figure ready. There is no group rate. A disability certificate shown at the window gives free entry for the holder and one companion. Neither the guide nor the fee notice lists payment methods (checked 16 October 2026), so bring cash in case cards are not taken.

Kyoto City’s official tourism page for Tofukuji, checked the same day, lists the autumn adult prices the other way round (bridge ¥600, garden ¥1,000). On adult prices the temple’s two pages agree with each other; go by them.

Booking. In its 2025 notice the temple said ordinary daytime admission needed no reservation and that it did not take bookings itself. Separately, JR Central’s “Souda Kyoto” campaign sells capacity-limited private viewings of Tofukuji in 2026, in the morning from 19 November and at night from 18 November, both to 6 December, for members of its EX train-booking service only. Those are booked on JR Central’s site, not at the temple. The temple had not posted a 2026 statement on booking for ordinary admission when checked on 16 October 2026.

Can you take photos on Tsutenkyo?

The visitor guide’s general rules ask visitors not to use tripods for photography in the grounds and refuse commercial photography without permission. For the autumn special opening it adds, in my translation: “Heavy crowding is expected during the autumn special opening period. You may be asked to refrain from taking photographs on the Tsutenkyo and Gaunkyo bridges.” The wording is conditional, so follow what staff ask on the day.

Its notice of 28 November 2025 gave the reason: weekends and holidays in the autumn period were expected to be very crowded, and, depending on the crowding, it might restrict photography on Tsutenkyo “to keep visitors safe”.

When are the autumn leaves at Tofukuji?

None of these is a forecast from the temple. For the week you go, see our Japan koyo tracker.

The 2022 row is one year’s record, not a pattern. The 21–23 November 2026 holiday weekend (Saturday to Monday) falls inside the usual window, and its last day is the date Weathernews’s spot page gave on 16 October for the start of peak. That weekend is the one I would avoid if I had a choice (see the photo section for the temple’s crowding notice).

JMA’s Kyoto averages (1991–2020), for packing:

Getting to Tofukuji

The temple asks visitors to come by public transport in the autumn season, and its own car parks close from 25 October to 10 December (no year is given on its access page; checked 16 October 2026). Its access page gives these routes:

On JR West’s timetable for Saturday 14 November 2026, the Miyakoji Rapid and the Regional Rapid both stop at Tofukuji and at Inari, two minutes from Kyoto to Tofukuji. The “Inishie” limited express to Nara, which runs on Saturdays and holidays until 29 November, passes through Tofukuji without stopping, so do not board it. JR West lists no coin lockers at JR Tofukuji Station; JR Inari Station has them. Between 9:00 and the temple’s 16:30 closing on that Saturday, a train that stops at Tofukuji leaves Kyoto every 7 to 12 minutes.

Times are from JR West’s online timetable (based on the October 2026 edition of the JR Timetable) and can change; check on the day. The walk from the station to the Tsutenkyo gate is about 10 minutes.

A half-day route with Fushimi Inari

Fushimi Inari Taisha is “right by” JR Inari Station, the shrine’s access page says. This plan uses the autumn opening times and JR West’s timetable for Monday 16 November 2026, a weekday; Saturday changes are given below it.

On Saturday 14 November. Take the 8:01 from Kyoto (Tofukuji 8:04) or the 8:15 (8:17, about 8:27 at the gate); the 12:00 to Inari and the Inari departure pattern above are the same on that Saturday. If you miss the planned train: southbound trains (towards Uji, Joyo and Nara) leave Tofukuji at 12:07, 12:18, 12:30 and 12:37 on both days, and every one of them stops at Inari. On a stormy morning, see the weather note under Practical notes before you set out.

Sub-temples nearby

Practical notes

• Weather: in 2026 the temple said it would close Tsutenkyo and the Hojo garden if a storm warning was still in force at 7:00 (August notice), and would limit or stop visits in heavy snow (February notice).
• Pets: the temple asks visitors not to bring pets into the grounds or onto the approaches.
• Car: the temple car parks close 25 October to 10 December (no year given; see Getting to Tofukuji). In 2025 the temple posted Higashiyama traffic measures for 22, 23, 24, 29 and 30 November; check its news page for 2026.

Who this is for, and when to skip it

Go for the maple valley under Tsutenkyo (usual peak mid-November to early December, Keihan) or for Shigemori Mirei’s 1939 gardens, which are open all year. Outside 14 November to 6 December 2026 the bridge is ¥600 and a combined ticket ¥1,000.

Avoid autumn weekends and holidays if you want to photograph from the bridge: the temple’s 2025 notice named them for crowding and possible photo limits. For other autumn temples, with crowd notes, see our lesser-known Kyoto autumn temples, and for prices and booking rules elsewhere in the city, Kyoto in November 2026. If you are staying in Kyoto to see the autumn leaves, compare Kyoto stays on Booking.com.

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