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This guide covers everything you need to know to enjoy the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival without stress, from the increasingly competitive ticket lottery to on-the-ground tips for avoiding common pitfalls.
For an overview of the highlights and appeal of the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival, see the article below.
Read more about Nagaoka Festival Grand Fireworks Show
For how to secure Nagaoka Fireworks tickets without going through the lottery, see below.
Read more about How to get Nagaoka Fireworks tickets without the lottery
The Nagaoka Festival Grand Fireworks Show is counted among Japan’s three great fireworks festivals.
Its massive scale and overwhelming power make it extremely popular, and competition for spectator tickets is fierce. The venue itself also gets incredibly crowded on the day.
The number of paid spectators reaches around 170,000 per day, totaling 340,000 over the two-day event.
| Year | Spectators |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 340,000 |
| 2024 | 340,000 |
| 2023 | 295,000 |
Unlike most fireworks festivals abroad, the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival does not offer any free public viewing areas.
To watch the fireworks from the paid spectator area at the venue, you must purchase a spectator ticket.
Ticket purchases are limited to lottery winners, with only a small number of remaining tickets available on a first-come-first-served basis. The odds of winning the lottery are very low.
So the first major challenge is the difficulty of getting a spectator ticket.
Paid spectator tickets for the Nagaoka Festival Grand Fireworks Show, sent from the ticket center
After the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival ends, both roads and public transportation become extremely congested.
“I came by car, but the traffic is so bad that my car won’t move at all.”
“I came by train, but the station is so packed that I can’t get on a train.”
If you face this situation without being prepared for it, the joy of the festival can quickly turn into exhaustion. And this is a very real scenario at the hugely popular Nagaoka Fireworks Festival.
If you drive, you will eventually get home even if it takes time. But if you take the train, there is a last-train deadline to keep in mind, so you need to plan your movements accordingly.
The photo below shows the flow of people heading toward Nagaoka Station after the fireworks ended.
This was around 9:35 pm, and many more people were still streaming toward Nagaoka Station. The area in front of the station becomes extremely packed as well.
For this reason, if you plan to use public transportation, keep the return schedule in mind as you plan your evening.
In recent years, traffic control along the routes to Nagaoka Station and for station entry has been well-managed, and most visitors have been able to board trains and Shinkansen without major issues.
For the 2026 Nagaoka Fireworks Festival, you can check the application process for general lottery sales at the link below.
Starting in 2026, first-come-first-served online sales have been discontinued and replaced with an all-seat lottery system. Even if you miss the first lottery round, there is a second lottery round. Additionally, block-assigned seating has been changed to fully assigned seating, and high school student support seats (1,000 seats per day, ¥500) have been newly introduced.
See the Ticket Sales Schedule section below for application dates.
https://www.nagaokahanabi.jp/generalsale
A Rakuten account is required to apply. If you win the lottery, payment will be processed via credit card through your Rakuten account, and tickets will be shipped to the address registered with Rakuten. Make sure your registered credit card is valid and your address is current before applying.
A separate page is available for visitors traveling from outside Japan. The application process differs from that for Japan residents, so please check the following URL for details.
Nagaoka Fireworks International Visitors Ticket Site
Based on my own experience attending the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival, here are strategies and tips for overcoming these challenges.
(*International visitors cannot use the resale system. This section is for Japan residents only.)
General sales use an all-seat lottery system. There are two chances with the first and second lottery rounds, but if you lose both, you cannot purchase paid spectator tickets.
(*Until 2025, any remaining unsold tickets were available on a first-come-first-served basis online, but this has been discontinued from 2026.)
However, do not give up just yet.
There is still a way to get paid spectator tickets.
That is the official resale system.
Official resale is a system where tickets purchased by lottery winners who can no longer attend are made available for purchase by others.
In simple terms, these are tickets from cancellations.
The Nagaoka Fireworks Foundation, the organizer of the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival, officially handles these resales.
Below is the ticket sales and resale schedule for the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival.
| Apr 10 (Fri) – Apr 28 (Tue) | Advance Lottery for Nagaoka Residents Application: dedicated postcard only (postcards distributed with the April city newsletter) |
|---|---|
| Mid - May | Lottery results announced |
| May 25 (Mon) – Jun 8 (Mon) | General Sales – First Lottery Round Online only |
| Mid - Jun | Lottery results announced |
| Jun 18 (Thu) – Jun 22 (Mon) | General Sales – Second Lottery Round Online only |
| Late Jun | Lottery results announced |
| Jul 6 (Mon) – | Official Resale Online |
The “Official Resale” at the end of this schedule is the resale opportunity.
| Apr 10 – Apr 30 | Advance Lottery for Nagaoka Residents Application: dedicated postcard only (postcards distributed with the April city newsletter) |
|---|---|
| – May 23 (Fri) | Lottery results announced |
| May 26 (Mon) – Jun 6 (Fri) | General Lottery Sales Online only |
| Jun 17 (Tue) | Lottery results announced |
| Jun 30 (Mon) – Jul 11 (Fri) | If unsold tickets remain First - come - first - served online sales |
| Jul 4 (Fri) – | Official Resale Online |
| Apr 10 – Apr 30 | Advance Lottery for Nagaoka Residents Dedicated postcard only |
|---|---|
| Late May onward | Lottery results announced |
| May 27 – Jun 7 | General Lottery Sales Online only |
| Jun 17 (Mon) 6:00 pm onward | Lottery results announced |
| Jun 27 (Thu) – Jul 12 (Fri) | First - come - first - served online sales |
| Jul 8 (Mon) 12:00 pm – Jul 24 (Wed) 11:59 pm | Official Resale Online |
| Apr 10 – Apr 28 | Advance Lottery for Nagaoka Residents Online or dedicated postcard |
|---|---|
| – May 26 | Lottery results announced |
| May 29 – Jun 9 | General Lottery Sales Online only |
| – Jun 16 | Lottery results announced |
| Jun 19 – Jun 23 | If unsold tickets remain First - come - first - served online sales |
| Jun 26 – Jul 14 | Official Resale Online or by phone |
Nagaoka Fireworks Ticket Center
Resale tickets are also first-come-first-served.
However, the key point is that resale listings do not all appear at once.
When someone who can no longer attend completes the resale procedure (listing their ticket for sale), that ticket becomes available for purchase at that moment.
In other words, you never know when a ticket will appear.
So once the resale period begins, check the resale site frequently and keep searching without giving up. This significantly increases your chances of getting a ticket.
Below is an actual paid spectator ticket I purchased through the official resale.
Paid spectator ticket actually purchased via official resale
I managed to purchase the ticket on June 28, just two days after the resale started on June 26.
As you can see, even though it is first-come-first-served, tickets do not sell out instantly the moment sales open. If you keep checking the official resale site persistently, you can get paid spectator tickets.
There is one important thing to note when purchasing resale tickets.
Resale tickets are listed exactly as the original set was cancelled. The full bundle is resold as-is.
For example, if “Venue A South Area, 4 tickets” was cancelled and listed for resale, you can only purchase “Venue A South Area, 4 tickets.”
You cannot buy just 2 out of the 4.
“Which seats will be listed for resale”
is a matter of luck, and
“how many tickets will be available”
is also a matter of luck.
Be selective about what you purchase. At the same time, always confirm the seat location and number of tickets before completing your purchase.
Incidentally,
I continued monitoring the resale site even after purchasing my tickets, and resale listings kept appearing throughout the official resale period.
If you do not give up, you will get your paid spectator tickets, so keep trying until the very end. (The Nagaoka Fireworks Festival is spectacular enough to justify this level of effort.)
Unauthorized resale of Nagaoka Fireworks Festival tickets is strictly prohibited. Transferring tickets for a fee without the organizers consent is forbidden, and entry with illegally resold tickets is not permitted. Always use the official resale system provided by the organizers.
Tickets bear the original purchasers name, and random ID checks (photo ID required) are conducted at entry. If you buy tickets from unofficial sources, including individual resellers, the name on the ticket may not match yours, and you may be denied entry.
If you plan to drive to the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival, parking is a major issue.
Starting in 2025, all official parking lots have switched to a lottery-based paid reservation system. The previously available free parking lots and first-come, first-served parking lots have been eliminated.
Official lots cost between ¥1,000 and ¥6,000, which is affordable compared to private parking lots. (Lots farther from the venue operate shuttle buses and temporary buses to the site.)
However, the official parking lottery is highly competitive, and winning a spot is far from easy.
Note that if you purchased your tickets through resale, you may not make it in time for the official parking lottery application period. A reservation code included with your mailed tickets is required to apply for official parking, so depending on when you obtain your resale tickets, you may effectively be unable to use official parking.
Given the enormous number of visitors, official parking alone is not enough.
On the day of the event, private homes and businesses also offer paid parking.
To book these lots, use Nokisaki Parking, a parking reservation site also recommended by the official organizers.
However, prices on this platform are inflated as well.
Lots close to the venue can cost over ¥20,000, and lots a bit farther out near Nagaoka Station range from ¥10,000 to ¥17,000, which is very expensive. (For reference, parking in regional Japanese cities typically costs around ¥1,000 to ¥2,000 for half a day.)
After all the effort of securing tickets, facing these parking prices can be disheartening.
So next, let me share how to avoid this problem.
The following tips address both the expensive parking problem and the traffic congestion on the way home described earlier.
Note that these tips are specifically geared toward Venue A. If you are attending at Venue B, adapt this approach accordingly.
This is based on my personal experience, but conditions change from year to year. Treat this as one reference point, and proceed at your own risk.
Nagaoka Bunka Driving School is not close to the fireworks venue. Even so, book a parking spot at this driving school.
3-1-1 Zao, Nagaoka, Niigata 940-0028
Below is a map showing the relative positions of Nagaoka Bunka Driving School and the fireworks venue. For example, it is about 1.5 km (about 1 mile) to Nagaoka Bridge and about 3.6 km (about 2.2 miles) to the southern area of Venue A. (However, with the method described below, this distance will not be an issue.)
Parking at Nagaoka Bunka Driving School costs ¥7,000. It is not cheap, but compared to parking lots that charge over ¥10,000, this falls into the more affordable category.
For reference, the image below shows the digital ticket from Nokisaki Parking after booking a spot at Nagaoka Bunka Driving School. You enter the lot by showing the digital ticket on your smartphone to the staff at the entrance.
(Obviously, displaying this article image will not get you in. Book through Nokisaki Parking to get your own digital ticket.)
This lot also has a larger capacity, making it one of the more reliable options to secure a reservation. Start by using this method to lock in affordable and guaranteed parking.
This is the key point.
Once you arrive at the driving school, call a local Nagaoka taxi company to request a pickup.
You might think there is no way to catch a taxi near the venue on the day of the festival, but you would be surprised. Taxi dispatch is actually available.
In my case, after about 10 minutes of calling various taxi companies, I was able to get a car dispatched. The taxi arrived about 5 minutes later.
Even at a popular and crowded fireworks festival, taxis can be called. Here, too, persistence is key.
Below is a list of taxi companies operating in Nagaoka with their phone numbers. Bookmarking this article will save you the trouble of searching for taxi companies on the day.
While taxis can be spotted around the venue area, the number of spectators increases every year, so there is no guarantee you will be able to arrange one by phone.
Always confirm an alternative route in advance in case you cannot get a taxi. Keeping this contingency in mind is extremely important. For example, from the driving school, you can reach Kita-Nagaoka Station on foot in about 10 minutes.
Also, since you may end up walking if no taxi is available, try not to bring too much luggage. Even if you do manage to get a taxi, remember that you will still need to walk from the drop-off point to your spectator seat.
Using a taxi is an effective strategy, but since advance reservations are not available, be aware of the risk that comes with relying on day-of availability.
Let me explain why taking a taxi is worth it.
There is a fair distance from Nagaoka Bunka Driving School to the fireworks venue. (About 1.5 km / 1 mile to Nagaoka Bridge, and about 3.6 km / 2.2 miles to the southern area of Venue A.)
In reality, though, the taxi ride costs only about ¥1,000 to ¥1,200. It takes just 5 to 8 minutes.
Compare that to walking for over 10 minutes in the scorching summer heat with your bags to Kita-Nagaoka Station (the nearest station to the driving school), riding a crowded train to Nagaoka Station, and then walking another 15-plus minutes in the heat. That ¥1,000 is incredibly good value and efficient.
On top of that, there are designated routes where taxis are allowed to enter, bringing you close to the venue.
Taxi-accessible route near the venue (drop-off only)
I was able to reach the taxi-accessible lane in the Venue A South Area, as shown in the photo and map above, for about ¥1,000 to ¥1,200. Getting to Venue A should cost the same or less.
To save both energy and time, taking a taxi is one of the most effective strategies.
Walking from the fireworks venue back to Nagaoka Bunka Driving School takes about 40 minutes.
Start walking toward the driving school first. Along the way, flag down a taxi and hop in.
If you manage to catch a taxi, you can reach the driving school in about 5 minutes. The fare is the same as the trip there: around ¥1,000 to ¥1,200.
I enjoyed the fireworks almost until the very end and left the venue at 9:20 pm. Using this method, I was back at the driving school by 10:00 pm.
However, if you cannot flag down a taxi, you will need to walk all the way to the driving school. Be prepared for that possibility.
If you have time to spare, another option is to take the crowded train to Kita-Nagaoka Station.
If you can get back to the driving school as quickly as possible after the fireworks end, you can avoid traffic jams entirely.
The roads leading to the highway and the highway itself were completely clear, and I made it all the way back to the Niigata Station area without any congestion.
I arrived at my hotel in Niigata City a little after 11:00 pm. It was a very comfortable journey home.
When the fireworks end, everyone starts moving at once. Even if you manage to park close to the venue, the surrounding area is packed with people, making it hard for cars to move. Getting out of that area takes a long time, and you end up stuck in traffic anyway.
For this reason, it is better to park at a location some distance from the venue and use a taxi to get to and from the site. This is the fastest way to get around. You avoid traffic on the way home, keep your total costs lower, and enjoy the Nagaoka Fireworks in comfort. (However, as mentioned, this approach does carry some risk.)
If you are returning from Nagaoka Station by Shinkansen (bullet train), the station will be extremely crowded and getting on a train can be quite a challenge.
However, extra Shinkansen services are significantly increased for both the Tokyo and Niigata directions. In 2025, a total of 83 extra Shinkansen and 58 extra local trains were operated over the two days, and most visitors were able to board.
If you can handle the crowds, taking the Shinkansen instead of driving is another viable option for attending the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival.
Hotels in Nagaoka and Niigata City fill up quickly.
Rates also surge, so book a hotel that fits your budget as early as possible.
During the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival period, hotel rates average around ¥20,000 to ¥40,000 per night. A few options in the ¥10,000 range can be found. Normally, budget city hotels cost around ¥4,000 to ¥5,000 per night, so prices rise dramatically.
Some hotels near Niigata Station had rates inflated by as much as 10 to 20 times the normal price.
Normal rates
Rates during the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival
| Hotel | Normal Rate | Fireworks Festival Rate | Price Increase |
|---|---|---|---|
| Juraku Stay Niigata | ¥3,700 | ¥35,400 | 9.57x |
| Art Hotel Niigata Ekimae | ¥4,700 | ¥42,300 | 9x |
| Hotel Livemax Niigata Ekimae | ¥4,675 | ¥100,000 | 21.39x |
Spectator tickets are hard to get. Hotels are fully booked and overpriced. Parking is expensive.
Without careful planning, you could get stuck in traffic on the way home or miss your train.
Keeping costs down takes real effort. There is a lot to manage.
But the fireworks at the Nagaoka Festival Grand Fireworks Show are spectacular enough to make all that effort worthwhile.
This photo was taken at around 7:00 pm. The sky was gorgeous during the magic hour.
Once the fireworks begin, the sheer power and scale are on a completely different level from fireworks shows in Tokyo.
The absolute highlight is the Phoenix Fireworks for Recovery. Launched along approximately 2 km of the Shinano River riverbank, this spectacular show evokes the mythical phoenix. For about 5 minutes, the fireworks shift through vivid colors of red, blue, green, and yellow, painting the night sky in breathtaking fashion.
When you know what to expect, there is nothing to fear.
Plan ahead, manage the risks, and come experience this extraordinary spectacle for yourself.
