Japanese expressway tolls are billed interchange-to-interchange, by vehicle class — not as a flat “the Tomei costs ¥X.” This page is for English-speaking rental-car tourists. JapanTolls is an independent estimator, not NEXCO.
JapanTolls is not NEXCO East, Central, or West, and not the Metropolitan or Hanshin Expressway companies. Live fares, ETC discounts, and pass rules come from the operator. Confirm before you drive.
Longer reads on how Japan tolls work, written from official operator publications.
How the Shuto Expressway (Tokyo) and Hanshin Expressway (Osaka–Kobe) charge by distance, the ¥300–¥1,950 car range, the 1 October 2026 Shuto increase to ¥2,130, the cash flat-toll rule, and why neither is included in a NEXCO estimate.
Last reviewed: 2026-09-03
Read the guideThe NEXCO ETC discounts that apply to motorcycles in 2026: late-night 30%, holiday 30%, the 37.5% motorcycle flat-rate discount (4 April–29 November), and the 22 Touring Plan flat-rate courses from ¥2,000, with registration links and conditions.
Last reviewed: 2026-09-03
Read the guideOn NEXCO East, Central, and West roads, you pay for a specific entry interchange (IC) and exit IC. DrivePlaza’s official search is built that way: pick a departure IC and an arrival IC, then a vehicle class and a date and time. There is no nationwide sticker price for “the Tomei” or “the Meishin.”
The same corridor can price differently if you enter or leave at a different IC, take a longer connector, or travel at a time when an ETC discount applies. DrivePlaza notes that late-night and other ETC discounts are identified from the times you enter in the search — and that traffic can still change whether a discount actually applies. Cash in a general lane does not get those ETC discounts.
A “Tokyo to Osaka” figure is therefore which Tokyo-area IC to which Osaka-area IC, on that day, for that class. Urban expressway connectors can sit on the path; DrivePlaza even offers a “Do not use urban expressways” option because that total is not the same drive.
JapanTolls city-pair pages quote NEXCO Route Search (mk_route.php). They are unofficial estimates from a dated dataset, not a NEXCO invoice.
NEXCO bills five classes. The old stub on this site compressed those five official classes into four calculator buckets. The official table is still five.
Tourists mainly choose ordinary versus kei. JapanTolls’ calculator shows four of those five official classes: motorcycle uses the 軽自動車等 fare (the same class as a kei), car is 普通車, light-truck is 中型車, heavy-truck is 大型車. We do not quote 特大車. That is a display mapping, not a claim that NEXCO only has four classes. Ask the rental desk which class they booked.
Cash or a credit card (where the plaza still takes one) means a general lane (一般): take a paper ticket in, stop and pay yen out. ETC is a Japanese ETC card seated in the car’s onboard unit, used in an ETC lane. JapanTolls does not sell cards. How a visitor actually gets one, what happens at the booth, and how the rental company bills you on return are on the ETC hub — this page does not repeat that guide.
Smart ICs are interchanges built for ETC only. NEXCO Central is explicit: no cash, no credit card, no highway card. A growing list of ordinary plazas are also ETC-only, with a Support lane if you enter by mistake. Cash is not gone nationwide in 2026, but treating a general lane as always there is already a bad plan — especially if your map uses a rest-area or rural Smart IC.
Four visitor ETC passes are still sold with designated rental cars: HEP (Hokkaido), TEP (Tohoku), SEP (San’in–Setouchi–Shikoku), and KEP (Kyushu). Each is a fixed price for unlimited use on listed NEXCO roads in that region for a set number of consecutive days. You need a non-Japanese passport, or Japanese citizenship with permanent residency abroad, plus a license that is valid in Japan. The nationwide Japan Expressway Pass (JEP) and the Central Nippon Expressway Pass (CEP) are no longer sold.
They can beat ordinary IC-to-IC tolls when you drive a lot inside one coverage area. They are a poor fit for a single Tokyo–Osaka hop, or for a trip that lives on urban expressways the pass does not cover. KEP’s operator page excludes city expressways; SEP excludes Honshi (Honshu–Shikoku Bridge) expressways and urban expressways. Driving outside the area or the dates still bills as a normal toll.
Compare each pass with pay-as-you-go on the expressway pass hub. JapanTolls does not sell passes. Official prices and covered ICs still change, so confirm on the operator pages below.
The Metropolitan Expressway (Shuto) in Tokyo and the Hanshin Expressway around Osaka and Kobe are not NEXCO. They keep their own distance-based tables, ETC versus cash rules, and fare-search tools. A JapanTolls Tokyo–Osaka pair is a NEXCO IC-to-IC estimate (typically Tomei / Shin-Tomei / Meishin and connectors). It is not “drive through central Tokyo on the Shuto.” If you enter or leave on the urban network, add the Shuto or Hanshin search on top of the NEXCO figure — do not treat them as the same invoice.