Collection

Kyoto Autumn Leaves

Where the maples turn, and when to go

Kyoto's temple maples usually peak from mid to late November, and some gardens hold their colour into the first week of December. They're packed by then, so when you go matters as much as where. Kiyomizu-dera opens its gate at 6:00, and in the season Tofuku-ji opens its Tsutenkyo bridge at 8:30. Be there for it. After dark, Eikan-do and To-ji light their maples on ¥1,000 night tickets, and Kodai-ji's day ticket lets you stay on until the gate shuts at 22:00. In Arashiyama, Jojakko-ji and Nison-in are a few minutes' walk apart under Mount Ogura, and Gio-ji isn't much further.

The autumn leaf spots on a map

Every spot in this collection, numbered from west to east. Spots within about 250 m of each other share a pin, and the ones outside the frame are listed under it. Tap a pin to open its page, or open the full map to see the spots with the events and the rest of Kyoto.

  1. Gio-ji, Nison-in · Arashiyama
  2. Jojakko-ji · Arashiyama
  3. Kameyama Park, Okochi Sanso · Arashiyama
  4. Jingo-ji · Takao
  5. Hogon-in · Arashiyama
  6. Togetsukyo Bridge · Arashiyama
  7. Sagano Romantic Train · Arashiyama
  8. Ninna-ji · Kinkakuji
  9. Toji-in · Kinkakuji
  10. Kitano Tenmangu · Kitano
  11. Umekoji Park · Kyoto Station
  12. Jonangu · Fushimi
  13. To-ji · Kyoto Station
  14. Nijo Castle · Nijo
  15. Kyoto Botanical Gardens · Demachiyanagi
  16. Shosei-en Garden · Kyoto Station
  17. Kyoto Gyoen · Imperial Palace
  18. Tofuku-ji · Fushimi
  19. Kodai-ji · Gion
  20. Kiyomizu-dera · Higashiyama
  21. Shogunzuka Seiryuden · Higashiyama
  22. Konkai Komyo-ji, Shinnyo-do · Ginkakuji
  23. Konchi-in · Okazaki
  24. Eikan-do · Okazaki
  25. Shisen-do · Ginkakuji
  26. Philosopher's Path · Ginkakuji
  27. Shugakuin Imperial Villa · Shugakuin
  28. Daigo-ji · Daigo

Off the map: Kurama and Kibune (Kurama and Kibune), Ohara (Ohara).

Open the autumn leaves map full screen

Autumn 2026 at a glance

Checked . Forecasts change as the season goes on, so check the source before you plan a day round a date.

Forecast for the city
Ginkgo around 27 November and maples around 11 December, which the forecaster counts as an average year (the averages are 24 November and 5 December). The dates are for sample trees in the city, on the first day most of a tree's leaves have turned. The next update is due in early November. Source: Japan Meteorological Corporation, 1 October 2026
Jojakko-ji, Arashiyama
The temple says its maples usually start to turn in the second week of November, are at their best from mid to late November and hang on in places into the first week of December. It's open every day, ¥600. Source: Jojakko-ji
Tofuku-ji
From 14 November to 6 December the Tsutenkyo bridge opens at 8:30, half an hour before the Hojo garden, and costs ¥1,000 with the Founder's Hall. There's no joint ticket in those weeks, and no re-entry. Source: Tofuku-ji
Eikan-do
The autumn treasure exhibition, with the garden, runs 11 November to 6 December (¥1,500, entry 9:00 to 16:00). The light-up runs 20 November to 6 December, entry 17:30 to 20:30, on a separate ¥1,000 ticket. Day and night are separate sessions, there are no advance tickets, and on crowded days it may stop selling them early. Source: Eikan-do
Kiyomizu-dera at night
From 21 to 30 November the temple stays open to 21:30 (last entry 21:00), and you don't need to book. Source: Kiyomizu-dera
To-ji light-up
Every night from 31 October to 13 December, 18:00 to 21:30 (last entry 21:00), ¥1,000. The maples in the grounds are lit and the Kondo and Kodo halls open after dark. You can walk there from Kyoto Station. Source: To-ji
Kodai-ji
From 23 October to 13 December it's open 9:00 to 22:00 (last entry 21:30), with the garden lit from 17:00. One ¥800 ticket covers day and night, but you can't come back in once you've left. Source: Kodai-ji
Rurikoin, Yase
Open 1 October to 13 December, 10:00 to 17:00 (last entry 16:30), ¥2,000. From 13 November to 6 December you have to book on the temple's own site. Source: Kyoto City Tourism Association
Kyoto accommodation tax
Kyoto has charged it since October 2018, and the rates went up on 1 March 2026. It's per person per night on the room rate before meals and consumption tax. That's ¥200 under ¥6,000, ¥400 under ¥20,000, ¥1,000 under ¥50,000, ¥4,000 under ¥100,000 and ¥10,000 from ¥100,000 up. You pay it at the hotel, though it's sometimes included in what you paid a booking site. Source: Kyoto City
33 places
Mid-November to early December When

The places

Park · Kyoto Station Shosei-en Garden Higashi Hongan-ji's own pond garden, a few blocks east of the temple. It began in 1653 as a retirement villa for the temple's 13th head, the layout is credited to Ishikawa Jozan, and it's been a national Place of Scenic Beauty since 1936. You'll also hear it called Kikoku-tei, after the trifoliate orange hedges planted round it.
Temple · Kyoto Station To-ji When Heian-kyo became the capital in 794, the only temples allowed in it were To-ji and its twin, Sai-ji, built either side of the main gate, Rashomon. Sai-ji and the gate are long gone, and To-ji is all that still stands of Heian-kyo. In 823 Emperor Saga handed it to Kukai, and his Kodo hall holds a three-dimensional mandala of statues. The pagoda, about 55 m tall, is the fifth on the spot, rebuilt in 1644.
Park · Kyoto Station Umekoji Park Umekoji Park is 13.7 hectares of lawns, play areas and woods a 15-minute walk west of Kyoto Station, open since 1995, with the aquarium in its grounds and the railway museum next door. Its Suzaku no Niwa garden was built for the capital's 1,200th anniversary. Its pond is just 1 cm of water over black granite, so the whole pond works as a mirror, and its 6 m waterfall is the biggest in central Kyoto.
Temple · Gion Kodai-ji Toyotomi Hideyoshi's widow, Kita-no-Mandokoro (Nene), founded Kodai-ji in 1606 to pray for him. Both are enshrined in the Otamaya, whose altar and shrine are decorated with the gold lacquer work known as Kodai-ji maki-e. The paid garden takes in a pond garden credited to Kobori Enshu and a bamboo grove, and Minder, an android Kannon, recites the Heart Sutra in its own hall.
Temple · Higashiyama Kiyomizu-dera Kiyomizu-dera was founded in 778 on Mount Otowa, and its main hall, rebuilt in 1633, juts out over the slope on a wooden stage about 13 metres high. Eighteen zelkova pillars hold it up, and the joints don't use a single nail. The grounds have about 1,500 cherry trees and 1,000 maples, and they've been part of the Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto World Heritage site since 1994.
Viewpoint · Higashiyama Shogunzuka Seiryuden Shogunzuka is the mound on the Higashiyama ridge where Emperor Kanmu is said to have buried a clay general in armour to guard his new capital in 794. Beside it, Shoren-in's Seiryuden has a wooden stage of 1,046 square metres, 4.6 times the size of Kiyomizu-dera's, looking over the whole city, and from the west viewpoint you can see as far as the towers of Osaka. The National Treasure Ao Fudo painting is kept in its inner hall, and you pray before a detailed copy.
Temple · Okazaki Eikan-do Eikan-do, formally Zenrin-ji, has been a temple for more than 1,100 years and still goes by its old nickname, Eikan-do of the maples. Its main image is the Mikaeri Amida, a Buddha who turns his head to look back, and its grounds fill up with visitors for the leaves in late November.
Temple · Okazaki Konchi-in Konchi-in is a Nanzen-ji subtemple, moved to this spot in 1605, whose Crane and Turtle Garden by Kobori Enshu is a Special Place of Scenic Beauty, with a crane island and a turtle island facing each other behind a bed of white gravel. Its Toshogu shrine, built in 1628, has a dragon on the worship hall ceiling painted by Kano Tan'yu.
Temple · Ginkakuji Konkai Komyo-ji Known as Kurodani, this is where Honen built his first hermitage in 1175 after coming down from Mount Hiei, and it's now a head temple of the Jodo sect. In 1862 Matsudaira Katamori, lord of Aizu, made it his Kyoto headquarters with 1,000 men, and the men who became the Shinsengumi had their audience with him here. The Aizu cemetery up the hill remembers 237 who died in Kyoto from 1862 to 1867 and 115 killed at Toba-Fushimi.
Neighbourhood · Ginkakuji Philosopher's Path A stone path that follows a branch of the Lake Biwa Canal for about 1.8 km, from near Nyakuoji Bridge in the south to Ginkaku-ji in the north. It's named after Kitaro Nishida, the Kyoto University philosopher who's said to have walked here deep in thought. In 1922 the painter Hashimoto Kansetsu gave 360 cherry trees for the banks, which is why they're known as Kansetsu's cherry trees.
Temple · Ginkakuji Shinnyo-do A Tendai temple founded in 984, when the priest Kaisan brought an Amida statue down from Mount Hiei. The main hall was rebuilt in 1717 and the three-storey pagoda, about 30 m tall, in 1817. The Nehan garden, laid out in 1988, shows the dying Buddha ringed by his disciples and animals in stones, with white sand for the Ganges and the Higashiyama hills, Mount Hiei and Daimonji behind it.
Temple · Ginkakuji Shisen-do The retreat where the poet Ishikawa Jozan (1583 to 1672) spent his last years, now a temple under Eihei-ji of the Soto Zen sect. At its heart are portraits of 36 Chinese poets by Kano Tanyu, each with a poem above it in Jozan's hand. Out in the garden you'll hear the knock of a bamboo shishi-odoshi, a device Jozan is credited with inventing.
Temple · Arashiyama Gio-ji Gio-ji is a small thatched nunnery hidden in bamboo and maples, with a story straight out of The Tale of the Heike. Gio, a dancer favoured by Taira no Kiyomori, was pushed out when he tired of her and became a nun here with her mother and sister. In the hut, a big round window glows with the colours of the garden outside, and the temple calls it the rainbow window.
Temple · Arashiyama Hogon-in Hogon-in is a subtemple of Tenryu-ji that only opens in spring and autumn. Its Shishiku garden, laid out by the Zen monk Sakugen Shuryo, borrows Arashiyama as a backdrop and centres on a huge lion rock under a canopy of maples. The temple was founded in 1461 and moved to this site in 2002.
Temple · Arashiyama Jojakko-ji Jojakko-ji climbs the lower slope of Mount Ogura in flights of stone steps under the maples. The priest Nisshin founded it in 1596, and its main hall was the guest hall of Fushimi Momoyama Castle, moved here with help from Kobayakawa Hideaki. The thatched Niomon gate, built in the 1340s and brought here in 1616, is the oldest building on the grounds, and its guardian statues are attributed to Unkei.
Viewpoint · Arashiyama Kameyama Park Kameyama is the hillside section of Arashiyama Park, upstream from Togetsukyo on the north bank, a slope of red pines, cherries and maples with wild azaleas underneath. Paths wind up through it to rest spots and a viewing deck.
Temple · Arashiyama Nison-in Nison-in is named for its two main images, a Shaka who sends souls off and an Amida who welcomes them, a gilded pair carved in the mid-Kamakura period. Past the gate, the Momiji no Baba approach runs about 100 m between alternating maples and cherries. The temple dates to the 830s or 840s and sits at the foot of Mount Ogura.
Park · Arashiyama Okochi Sanso Okochi Denjiro, a period-film star of the early Showa years, fell for the view from Mount Ogura and spent 30 years building this hillside garden at the far end of the bamboo path. Its paths wind through cherries and maples to views of the Hozu River, Mount Hiei and the city. Four of its structures, the Daijokaku house among them, are registered cultural properties.
Landmark · Arashiyama Sagano Romantic Train This slow, old-style train covers about 7 km of the Hozu River gorge in 25 minutes, from Torokko Saga next to JR Saga-Arashiyama Station to Torokko Kameoka. It runs on track left over when the JR line was double-tracked, and it's been carrying sightseers since 1991. Car 5, the Rich, has no window glass, so you get the wind and the river noise.
Landmark · Arashiyama Togetsukyo Bridge The 155 m bridge over the Oi River, with wooded hills rising right behind it, is the picture most people carry of Arashiyama. A monk named Dosho first bridged the river near here in the 830s or 840s, and the bridge you walk across today was finished in 1934. Its name, the moon-crossing bridge, comes from the retired Emperor Kameyama, who watched the moon move over it.
Landmark · Nijo Nijo Castle Tokugawa Ieyasu built Nijo Castle in 1603 to guard the Imperial Palace and to lodge the shogun on his visits to Kyoto. Its Ninomaru Palace, six buildings lined with Kano school paintings, is the only palace complex still standing inside a Japanese castle. In 1867 the 15th shogun, Tokugawa Yoshinobu, announced the return of power to the emperor in its great hall.
Park · Imperial Palace Kyoto Gyoen Kyoto Gyoen is the park around the Imperial Palace, 1.3 km long and 700 m wide. More than 140 princely and noble houses stood here in the Edo period, and what's left is lawns, woods more than a century old and the remains of a few old gardens, among about 100,000 trees. It never closes and it's free.
Park · Demachiyanagi Kyoto Botanical Gardens Opened in 1924, this is Japan's oldest public botanical garden, 24 hectares with about 10,000 kinds of plants, 7,000 of them garden varieties. The glass conservatory, one of the largest in the country, holds about 4,500. About 500 cherry trees flower in spring, and in autumn the maples, sweetgums and ginkgos turn.
Shrine · Fushimi Jonangu Jonangu was founded in 794, with the new capital, to guard its southern approach, and people still come to pray for protection from unlucky directions and for safe travel. Its garden, Rakusuien, covers about 30,000 square metres, and the weeping plums and camellias from mid February to March are the big draw.
Temple · Fushimi Tofuku-ji Tofuku-ji is a Rinzai Zen head temple, built over 19 years from 1236 and named after Nara's two great temples, Todai-ji and Kofuku-ji. From the covered Tsutenkyo bridge you look down into the Sengyokukan valley of maples, and the Hojo is ringed by four gardens Shigemori Mirei made in 1939.
Shrine · Kitano Kitano Tenmangu Kitano Tenmangu is the head shrine of the roughly 12,000 Tenjin shrines across Japan, founded in 947 for Sugawara no Michizane, the scholar students still pray to before exams. Toyotomi Hideyori built the main hall in 1607 and it's a National Treasure. About 1,500 plum trees of 50 varieties flower here from January to late March.
Temple · Kinkakuji Ninna-ji Emperor Uda finished Ninna-ji in 888, and imperial princes served as its head priests until 1867. The Kondo main hall is the oldest surviving Shishinden, the ceremonial hall of the Imperial Palace, moved here between 1624 and 1643 and now a National Treasure. The five-storey pagoda went up in 1644, and in early to mid April the low, late-blooming Omuro cherries flower inside the middle gate.
Temple · Kinkakuji Toji-in Ashikaga Takauji founded Toji-in in 1341 at the foot of Mount Kinugasa, and it became the family temple of the Ashikaga shoguns. The Reikoden hall holds wooden statues of the shoguns, and one of Tokugawa Ieyasu, and Takauji's grave is a stone pagoda behind the abbot's hall. The Fuyo pond, in a garden said to be by Muso Soseki, is shaped like a lotus flower.
Temple · Daigo Daigo-ji Daigo-ji climbs from the foot of Mount Daigo to its summit, and its five-storey pagoda, finished in 951, is the oldest wooden building in Kyoto Prefecture. Toyotomi Hideyoshi threw his famous cherry blossom party here in 1598, planting 700 trees for it, and he designed the Sanbo-in garden. Kamidaigo, the original temple on the summit, is about an hour's steep climb from the trailhead.
Temple · Takao Jingo-ji Jingo-ji is a Shingon temple in the Takao hills north-west of the city. Kukai, who brought Shingon to Japan, was its abbot for 14 years from 809, and the temple took its present name when it was handed to him in 824. From the lookout you can throw small clay discs called kawarake into the valley to get rid of bad luck, and it's a popular spot for autumn leaves.
Day trip · Kurama and Kibune Kurama and Kibune Two mountain villages north of the city, joined by a hiking trail over the ridge. Kurama-dera is where, legend says, the young Ushiwakamaru learned swordsmanship from the tengu, and the path to its inner sanctuary crosses the Ki-no-ne Michi, a stretch of ground covered in cedar roots. In the next valley, Kifune Shrine honours the god of water, and in summer the restaurants along the Kibune River serve meals on platforms over the water.
Day trip · Ohara Ohara Ohara is a valley in the hills north-east of Kyoto, and the main sight is Sanzen-in, a Tendai temple. Its Yusei-en garden is moss under cedar and cypress, with small stone jizo figures grown over with the same moss. The Ojo-gokuraku-in hall has a ceiling shaped like the bottom of a boat, raised to fit the big Amida triad inside.
Landmark · Shugakuin Shugakuin Imperial Villa Retired Emperor Gomizuno-o built Shugakuin Imperial Villa on the slopes of Mount Hiei between 1656 and 1659. It's three gardens on three levels, joined by pine-lined paths through rice paddies. From the Rinuntei pavilion at the top you look across the Yokuryuchi pond to the whole of Kyoto and the western mountains.

Autumn light-ups and garden openings

Every Kyoto event on the calendar

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