Universal Studios Japan (ユニバーサル・スタジオ・ジャパン) is a theme park located in Osaka, Japan. Opened on March 31, 2001, it is one of six Universal Studios theme parks worldwide and was the first to open outside the United States. The park is owned and operated by USJ LLC, (合同会社ユー・エス・ジェイ) a wholly owned subsidiary of NBCUniversal. The park is similar in layout to Universal Studios Florida and contains selected attractions from both Universal Orlando and Universal Studios Hollywood, in addition to a small number of unique attractions. Over 11 million guests visited the park in its opening year, making it the fastest theme park to reach the 10 million guest milestone at the time. In 2023, USJ hosted 16 million visitors, making it the third-most visited theme park in the world behind Magic Kingdom and Disneyland, and the most visited theme park in Asia.

History

In December 1992, Osaka Universal Planning Inc. was established in Minato-ku, Osaka to plan and research for the development and construction of a large-scale theme park in Japan. In February 1996, the master agreement regarding planning, construction and operation of the Universal Studios Japan theme park was concluded with American corporation MCA Inc. Osaka Universal Planning Inc. was also renamed USJ Co., Ltd. Licensing agreements regarding the planning, construction and operation of Universal Studios Japan was concluded with the Universal Group in 1998 and later that year, construction of the theme park officially began. The park opened on March 31, 2001.

Lands and attractions

The park covers 54 ha. The attractions are spread across eleven different areas. The tenth area, The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, opened on 15 July 2014 with its flagship attraction, Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey. The area and its attractions were modeled after its previous iterations at Universal Orlando and Universal Studios Hollywood. Its eleventh area, Super Nintendo World, opened after several delays on 18 March 2021.

Hollywood

Based on the neighborhood of Hollywood, Los Angeles.

Attractions

Notable Cafes and Stores

New York City

Based on the city of New York City, New York.

San Francisco

Based on the city of San Francisco, California.

Minion Park

An area inspired by Illumination's Despicable Me franchise. It opened in March 2017.

Jurassic Park

Inspired by Steven Spielberg's blockbuster film franchise of the same name.

Amity Village

Inspired by Steven Spielberg's Jaws film.

Universal Wonderland

Universal Wonderland is a section aimed at children and families. Opened in March 2012, it contains three themed sub-zones including Snoopy Studios, Hello Kitty's Fashion Avenue, and Sesame Street Fun Zone.

Snoopy Studios

Based on the Peanuts comic strip. Snoopy Studios was originally its own standalone area, opening with the park in April 2001 before becoming part of Universal Wonderland in 2012.

Hello Kitty's Fashion Avenue

Themed to Sanrio's Hello Kitty franchise.

Sesame Street Fun Zone

Based on the children's television series Sesame Street. It is split into three areas - "Sesame Street Plaza", "Sesame Central Park" and "Elmo's Imagination Playland".

WaterWorld

Based on Universal Pictures' 1995 film of the same name.

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter

Based on Warner Bros Discovery's Wizarding World franchise.

Super Nintendo World

Based on several Nintendo franchises, focusing on Super Mario and its Yoshi spin-off series. An expansion themed to the Donkey Kong Country spin-off series is scheduled to open on December 11, 2024, and will be divided into Super Mario Land and Donkey Kong Country.

Attractions

Notable Cafes and Stores

Seasonal overlays

The park is consistently installing seasonal attraction and show overlays. Some include Halloween Horror Nights, Christmas, Easter, Summer, and Cool Japan. The park's "Cool Japan" seasonal attractions have been based on popular Japanese anime and video game franchises, including: Sailor Moon, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Shin Godzilla, Attack on Titan, One Piece, Detective Conan, Lupin III, Monster Hunter, and Final Fantasy.

Former attractions

Western

The Western Area, and with it, The Wild Wild Wild West Stunt Show and the Animal Actors Stage show, were revamped to become Land of Oz in 2006. This involved completely re-theming two live shows, one restaurant and a number of retail facilities.

Land of Oz

The Western Area was replaced for 2006 with an area based on L. Frank Baum's Wizard of Oz book series. The land closed in February 2011 to make way for Universal Wonderland.

Parades

The park has held a variety of seasonal parades throughout the past two decades, including Festa de Parade, Universal Summer Parade – We Are One, and Minion Hacha-Mecha Christmas Party Parade. Universal Studios Japan currently offers the nighttime Universal Spectacle Night Parade. This parade premiered on 17 May 2018, and features floats, performers, and characters based on the Harry Potter, Transformers, Jurassic World and Despicable Me franchises. The park also offers a daily daytime parade, titled ''No limit! Parade.'' The parade held its first preview performance on 27 February 2023, and officially premiered on 1 March 2023. It features floats, characters, and performers based on Hello Kitty, Peanuts, Despicable Me, Sesame Street, Sing, Mario Kart and Pokémon. While Mario and Pikachu appeared on Universal's No Limit!-marketing float at the Midosuji Autumn Party in November 2022, the ''No limit! Parade'' is the first time these franchises have appeared within a Universal Studios parade.

Characters

Much like with the previous Universal parks, USJ has characters both from Universal and third-party companies. USJ has the Japanese license to use the Sesame Street, Peanuts and Sanrio characters, and alongside many others.

Awards

In 2011, USJ's Christmas tree was recognized by the Guinness World Records as the most illuminated Christmas tree in the world having 260,498 lights.

Attendance

Official hotels

There are five official hotels at or near the park:

Incidents and accidents

In November 2004, a 35-year-old woman from Osaka Prefecture suffered nerve damage in her right wrist, affecting the use of two of her fingers. This occurred when her hand got stuck in a safety bar of the E.T. Adventure attraction as an employee pulled it down to secure it. The Yoshi's Adventure attraction suffered two accidents in late 2021, with a Goomba stack animatronic falling onto the ride during operation on August 12, 2021, and a fire starting in one of the ride's indoor areas on November 23, 2021. This caused everyone to evacuate from the ride and the rest of the park. Neither accidents led to any park guest injuries. In October 2022, an employee at the amusement park found human bones in shrubbery along a road west of the premises.