Nara · a city guide
Nara, by the clock
Three places within a walk of each other. The earliest of them opens at 6:30 and charges nothing, and the one in the middle publishes no opening time, no closing time and no fee — because there is nothing to publish.
Every figure above was read from an official page on 18 September 2026.
What you are choosing between
Every figure below was read from an official page on 18 September 2026. Where the Japanese and English versions disagreed, we have said which one we would carry.
Nara Park奈良公園
A park with deer in it, and no gate.
OpensNo opening time and no closing time. Nara Prefecture publishes neither on any page that describes the park to a visitor.CostsNone published — not “free”, nothing at all.Closed, bookingNothing closes here, because nothing opens. The only schedule belongs to the animals, and it starts at sunrise.Read the guide
Todai-ji東大寺
A temple, and an argument about which parts are actually old.
OpensGreat Buddha Hall 7:30 (April–October), 8:00 (November–March). Hokke-do and Kaidan-in 8:30 all year. The museum 9:30, closing 17:30 in summer and 17:00 in winter.CostsNot among the figures we checked. The temple’s pages we read publish hours rather than prices.Closed, bookingApart from special events and emergencies, none of these close for the year.Read the guide
Kasuga Taisha春日大社
A shrine whose free part opens two and a half hours before the ticketed one.
OpensGrounds 6:30 (March–October), 7:00 (November–February). Special worship 9:00–16:00. Treasure hall 10:00–17:00. Botanical garden 9:00–16:30, closed Tuesdays from June to March.CostsThe grounds are free. ¥700 each for special worship, the treasure hall and the botanical garden.Closed, bookingSpecial worship shuts all day from 20 December to 7 January, around 8–13 March, and on Coming of Age Day. Mornings on the 1st, 11th and 21st, plus seventeen further festival dates. The afternoon of 16 December.Read the guide
And then the timing
Once you have picked, the published hours decide the order — and Nara Park is the exception that makes the rest workable. It has no hours, so it is the thing you do while you wait for everything else.
- Sunrise
The deer get up, and the park’s only schedule begins
The park publishes nothing. The animals do keep an order: they rise at sunrise, spend the day in the grass and move to wooded ground toward evening. The one hour anybody has put a number on is the annual count, 5:30 to 8:00 on two mornings in July, timed to when they can be found.
Read the guide → - 6:30
The shrine opens, and nothing is being sold
Kasuga Taisha’s grounds open at 6:30 from March to October, 7:00 from November to February, and cost nothing. Two thousand stone lanterns stand in this part — an hour and a half before any ticket desk opens.
Read the guide → - 7:30
The Great Buddha Hall opens first
7:30 from April to October, 8:00 from November to March. The head inside is Edo work, eleven centuries younger than the temple around it, and the temple says so on its own pages.
Read the guide → - 8:30
The two halls that settle the argument
Hokke-do and Kaidan-in open at 8:30, all year. Hokke-do arrived in two pieces — the front section 1199, the rear thought to be Tenpyo era and the oldest building on the grounds.
Read the guide → - 9:00
The shrine starts charging
Special worship runs 9:00 to 16:00 at ¥700. Nara Prefecture’s tourism site still prints ¥500 for it; the shrine gives ¥700 in four places across both of its languages.
Read the guide → - 9:30
The museum, and the last of Todai-ji’s three opening times
The Todai-ji Museum opens at 9:30 and closes at 17:30 in summer, 17:00 in winter. Three halls, three different opening times, one temple.
Read the guide → - 10:00
The treasure hall
10:00 to 17:00, ¥700. The drum on show downstairs is a copy, which the shrine prints on its own page rather than leaving you to find out.
Read the guide → - 16:00
Special worship stops, and the free part carries on
The ticketed inner precinct closes at 16:00. The grounds do not — and the banner across the top of the shrine’s site, reading 6:00–18:00, matches none of the seasonal hours printed further down the same site.
Read the guide →
The line that isn’t in English
The same organisations publish both versions of these pages. Twice in Nara, the Japanese one carried the thing we had gone looking for, and the English one did not.
A prohibition with one hole cut in it — feeding is forbidden, the deer crackers are the exception, and the reasons for both are set out.
Don’t feed them anything except the crackers. It reads as advice about diet.
The afternoon closure on 16 December, and most of the morning closures.
Neither appears on the list.
Before you go
- Check your date against the shrine’s own list. Special worship at Kasuga Taisha shuts all day from 20 December to 7 January, around 8–13 March and on Coming of Age Day, and closes on the mornings of the 1st, 11th and 21st plus seventeen festival dates. The English list is the shorter of the two.
- Two prices for the same ticket are in circulation. Nara Prefecture’s tourism site still prints ¥500 for special worship. The shrine itself gives ¥700, in four places, in both of its languages. Carry the larger figure.
- The park will not tell you when to come. It publishes no hours and no fee, and neither do the English guides to it. Nothing opens here, so nothing can be missed — the clock belongs to the temple and the shrine.
- Winter moves everything later. The Great Buddha Hall opens at 8:00 from November to March instead of 7:30, and the shrine’s grounds at 7:00 from November to February instead of 6:30.
All hours and prices on this page checked 18 September 2026.