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Season tracker · Sat 24 Oct 2026

Cherry Blossom Forecast 2027: the tracker

The 2027 cherry blossom season, tracked from the long-run averages to the final forecast update: when each city usually blooms, what actually happened in 2026, and when the real forecasts arrive.

Forecast status, 24 October 2026: no forecaster has published a 2027 forecast yet. The first, from the Japan Meteorological Corporation, is expected in mid-to-late December 2026. Until it lands, this page runs on the official long-run averages below, and it is updated at every forecast release through the season. This status line always shows where things stand.

Cherry blossom is the hardest week in Japanese travel to get right. The flowers hold for about a week in any one place, the hotels in the famous districts sell out months ahead, and the real forecast does not exist until winter. Read this page in order: the averages to plan on now, the towns that bloom later, how a bloom unfolds, when the forecasts arrive, and how to book a trip that survives the dates moving.

The baseline: average bloom dates

The Japan Meteorological Agency has kept the same record for decades: the day the designated sample tree in each city opens its first flowers, and the day more than 80 percent of its buds are open. The averages in this table are the 1991 to 2020 normals from those records. They are the only honest starting point in October, and every forecast this winter is, in effect, an argument with this table.

CityFirst bloom, averageFull bloom, averageFull bloom in 2026
Fukuoka22 March31 March3 April
Tokyo24 March31 March28 March
Hiroshima25 March3 April30 March
Kyoto26 March4 April30 March
Osaka27 March4 April3 April
Nara28 March4 April31 March
Kanazawa3 April8 April3 April
Sapporo1 May6 May24 April

Read the last column as the warning. In 2026 almost every city bloomed early: first bloom came five days ahead of the average in Tokyo, three in Kyoto, five in Kanazawa, and thirteen in Sapporo, which opened on 18 April against an average of 1 May. An average is a centre of gravity, not a promise, and the swing runs in both directions.

Higher and later: the towns without a sample tree

Five of our cities have no official sample tree, and there altitude sets the date instead. These are typical windows from local tourism sources, not measured averages, and they are labelled as such because the difference matters.

The pattern to hold onto: every step north or uphill buys time. A trip built south to north can ride the front for weeks instead of gambling on one city's one week.

How a bloom unfolds

From first bloom to full bloom takes about a week in Tokyo and Kyoto: seven days on Tokyo's average, nine on Kyoto's. In the north it is quicker, five or six days. Full bloom then holds for roughly a week, and in calm weather the petals take about another week to fall in earnest; wind and rain end it early. The whole arc, first flowers to bare branches, is about two weeks in one place.

Across the country the front needs about six weeks, from first bloom in Fukuoka on 22 March, on the averages, to Sapporo on 1 May. So the practical advice: aim at the middle of a city's full-bloom window rather than its first day, be in place a day or two early, and keep one move in reserve. If the south blooms early, Kanazawa and the Fuji lakes are still a week behind. If everything runs late, the north forgives you in late April.

When the real forecasts land

The Meteorological Agency records the bloom but no longer forecasts it. The forecasting is done by private companies, and their release dates set the rhythm of this page. For the 2027 season, on the pattern of 2026:

Each release moves the expected dates by days, not weeks, and the later releases are the ones to trust. This tracker is updated as each one lands, and the status line at the top changes with it.

Booking against a moving target

Book the skeleton now, on the averages: flights, and refundable hotels in the cities you care about, weighted a day or two after the average full bloom rather than before it. Hold the internal moves, the shinkansen hops between bloom cities, as late as your nerve allows: they are the part that benefits from the January and February forecasts. Our hotels page is organised city by city for exactly this, and the trip planner will build the route around the events you pick. If the trip is really about the flowers, run it south to north, Fukuoka or Hiroshima first and Sapporo last, so the front works for you instead of against you.

Blossom season on the calendar

The season is already taking shape on the calendar, from the early blossom at Kawazu in February to the castle festivals of April, each with its date status shown the way it appears on its own page.

The full season, every flower festival, castle park and night illumination of the blossom, is collected on the cherry blossom season page, and the events calendar carries each date as it is confirmed.

Averages and 2026 dates: Japan Meteorological Agency sample-tree records, 1991 to 2020 normals. Forecast schedule: the 2026 season release patterns of the Japan Meteorological Corporation, Weathernews and the Japan Weather Association. Typical windows for Hakone, Nikko, Kawaguchiko, Hakuba and Niseko: local tourism sources, labelled as typical in the text.

More reading on the articles page, or go straight to the events calendar.