Event guide · Thu 29 Oct 2026
The Kyushu Grand Sumo Tournament: a first-timer's guide to the November basho
The last grand tournament of 2026 runs for fifteen days at the Fukuoka Kokusai Center, Sunday 8 to Sunday 22 November, and the honest headline comes first: the official sale has sold out on every date. What that means, the routes that still lead to a seat, how a tournament day actually runs, and how to be ready when the next sale opens.
The short answer: the Kyushu Grand Sumo Tournament is the sixth and last grand tournament (honbasho) of 2026, fifteen days at the Fukuoka Kokusai Center from Sunday 8 to Sunday 22 November. The Japan Sumo Association's ticket service opened its general sale on Saturday 19 September, and the association's site now carries a plain notice: tickets are sold out on all dates, and no tickets are sold at the venue, in advance or on the day. So this guide does two jobs. It explains the ways in that remain open, the official resale and the tours that hold seats, and it explains the tournament itself, seats, schedule and rituals, for anyone who gets in, and for the bigger number who will aim at the next tournament instead: Tokyo in January, whose sale opens on 5 December.
The tournament in brief
Professional sumo runs six grand tournaments a year, three in Tokyo and one each in Osaka, Nagoya and Fukuoka, each of them fifteen days from a Sunday to a Sunday. Fukuoka's November tournament closes the year. In the top division, 42 wrestlers each fight once a day; the championship (yusho) goes to the best record across the fifteen days, with a playoff on the final day, senshuraku, if the lead is tied. The ranking list for this tournament, the banzuke, was published on Monday 26 October, and it shapes the fortnight: the top men are kept for each other's company and for the last days, as the championship narrows. Our listing carries the dates and the official source: the Kyushu Grand Sumo Tournament page.
Tickets: what they cost, and what sold out means
Face values at Fukuoka this year, tax included, ran in three families. Chair seats upstairs are sold per person and cost from 2,000 yen (about US$13) on a weekday to 6,000 yen (about US$38). The floor boxes, masu-seki, are sold whole: a box built for four costs 32,000 yen (about US$203) to 56,000 yen (about US$354), depending on how close it sits to the ring. Ringside cushions, tamari-seki, a metre or two from the clay, were 20,000 yen (about US$127) a person, and sold only through the association's Japanese site. Buying through the official English site adds a service fee of 2,000 yen (about US$13) a ticket, payment is by credit card only, and the ticket itself is printed at a Seven-Eleven once you are in Japan.
US dollar figures are approximate, converted at ¥158 to the dollar (October 2026).
All of that is now history for 2026: the sale sold out, and the venue sells nothing. What remains, in order of trust:
The official resale. The association's ticket service also lists tickets that buyers have released back, at face value, first come first served. Listings appear and disappear as the tournament approaches, the flow is mostly in Japanese, and it is worth checking the official ticket site rather than anywhere else.
A tour with a seat in it. A small number of guided tours bundle a tournament seat with an English-speaking briefing. They cost well over face value, which is the price of certainty in a sold-out year. Book only with an established operator, and get the date and the seat class in writing before paying.
Nothing else. The association's spectator terms treat tickets resold for profit as not valid, and it warns that tickets from unauthorised resellers may not be honoured at the door. In a sold-out year the markups are steep and the risk is real. If a listing looks easy when the official site says sold out, that is the tell.
And if Fukuoka does not work out, the city in basho season is still worth the afternoons: the stables base themselves in and around Fukuoka for the tournament, wrestlers in yukata are a normal sight on the streets of Hakata, and the top division is broadcast live every day on NHK. Fukuoka also lights its station plaza for the season from 3 November: the Hikari no Machi Hakata display runs through the whole tournament.
How a tournament day runs
Doors open at 8:45 on most days (10:30 on days thirteen and fourteen, 10:00 on the final day), and the hall fills in layers. The morning belongs to the lowest divisions and to the connoisseurs: the arena is quiet, the seats are empty, and you can sit close and hear the sport. Juryo, the second division, takes the ring in the early afternoon. The top division's ring-entering ceremonies (dohyo-iri) come in the mid-afternoon, the yokozuna's separate ceremony follows, and the top-division bouts then run through to the last bout at about 18:00 and the bow dance that closes the day. A first-timer with one afternoon should arrive by about 14:00, settle in for the juryo bouts, and stay to the end: the last hour, when the highest-ranked meet, is the tournament at full stretch. A first-timer with a full day should come for a morning once, if only to watch the arena change character as it fills.
Two customs are worth knowing. In the floor boxes you sit on a cushion at floor level, shoes off, and eating and drinking in the box is part of the day: the arena sells bento, snacks and drinks, and chanko, the hearty stew the wrestlers themselves eat, is the dish to look for around the venue and the restaurants of Hakata. At ringside the rules invert: no eating or drinking, phones silent, and you are close enough that a falling wrestler is a genuine possibility the front rows accept as part of the seat. Photography for personal use is normal from the seats; the ushers will stop anyone standing in the aisles during a bout.
The seats, explained
| Seat | How it works | Face value |
|---|---|---|
| Chair seats (isu-seki) | The upper level, sold per person. The first-timer's friend: a real seat and a clear view of the whole ring. | 2,000 to 6,000 yen |
| Box seats (masu-seki) | A railed square on the arena floor holding four cushions, sold as one unit. Sociable and traditional, and a long sit cross-legged. | 32,000 to 56,000 yen per box |
| Ringside (tamari-seki) | A cushion on the floor at the ring's edge. The closest view in the sport, and the strictest rules. | 20,000 yen |
Getting there, and where to stay
The Fukuoka Kokusai Center stands in Hakata ward, a short walk from two subway stations: Gofukumachi on the Hakozaki line, about twelve minutes, and Nakasu-Kawabata, about fifteen. Buses from Hakata Station stop at Kokusai Center Sunpalace-mae, right by the hall. Fukuoka's airport is on the subway network, so the whole journey from plane to arena is one line and a walk. Stay in the Hakata Station or Tenjin and Nakasu districts and everything is a walk or a short ride away; the hotels page covers Fukuoka's districts and how booking around a big event works on this site. With a free morning, the city's viewpoint is Fukuoka Tower, across the bay in Momochihama; booking for it is on the attraction page.
The next chance: Tokyo in January
The first tournament of 2027, the Hatsu basho, runs from 10 to 24 January at the Ryogoku Kokugikan in Tokyo, and its general sale opens on Saturday 5 December 2026 at the official ticket service. That is the tournament to aim at if Fukuoka has beaten you: set up the account in advance, be online when the sale opens, and take a weekday in the first week if the weekends go, as they usually do, in the first rush. Our Hatsu tournament page carries the dates as the sale approaches.
Sources: the Japan Sumo Association's official English site (the 2026 tournament schedule, and the November ticket notice, tickets sold out on all dates, checked 28 October 2026) and its official ticket service, Ticket Oosumo (the 19 September general sale, the Fukuoka face values, the English site's per-ticket service fee and Seven-Eleven printing, the resale listings and the warning on unauthorised resale); the association's published 2027 schedule for the January tournament and its 5 December sale date, as recorded on our Hatsu page. Ticket status can change if resale listings appear; the official ticket site is the final word.
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