Visiting back home (from Japan to US) as a Dual Citizen

I’ve been putting off traveling internationally for the past 3 years because I didn’t want to deal with the COVID restrictions. But now that it has eased, I’m SO ready to visit friends and family back home. But I’m in a bit of a predicament.

I’m a 35yo currently living in Japan. I have dual citizenship with different legal names on my Japanese and American passports. On my American passport, my is “JOHN TARO TANAKA”. But on my Japanese passport, my name is “TARO SUZUKI (TANAKA)”. As you can see, my first name in my American name (JOHN) isn’t on my Japanese passport, and I have a different last name in Japan because I took the last name of my ex-wife.

I just recently purchased round-trip tickets to go back home to Hawaii for a few weeks using my Japanese name.

Now here’s what I worried about (and I know I should’ve thought about this beforehand, but I was too excited about going back home)

I wondering if I need to apply for an ESTA now because I used my Japanese name to buy the airline tickets? and If I don’t get an ESTA, do you think the airline counter will still give me my boarding pass with different names on my passports?

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I am wondering if I did this correctly and if anyone here is or has been in the same situation.

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