Hello all, I just finished a visit to the new WB studios “Making of HP” in Tokyo and am currently on a long ride home. I’ll write a couple of my thoughts and tips below, but feel free to AMA, especially if you are / want to visit this sometime soon!
Tips;
– You can enter the building ~2hrs before your ticket time. This is for people who want to eat at the food hall / frog Cafe, and/or peruse the main shop before starting. They check tix into the building, but not into the tour, so presumably you could(?) go inside earlier too.
– Set up your [‘Experience’ QR code](https://photos-ap.pomvom.com/ty/auth-login) beforehand. Staff will advise so before entry into the start of the tour (and there’ll be a mad crowd of people scanning and doing so), as well as at each experience spot. It’s fast and easy. Staff will ask you to show them your QR code before lining up for any experience.
– If you buy butterbeer from the butterbeer bar, you get to keep the cup! There’s a washing station and they give you a small bag to put the cup in.
My thoughts;
– Entry into the tour goes every 15-30mins, and the first section [from entry](https://www.wbstudiotour.jp/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/WBSTT_Maps-1024×870.png) takes 15mins before they open the cinema.
– They quote 4+ hours for the tour, which is a pretty good estimate. My tix was 11.30am but I went in at 12pm, finished the cinema 12.45, got to the ‘midway’ point (butterbeer bar) around 2.45, got back to the entrance for dessert around 5.30pm. Left at 6.15pm. I didn’t read or stop at everything, but I did all the experiences and took a lot of pictures and videos. I also went solo.
– IMO the ‘first half’ before the cafe is probably longer / more to see than the 2nd half. But a lot of the main ‘experiences’ are in the 2nd half and lining up for those take up time.
– Food isn’t anything particularly amazing, some cute plating and themed food, but you could probably eat outside and just have your snacks here.
– A _lot_ of photospots. If that’s your thing, going with friend(s) will be good so you can take pictures easier. You could also ask strangers or be creative (like me) but it will be harder both for taking good photos but also doing it without holding up others.
– Overall language seems 50/50 split between Japanese and English. There are subtitles either way. The Japanese VA for Harry does some cameo guiding around the tour, along with the trio themselves, and Newt’s actor. No idea about the digital audio guides, as I didn’t opt for one.
That’s about all I can think of rn. Feel free to ask anything else I mightve missed. I have about 3hrs on the train to get home, so I’ll be around!
7 comments
You answered most of the things I wanted to know (how long it takes, because I wanted to do Ikebukuro afterwards, but doesn’t look like there’d be much time).
How much did things generally cost inside? Like the butterbeer, maybe a house cloak from the main shop, etc. Trying to figure out if it’s better to order from the WB UK site or wait until I’m in Japan and buy them.
Would you say it’s worth doing for someone who is only in Japan for a few days since it seemed to take a most of your day? I know that’s subjective and depends on how much you love HP / how far you live from London, etc, but generally was it a good experience for the price and time?
Thank you 🙂
I enjoy HP movies but I’m not a huge fan. I went to USJ but only stay in HP area for the ride and few pictures before I went out to the other areas. I also went to the HP pop up cafe but left once I’m don’t eating. Would you still recommend this your for me? I want to book this tour for my next solo travel in December but I’m worried if I won’t like it since it will be crowded
Great write-up. Thanks for sharing!
Planning to go this November! Thanks for the writeup.
I note that you gave some tips and your thoughts but never actually said if you enjoyed it or not! 😀
What kind of rating would you give it out of 10, if you had to?
Thank you so much! I really appreciate excursion specific trip reports. The only time I could get a tour on the most convenient date was 5:30 so I’m going to get there around 4 to get the shopping out of the way. I’m going to USJ a few days after that so I’m only really going to focus on truly exclusive items.
Anyway to get tickets for early or mid-September? I just looked now and was surprised to see the earliest booking is for September 27 on the official site, and in October for Klook.
Any other sellers you’ve tried that have better availability?
I recently went and really enjoyed it. I was definitely overwhelmed by how much walking was involved and lack of seating provided.
I would go again.