The highest speed printed on the two operators’ own pages is 320 km/h, and it is not reached on the line between Tokyo and Osaka. JR East writes that its E5 Series trains on the Tohoku Shinkansen have operated at a speed of 320 km/h since March 16, 2013, while JR Central prints a maximum speed of 285 km/h for the Tokaido Shinkansen between Tokyo and Shin-Osaka. The two companies run separate railways with separate rolling stock, separate timetables and, as the figures below show, separate answers to the question of how fast, how often and how full.
320 km/h is a Tohoku Shinkansen figure, dated to March 2013
JR East’s route page for the Tohoku Shinkansen states that the trains have operated at a speed of 320 km/h since March 16, 2013, a figure attached to the E5 Series. The same page gives a second and lower number for the newest train on the line: the E8 Series, which began operation on March 16, 2024, operates at a maximum operating speed of 300 km/h. The line itself is older than either train. JR East writes that the Tohoku Shinkansen began operating in 1982, and that the E2 Series still running some services debuted in March 1997.
The page also shows why a single line carries several train names. On the Tohoku route JR East lists the E5 Series working as Hayabusa, Hayate, Yamabiko and Nasuno, the E6 Series as Komachi, Hayabusa, Yamabiko and Nasuno, the E8 Series as Tsubasa and the E2 Series as Yamabiko and Nasuno. JR East describes the E6 Series as a type operating on the Akita Shinkansen, connecting Shinkansen and conventional routes without needing to change lines, and its formation blocks give Komachi as the Akita Shinkansen service and Hayabusa, Yamabiko and Nasuno as Tohoku Shinkansen ones. The northern end runs through: the page describes direct service with the Hokkaido Shinkansen connecting Shin-Aomori and Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto.
The Tokaido Shinkansen runs at 285 km/h and covers Tokyo to Shin-Osaka in 2 hours 21 minutes
JR Central’s own summary of the Tokaido Shinkansen prints a maximum speed of 285 km/h and a Tokyo to Shin-Osaka time of 2 hours 21 minutes, with the note that this is accurate as of the March 2023 timetable revision and that the travel time is based on the fastest trains in service. The gap between the two headline speeds is 35 km/h, which is a subtraction of the two companies’ printed figures rather than a number either of them publishes.
The company’s non-consolidated basic information, dated as of the end of March 2024, sets the scale of the railway those trains run on: operating kilometres of 1,970.8, 405 stations, 18,514 employees, 4,802 items of rolling stock, an electrified section of 76.7 per cent or 1,511.0 km, and centralized traffic control over 97.5 per cent or 1,922.3 km. The same table gives a double- and multi-tracked section of 55.1 per cent or 1,086.8 km and an automatic signalling system over 97.8 per cent or 1,927.3 km, so the four percentages describe a network in which signalling and control are close to universal while double track is not.
Those figures cover the whole company, Shinkansen and conventional lines together, which is the footing they sit on when they are read next to the Tokaido-only numbers in the next section. The same profile page records paid-in capital of 112.0 billion yen, operating revenues of 1,417.3 billion yen, 1,030 million shares outstanding, share listings in Nagoya and Tokyo, and 147,569 shareholders. A bullet train ticket on the Tokaido line is therefore sold by a company whose shares are listed in Nagoya and Tokyo rather than by a ministry.
372 trains a day, 432,000 passengers a day, and an average delay of 1.6 minutes
The three numbers JR Central publishes for the Tokaido line’s operation are all results for FY2023. It records 372 train services per day, including extra trains; 432,000 passengers per day; and an average delay time of 1.6 minutes for one train in service, a figure the company states as including delays caused by natural disasters. The same page sets those daily counts against a longer total: it states that approximately 7.0 billion people have used the Tokaido Shinkansen since its inauguration in 1964, and, under a heading of zero accidents, that there have been no accidents resulting in fatalities or injuries of passengers on board since operations commenced. Put together, those figures describe a railway whose scheduling problem is density rather than distance, which is also why seat reservation behaves the way it does on peak dates; our piece on the days when Nozomi runs with no non-reserved seats at all covers that calendar.
A train seats 1,318 people, or 1,314 on the newest type
JR Central gives the number of seats available as 1,318 seats per train, and adds 1,314 seats per train for the N700S type introduced in April 2021. The difference is four seats, which is my subtraction of the two printed figures. The company also states two environmental comparisons for the Tokyo to Osaka journey: the energy consumption amount per seat is approximately one eighth of that of an aircraft, and the carbon dioxide emission rate for the same journey is around one twelfth.
The government’s bullet train list is five routes, and the Tokaido is not one of them
There is a second way to count the network. Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism uses the term Seibi Shinkansen for the lines being built under the 1973 construction plan made under the Nationwide Shinkansen Railway Development Act. Its page lists five routes and the section each one covers.
| Route in the 1973 plan | Section named by the ministry |
|---|---|
| Hokkaido Shinkansen | Aomori to Sapporo |
| Tohoku Shinkansen | Morioka to Aomori |
| Hokuriku Shinkansen | Tokyo to Osaka |
| Kyushu Shinkansen (Kagoshima route) | Fukuoka to Kagoshima |
| Kyushu Shinkansen (West Kyushu route) | Fukuoka to Nagasaki |
Two things follow from reading the table as written. The Tokaido Shinkansen does not appear in it; the table covers the five routes of the 1973 plan and does not list the Tokaido line among them. And the Tohoku entry covers only Morioka to Aomori, not the Tokyo to Morioka section that passengers ride as one journey, Morioka to Aomori being the section the ministry names for that route in the 1973 plan.
The new sections opened one at a time between 1997 and 2024
The ministry’s page lists the openings in order: the Hokuriku Shinkansen between Takasaki and Nagano in October 1997, the Tohoku Shinkansen between Hachinohe and Shin-Aomori in December 2010, the Kyushu Shinkansen between Hakata and Shin-Yatsushiro in March 2011, the Hokuriku Shinkansen between Nagano and Kanazawa in March 2015, the Hokkaido Shinkansen between Shin-Aomori and Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto in March 2016, the Kyushu Shinkansen between Takeo-Onsen and Nagasaki in September 2022, and the Hokuriku Shinkansen between Kanazawa and Tsuruga in March 2024. Counting the entries gives seven openings, and the gap from the first of them to the last is twenty-six years and five months; the count and the subtraction are both mine rather than figures the ministry prints.
Three items on the same page are still open. The Hokkaido Shinkansen between Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto and Sapporo is under construction, and the ministry writes that development of it is proceeding steadily. The Hokuriku Shinkansen between Tsuruga and Shin-Osaka has not been started; the ministry writes that environmental impact assessment procedures will be carried out and construction issues examined. The Kyushu Shinkansen West Kyushu route is the third: the ministry writes that it considers it important to keep building up discussion of what form of development would be desirable for the future of the Kyushu region and the western Japan region, and that it will continue its talks with the parties concerned.
On the newer lines, the track is not owned by the train operator
The ministry describes the arrangement for the Seibi Shinkansen lines as a vertically separated one: the Japan Railway Construction, Transport and Technology Agency builds and owns the Shinkansen facilities and leases them to the JR company that operates the service. For the money, the page states that after the lease income is applied, the national government bears two thirds of the remainder and local authorities bear one third.
Construction is also conditional. The ministry lists five conditions to be confirmed before work starts on a section: a stable funding outlook, revenue and expenditure viability, investment effect, the agreement of the JR company that will operate it, and the agreement of the local authorities along the route to the separation of the parallel conventional line from JR. The ministry sets the same arrangement out in its section on parallel conventional lines, the lines that run alongside a Seibi Shinkansen section. It writes that operating a parallel conventional line on top of a Seibi Shinkansen can be an excessive burden on the JR company, and that the parallel line is therefore separated from JR when the Shinkansen section opens, once every prefecture and municipality along it has agreed. The page then links nine such operators, from Donan Isaribi Railway at one end of the list to Hisatsu Orange Railway at the other, which is a count of the links as they stand on the page.
What to check again
Speeds and journey times are timetable values. The 2 hours 21 minutes figure is tied by JR Central to the March 2023 timetable revision, and the 320 km/h figure is tied by JR East to March 16, 2013, so both are dated statements rather than permanent ones. The service and passenger counts are FY2023 results and will be restated each year. The ministry’s list of openings gains a line whenever a section opens, and the Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto to Sapporo section is the one the page currently records as under construction. The company profile carries its own date, as of the end of March 2024, so the kilometres, the station count and the shareholder count all move at the company’s reporting cycle rather than at the timetable’s. Every figure here was read on the operators’ and the ministry’s own pages in September 2026.
Sources Checked
Central Japan Railway Company (JR Central) — About the Shinkansen
Confirmed the maximum speed of 285 km/h, the Tokyo to Shin-Osaka time of 2 hours 21 minutes with the note that it is accurate as of the March 2023 timetable revision and based on the fastest trains in service, the average delay time of 1.6 minutes for one train in service for FY2023 including delays caused by natural disasters, the 372 train services per day for FY2023 including extra trains, the 432,000 passengers per day for FY2023, the 1,318 seats per train and 1,314 seats per train for the N700S type introduced in April 2021, the approximately 7.0 billion people who have used the Tokaido Shinkansen since its inauguration in 1964, the statement under the heading of zero accidents that there have been no accidents resulting in fatalities or injuries of passengers on board since operations commenced, and the statements that energy consumption per seat between Tokyo and Osaka is approximately one eighth that of an aircraft and the carbon dioxide emission rate around one twelfth.
https://global.jr-central.co.jp/en/company/about_shinkansen/
Central Japan Railway Company (JR Central) — company profile, basic information on a non-consolidated basis as of the end of March 2024
Confirmed operating kilometres of 1,970.8, 405 stations, 18,514 employees, 4,802 items of rolling stock, the electrified section of 76.7 per cent or 1,511.0 km, the centralized traffic control over 97.5 per cent or 1,922.3 km, the double- and multi-tracked section of 55.1 per cent or 1,086.8 km, the automatic signalling system over 97.8 per cent or 1,927.3 km, paid-in capital of 112.0 billion yen, operating revenues of 1,417.3 billion yen, 1,030 million shares outstanding, share listings in Nagoya and Tokyo, and 147,569 shareholders.
https://global.jr-central.co.jp/en/company/about/outline.html
East Japan Railway Company (JR East) — Tohoku Shinkansen route map page
Confirmed that the trains have operated at a speed of 320 km/h since March 16, 2013, that the E8 Series began operation on March 16, 2024 with a maximum operating speed of 300 km/h, that the Tohoku Shinkansen began operating in 1982, that the E2 Series debuted in March 1997, the train names E5 Hayabusa, Hayate, Yamabiko and Nasuno, E6 Komachi, Hayabusa, Yamabiko and Nasuno, E8 Tsubasa and E2 Yamabiko and Nasuno, and the through service with the Hokkaido Shinkansen between Shin-Aomori and Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto.
https://www.jreast.co.jp/en/multi/routemaps/tohokushinkansen.html
Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism — page on Shinkansen railways
Confirmed the five routes of the 1973 construction plan and their sections, the seven openings from the Hokuriku Shinkansen between Takasaki and Nagano in October 1997 to the Hokuriku Shinkansen between Kanazawa and Tsuruga in March 2024, the statement that the Hokkaido Shinkansen between Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto and Sapporo is under construction, that the Hokuriku Shinkansen between Tsuruga and Shin-Osaka is unstarted with environmental assessment procedures to be carried out, and that discussion continues on what form of development is desirable for the Kyushu Shinkansen West Kyushu route, the vertically separated arrangement under which the Japan Railway Construction, Transport and Technology Agency builds and owns the facilities and leases them to the operating JR company, the cost split of two thirds national and one third local after lease income, the five conditions confirmed before construction begins, the separation of the parallel conventional line from JR when a Seibi Shinkansen section opens once every prefecture and municipality along it has agreed, and the nine parallel conventional line operators linked from the page.
https://www.mlit.go.jp/tetudo/tetudo_fr1_000041.html
Last updated: September 2026
