You've done the research. You still don't know if it's right.
Thirty tabs and three blog posts that contradict each other. Send us the plan and a local in Japan will go through it properly, so you find out now instead of later.
Start Planning
The research isn't the problem. The information is.
Blog posts from a trip taken in 2018, still ranking first.
AI itineraries that read perfectly and fall apart on the ground.
Forum threads where four people give you four different answers.
Restaurants that take reservations one way only, in Japanese, thirty days out.
Rail passes that made sense before the price rise and don't now.
Festival and holiday weeks that close whole districts and push hotel prices up, moving around the calendar year to year.
Start with what you've already got.
Most people arrive with a plan and a nagging feeling about it, so that's where we start. If you're earlier than that, there's an option for that too.
SenseCheck
from $15
You've made a plan, and you'd like someone who lives there to tell you whether it works.
Send the itinerary you already have. A verified local reads it and sends it back marked up with what's wrong, what's risky and the swap they'd make instead, reasoning attached. We verify your plan rather than rewrite it.
$5 for each day of your itinerary, with a three day minimum. Back within 48 hours.
Best for anyone who has done the work and wants to know whether the work holds up.
Get your plan checkedPerfect Day
$19
One day in Japan, built from scratch for you by someone who lives there.
Tell us the city, the date and roughly what you're after. A local builds the day hour by hour, with the timings, the walking routes and the order that makes it work. The cheapest way to see how a local thinks.
$19 for one made to order day. Back within 48 hours.
Best for a spare day you haven't worked out, a short stop, or trying us properly before committing.
Build my Perfect DayCustom Planning
from $60
Start with a conversation. Finish with a trip that fits.
For trips too complicated, too important or too particular to be sense-checked into shape. We start from what you actually want, build the route around your real constraints, and have a local sign off on every day before it reaches you.
$20 for each day of your trip, with a three day minimum. Back within 5 to 7 business days.
Best for complex routes, high stakes trips, or travellers who would simply rather hand it over.
Start a custom planNot sure? Start with a SenseCheck. If the plan needs more than a markup, we credit what you've paid against Custom Planning.
Local knowledge, in writing, before you go.
01
We won't tear up your work.
If your plan is already strong, a local says so and hands it back with the small refinements that make the difference. We don't invent problems to justify the fee.
02
A real person, named.
You'll know who checked your plan, where in Japan they live and what they know unusually well. No anonymous panel of experts.
03
Every change comes with a reason.
The trade-off behind a recommendation matters more than the recommendation. That's what lets you make the call yourself.
04
Current, not archived.
Prices, hours, closures and booking rules as they stand this season, not as they stood when the blog post was written.
Three steps, and your plan back in 48 hours.
i
Send us what you've got.
Your itinerary in whatever state it's in, plus dates, who's travelling and what you care about. A rough list is fine.
ii
A local takes it.
A verified Ground Crew member who knows your region checks it against how things stand right now and marks it up against our rubric.
iii
You travel on better information.
It comes back in writing, ready to follow, with the reasoning behind every change.
Questions people ask.
What if I don't have a plan yet?
Then SenseCheck isn't the right place to start, and you'd be better off with a Perfect Day if you want one properly built day, or with Custom Planning if you'd like the whole trip put together for you.
What if my plan is already good?
You'll still get the full check, because that's what you're paying for. Your local works through every day against the same rubric regardless of how good the plan looks, and tells you what they verified and how, so you know the confidence you're travelling on rather than just being told it's fine. Plenty of plans come back mostly intact.
How much of my plan will you change?
As little as it needs. Some come back with two corrections and a note saying the rest is solid, others come back heavily marked up. We don't have a quota, and nobody here is rewarded for finding more to fix.
Why is Perfect Day $19 when a three day SenseCheck is $15?
Because they're different jobs. SenseCheck reviews work you've already done, while Perfect Day builds a day from nothing, which takes a local considerably longer. It's priced at the same daily rate as Custom Planning, without the three day minimum.
Do you book anything for me?
Not yet, though we do tell you what to book, where and when. Where we link through to a booking site we may earn a commission on it, but the recommendation always comes first and the link follows it rather than the reverse, and nothing is ever recommended to you because it pays us.
How fast is it?
SenseCheck and Perfect Day come back within 48 hours. Custom Planning takes 5 to 7 business days depending on how complicated the trip turns out to be.
Is this a travel agency?
No, and we aren't trying to replace the people who are, since we don't sell trips or take bookings. We check plans, which works equally well whether you built the itinerary yourself or had an agent put it together for you.
You've done the hard part already.
Most of your plan will work exactly as you've written it. What's left is the few things you had no way of knowing, and fifteen dollars beats finding those out while you're standing there.
Start PlanningFor locals
Know Japan inside out?
We're looking for Ground Crew in Japan who want to turn what they know into income.