Shinjuku Station opening hours The station is open 24 hours a day; 365 days a year but most trains in Japan stop running at 12 midnight or 1am, starting again about 5am so the station is quiet at night with many shops closed.

Shinjuku Station, the busiest transport hub in the world, does not actually "close" in its entirety, but its train services and internal gates do shut down for a few hours every night. Most train lines (JR, Odakyu, Keio, and the Metro) stop running between 12:30 AM and 1:00 AM, and the station's ticket gates are shuttered shortly thereafter. The station typically "re-opens" for the first morning trains around 4:30 AM to 5:00 AM. During the "dead" period between 1:00 AM and 4:30 AM, you cannot walk through the station to get from the East side to the West side; instead, you must use the exterior overpasses or underpasses. While the trains are silent, the surrounding Shinjuku district remains very much alive with 24-hour "Izakayas" and convenience stores. In 2026, while there is ongoing talk of 24-hour service for major events, the "midnight shutdown" remains a critical time for the massive maintenance crews to ensure the world's most complex rail network remains safe and efficient for the millions of commuters who arrive at dawn.