Where to stay in Kagoshima

Three kinds of nightWhere to stay in Kagoshima

The choice is really about what kind of night you want. A hot-spring inn feeds you twice and stops you moving. A city hotel is the right answer if you are arriving late or leaving early.

A ryokan or hot-spring inn旅館・温泉宿

Dinner and breakfast brought to you, a bath, and floor bedding laid out while you eat. The price is per person and includes both meals.

Includes 2 meals Book ahead

See ryokan and onsen inns › How an onsen works

A city hotelホテル

Clean, small, reliable and priced per room. Right for early trains, late arrivals and anyone travelling with a large suitcase.

Per roomNear the station

See hotels in Kagoshima › Getting around

A guesthouse or minshuku民宿・ゲストハウス

Family-run, cheaper, and often the only option in the countryside.

Ask about cashRural areas

See guesthouses and minshuku ›

Our first choice in Kagoshima is named below.

Looking for a room in Kagoshima tonight?

MAP How an onsen works

BookingSix things worth asking before you pay

Ask about these

Meals: Whether dinner and breakfast are included, and what time dinner is served. Inns often serve at a fixed time and will not wait
Tattoos: Ask whether the bath admits them, and ask about a private bath
Private bath: Kashikiri. Many inns have one, and it removes the question of bathing with strangers entirely
Payment: Card or cash. Rural inns are often cash only
Arrival time: Tell them. Inns lock up earlier than hotels
Luggage: They will hold it before check-in and after check-out. Just ask

What a night at an inn is like

Shoes: Off at the entrance. Slippers inside; nothing on the straw matting
The robe: A cotton yukata is provided and is worn to dinner and to the bath. Left side over right
Dinner: Many small dishes, often in your room or a dining room at a set time
Bedding: Laid out on the floor, usually while you are eating
Bathing: Before dinner and again before bed is normal here
Breakfast: Rice, fish, egg, pickles. Ask the night before if you need it early

How an onsen works

Our first choice hereThe one we would book

Shiroyama Hotel Kagoshima城山ホテル鹿児島 — Shi-ro-ya-ma

This is the one to aim for in Kagoshima. It stands on a hill above the city, and the reason to pay for it is not the room — it is the open-air bath. You sit in hot spring water drawn from a thousand metres underground and look across Kinko bay at Sakurajima, an active volcano, with the whole city laid out below you.

The open-air bath faces the volcano. Go in at first light: the sun comes up behind Sakurajima and you are in the water while it happens. This is the single best-value hour of the stay and it costs nothing extra.
355 rooms, so unlike most inns with a famous view it usually has space even at short notice.
The hill is what you are paying for. Use the free shuttle down to the town — it runs both ways through the day.
In cloud or rain the bath is still open; you simply see less of the mountain. The hotel knows the forecast — ask at the desk rather than guessing.

Where: On the Shiroyama hill above the city — 108 metres up, looking straight at the volcano across the bay. A shuttle runs down to the city centre.
Address: 41-1 Shinshoin-cho, Kagoshima 890-8586
Telephone: 0570-07-4680
This number begins 0570. Numbers like this are a Japanese domestic service and often cannot be dialled from a foreign mobile or from outside Japan. If it does not connect, book through the official site instead, or ask your hotel or your hotel front desk in Japan to place the call for you.
Booking: Through the official site, or the booking services below

Worth knowing

Ask for a room on the bay side when you book, not on the day. The building faces several directions and the volcano is only out of one of them. It costs the same to ask early, and the desk can arrange it before you travel.

Checked 2026-08-17

MAP Call Official site

Where to stay & onsen