Shinkansen smartEX App

Central Japan Railway Company

About this app

▼With the EX app, you can:
- Reserve Shinkansen seats through the app easily
- Discount for early booking
- Reserve Shinkansen seats up to 1 year in advance
- You can make as many changes as you need, free of charge, before getting on the train
- Reserve a set of Shinkansen seats and hotel rooms!
- Reserve activities, hotels and car rentals!
- Select any seat from the seat map (*reserved seats only)
- Information on services available in stations and trains
- You can log in quickly by using fingerprint authentication.
(only for compatible models)

▼ Main features
- Membership registration
- Purchase ticket/Reserve seats (time designation, train name designation, easy free seat reservation)）
- Confirm reservation
- Change and refund reservation (reducing the number of persons)
- Display purchase history and receipt
- Check, change member information
- Display QR-Ticket for boarding
- Designate or register IC card for boarding
- Service status information (Link)

▼ Notes
- Membership registration is required to use this app. For registration, personal information is required, such as member name, date of birth, and a valid credit card, etc.
- Ticket purchase (reservation) payment will be taken from the credit card registered on the account.
-- You need to register or designate IC card for public transportation (*) to travel ticketless with IC card.
(*) Kitaca, PASMO, Suica, manaca, TOICA, PiTaPa, ICOCA, Hayakaken, nimoca, SUGOCA
- You need the pickup code to pick up tickets from ticket vending machines, etc., at main stations of Tokaido Sanyo Kyushu Shinkansen, such as Tokyo, Kyoto, Shin-Osaka, Hiroshima, Hakata, Kumamoto etc.
- Please do not use this app to make a seat reservation for Japan Rail Pass.
- This service is available only in English.
- For more details on this service, please see the website.

*The email address below is for inquiries about application specifications. Please note that we cannnot answer inquiries about the service.

Ratings and reviews

Extremely difficult to register in the app. Went through 4 different credit cards before i found one i could use. The problem is the app, as none of my cards issued a fraud alert. While in Japan, the app does NOT WORK during busy periods. So EVEN IF you manage to book seats, you might not be able to pull them up on your phone when its time to board, AND they warn you explicitly not to take screenshots of the QR codes as they might not work later on. GARBAGE APP AVOID AT ALL COSTS.

App does nothing if you don't have an account, and it won't let me register an account (a credit card is required and maybe US credit cards are not accepted? It doesn't tell you what went wrong, exactly, just that there was an error). And when the registration fails, it makes you start over AT THE VERY BEGINNING. Why can't it keep my previous inputs? Absolutely useless, no feedback, no way to know what went wrong or why, just go until error and then back to the beginning.

Completely useless. No credit or debit card I try is able to be registered, and I have tried three different cards. Can't even make an account without a card attached. I'll just end up getting my tickets in person, this app and the website both have issues with all my cards which is apparently a common problem.

What's new

▼Ver. 8.1.11
- Performance improvements