Originally Posted by
lobsterdog
Doing a bit of research, I also found one big difference between them - while both Suica and PASMO can be used on all buses and trains in Tokyo, Suica can also be used on certain lines in Osaka, Niigata, Sendai, and Sapporo.
So presumably a Suica card might be somewhat more convenient for anyone also traveling to any of those locations, whether they're visitor or local.
You mean there are systems in these other cities that will take Suica but not Pasmo?
I don't think this is true. According to this link (
http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2359_003.html) the only acceptability restrictions occur in some places out west where usually for non-JR trains only Icoca/Pitapa will work while other IC cards will not. But for everything else, any of the 10 major IC cards can be used interchangeably. If a system takes Suica, it will also take Pasmo, anywhere in Japan as I understand it.