Along with Kyoto, Nara is a popular tourist destination providing ancient historical Japanese experience, where Nara prefecture has three World Heritage Sites; Horyu-ji Temple, Ancient Nara city area, and Sacred Kii Mountain Range. During 2017 Nara prefecture had 2,090,000 visitors from outside of Japan which was record number.

However, when it comes to lodging Nara is on the bottom. Number of hotel rooms in Nara prefecture is 9197 rooms which is lowest in all prefectures in Japan. Number of people stayed at hotels at Nara prefecture was 2,650,000 people in 2017 which is second to last in all prefectures in Japan, Tokushima prefecture was last.

Reason is quite obvious, Nara is accessible from Osaka and Kyoto by train in less than an hour. Many tourists make a day trip from Osaka or Kyoto and most tourists do not overnight at Nara. Current governor of Nara prefecture is proponent of building more hotels in Nara and make tourist stay overnight at Nara. Nara prefecture has sold a land near Heiankyo remain area (ancient Japanese capital city area) which was owned by prefecture government to a developer and next year JW Marriott Nara will open. Now there is a plan to sell land at Nara park in the city of Nara to a developer to build a hotel.

There are both sides of argument in Nara prefecture government and by local Nara residents about building hotels at tourist places which has historical significant. Proponents say Nara need to become overnight destination so that tourists will spend more money at Nara, not at Osaka and Kyoto. Opponents say Nara is easy access from Osaka and Kyoto which is not inconvenient for visitors to Nara. Save historical area and sites, don't build hotels to gain more money by sacrificing historical area. Nara prefecture is having gubernatorial election, current governor is a proponent of building hotels at Nara. Two opponents want to have more discussion before going forward with more hotels.