Our hotel (Conrad Tokyo) has told us the studio won't sell tickets to foreigners. We're traveling 1/22, I guess we'll try again next time.

A (possibly) easier option, if they haven't been already, would be to consider a visit to the Ghibli Museum in Mitaka.

I've been a few times and it is a fantastic experience for the Ghibli fan

There is still a process to get tickets but it seems more doable for foreigners, even now

Similarly when to the Museum and it was a really cool experience. Can't take photos inside though, but I got tickets through JTB as well and they were reasonable.

Indeed that would be too late for us.

Looking carefully at the [translated] site, it seems that the need for a mobile is only because the tickets are digital, not because they're delivered by text message. Question then to the more experienced visitors - and likely more importantly the Japanese residents - if we arrive with tickets despite the present lack of sales to foreigners, are we likely to have any issues...?

How did you purchase the tickets for JTB?

I used the package option [hotel + shinkansen + park tickets] on the website. You have to struggle through translate though if you can't read Japanese, and the site is prone to bugging in Chrome and Safari - it seemed best in Firefox [which doesn't have native translate support]. I have since noticed some tours on Viator including the park - presumably enterprising locals making use of having the inside line on getting tickets, along with providing translation. I would probably have used that, but by the time I saw them I was past the 21-day cancellation deadline with JTB so the bed was made.

We arrive Sunday, I have all the QR codes and confirmations which I need to print out today so hopefully all goes smoothly - I will revert to update.

Just to update: all went off smoothly enough. Bit slow through the border at Narita lead to less time than we’d have liked to pick up Shinkansen tickets - complicated by JTB tickets only being issued by machines outside the gates. Once we got pointed in the right direction we were fine and no issues at Ghibli Park at all. The first two areas are fairly minimal and not many visitors were doing those (I presume they are keeping the numbers very low). The warehouse is much bigger and busier.

Enjoy your trip! Thanks for the heads up with the Viator tour service. I downloaded the app, and it seems like an excellent place to book other tours in addition to ghbili.

Did you have fun at Ghibli Park? I visited the Ghibli Museum in 2012 and am looking to return to Japan next year with my husband who has never been. Unsure if we should venture out to Ghibli Park or if I should just revisit the museum. Any suggestions?

I'm not the Ghibli fan, that would be my wife - and we haven't been to the museum. The park is cute, but feels a bit bare-bones at the moment - of course the majority of the content was going over my head. My wife enjoyed it. There are a couple more areas under construction, so if you can choose your visit to be after those are due to be open I would certainly do that.

It would be a pretty long day to do as a day trip if you weren't planning to stay in Nagoya, but would definitely recommend the city itself as being worth stopping in.

Hi, I just booked a hotel in Nagoya with timed entry to the park through the Japanese JTB website. I used Google Translate to get "Japanese equivalents" for my name. Did you have any trouble at all checking into your hotel as the reservation must have been under the Japnese name you gave at booking? What about at the park? Did they have any issues matching the Japanese name you gave them with what's on your passport? Did they even bother to check passports? Thank you!

I took an untranslated printout of the JTB booking, which I showed to the front desk. I don't recall names being checked at the gate, I think it was just the QR code.

Perfect!
Thanks so much for the quick reply!