Which transit card
 

Are there any practical differences between ICOCA, PASMO and Suica cards for someone visiting Tokyo and Kyoto (about 3-4 days at each city)?

My daughter and I will be visiting in mid-May so we've been researching this. Looks like we can just add any of those cards to the wallets on our iPhones while we're in the US and hit the ground running when we get there. But which card to get?

There are no practical differenes between the three transit cards if you are going to be using them for just transit fare and retail/shop payments for tourists, any of them will do as they are interchangeable as far as these payments go.

Just be aware that you should test out which of your US credit cards can charge/re-charge the transit cards on iPhone via Apple Pay. Amex ones definitely work, VISA/Mastercard ones most likely are not.

True

There's a whole thread on this, but Mastercard should work. Visa currently doesn't.

Suica for the penguin mascot

I have 6 letters for you: PENSTA

It’s short for Penguin Stadium, for all your Suica Mascot needs. Just wait until 2026, it will be the mascot’s 25th anniversary, there’ll be an explosion of items then.

Example:
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...b675e9d71.jpeg

Lol i love it!

I prefer FreeBSD.

Is there a 1 or 2-day unlimited Tokyo subway (Metro) pass like the JR pass that allows unlimited travel on JR? If yes, what is it called and how much does it cost? May I pick one up at Haneda Airport?

In that case, SUGOCA by JR Kyushu might be the closest. It's red and the mascot has two eyes on top of its head.

I've been able to refill SUICA from my Chase and US Bank visas over the last few weeks. I can get 2 fills before it starts giving me an error, then a few hours later it works again for 2 more, rinse repeat.

Card is a US Bank Altitude Reserve Visa:
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...2c397e7b17.png

Yes, SUICA has (mostly) sorted out the VISA-induced issues (requires iOS 17.2). PASMO and others have not yet updated their backend to reflect the fix, unfortunately. Only really matters for those looking to maximize their points/cashback - SUICA stopped coding as travel for CHASE years ago, so I switched to PASMO at that point so that I could continue to get 3x on my CSR. Unfortunately unless/until PASMO gets their act together on the visa fix I'm stuck with 2% via Apple Card.