The number of foreign visitors to Japan in October surpassed the figure in the same month in 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic, for the first time.
The Japan National Tourism Organization says an estimated 2,516,500 foreigners visited the country last month. That is more than the figure for October 2019.
The number of foreign visitors has topped 2 million for the fifth straight month.
Visitors from South Korea totaled 631,100, followed by 424,800 from Taiwan, 256,300 from China and 211,900 from the United States.
Organization officials attribute the recovery to the weak yen and the increase in tourists from Asia, Europe and the US.
Meanwhile, travelers from China, who used to account for the biggest number of foreign visitors to Japan, accounted for just 35 percent of the figure for October 2019, despite Beijing's lifting of the ban on group tours to Japan in August and the National Day holiday week that began in late September.
The organization says one factor could be that flights between Japan and China have not been fully restored to pre-pandemic levels.