Onsen Etiquette: What to Actually Do, in Order
Wash your entire body at the shower stations before you get into the bath, keep your small towel out of the water, and never swim or splash. Onsens are gender-separated by default, and most established facilities still turn away visible tattoos, though the strictness varies a lot by region and by how the tattoo is covered. If you follow the sequence below, you will not stand out for the wrong reasons.
The sequence, from changing room to exit
The order matters more than any single rule, because each step assumes the last one happened.
1. Take off your shoes before the changing room, not inside it. Most onsens have a shoe rack or a small tiled entry area right at the door. Slippers, if provided, usually stop at that threshold too.
2. Undress completely in the changing room (datsuijo). There is no swimwear in a traditional onsen bath. Store everything, including your small towel’s dry state, in a basket or locker. Take only the small hand towel with you into the bathing area; leave your large bath towel behind to dry off with afterward.
3. Bring only the small towel, a bit of soap or cleanser if the facility doesn’t supply it, and nothing else. Phones, cameras, and jewelry stay in the locker. Glasses are fine to keep on if you need them to see the shower controls, but take them off before soaking.
4. Wash and rinse thoroughly at the shower stations before touching the bath. This is the single rule onsens care about most. Sit on the low stool, use the handheld shower, and clean yourself the way you would at home; shampoo, soap, rinse. Skipping this step, even briefly, is the fastest way to get a pointed look from other bathers or staff.
5. Do kake-yu before entering the water. Kake-yu is a final rinse using a small bucket or ladle of the bath’s own water, poured over your legs and body a few times before you step in. It is not a substitute for washing with soap; it comes after that, as a way to acclimate your skin to the water’s temperature and let your body adjust gradually, especially important since many onsen waters run hotter than a home bath.
6. Enter the bath slowly and keep your small towel out of the water. Most bathers fold the towel and set it on their head, on the side of the bath, or on a nearby rock. Dunking it in the shared water is considered unclean, since you used it to wash and dry yourself moments earlier.
7. No swimming, no splashing, no dunking your head under. The bath is for sitting and soaking. Keep your hair tied up or out of the water if it’s long enough to touch the surface.
8. When you’re done, do not rinse off with fresh water at most traditional onsens. The mineral content is considered part of the experience, and many facilities prefer you don’t wash it away immediately. Some baths, particularly sulfur-heavy ones, are the exception, and signage will say so if a rinse is expected.
9. Dry off with your small towel before re-entering the changing room. Shake or wipe off excess water at the edge of the bathing area so you’re not dripping onto the changing room floor.
Tattoos: what actually happens
Many onsens, particularly older or more traditional ones, still refuse entry to visible tattoos, a policy rooted in the historical association between tattoos and organized crime. This is loosening, especially in areas with heavy foreign tourism, where some baths now allow tattoos if they’re covered with a patch or bandage, and a smaller number allow them outright.
If you have a tattoo, check the specific facility in advance. Hotel and ryokan websites often state their policy directly. Cover-up patches, sold at drugstores and some onsen front desks, work for smaller tattoos. For larger tattoos, look for facilities that explicitly advertise as tattoo-friendly, or consider a private bath (kashikiri or family bath), which sidesteps the issue entirely since you rent the whole room.
Mixed-gender situations
Almost all onsens split bathing areas by gender, with separate entrances marked by curtains, typically red for women and blue for men, though colors can vary. Some rural or older facilities still have genuinely mixed-gender baths (konyoku), but these are increasingly rare and usually require a swimsuit or a modesty towel wrap, which is a different set of rules from the single-gender baths described above. If you’re traveling as a mixed-gender group, plan to separate for the bath itself and reunite afterward.
If you’re on your period, have an open cut, or are visibly intoxicated
Most onsens ask that you not enter during menstruation, largely for hygiene reasons in a shared soaking pool. Open wounds or skin infections are also grounds for a staff member to ask you to sit out, since the water is shared and not chemically treated the way a swimming pool is. Visible intoxication is a common reason for refusal too, both for safety (hot water and alcohol don’t mix well) and for the comfort of other bathers.
What to check locally before you go
Policies vary enough between individual onsens that it’s worth a quick check rather than assuming. Confirm tattoo policy directly if you have one, since “loosening” doesn’t mean universal. Confirm whether a facility has fixed gender-separated hours that rotate through the day, which some do, alternating which bath is designated for which gender on a schedule. And if you’re visiting a facility attached to a ryokan versus a public sento, ask whether outside guests are allowed at all, since some are reserved for overnight guests only.
None of this is complicated once you’ve done it once. The core of onsen etiquette is simple: wash first, rinse before soaking, keep your towel dry and out of the water, and treat the shared bath as something you’re a guest in, not a swimming pool you’re renting for the hour.