Attendance and Economic Impact of Light Events: Osaka Festival of the Lights, Sapporo Snow Festival, Kobe Luminarie and More

How many people do light events draw, and how much economic impact do they bring to their regions? On March 27, 2026, Osaka Prefecture announced that the Osaka Festival of the Lights 2025 drew a cumulative total of about 45 million visitors and had an economic ripple effect of about ¥803.2 billion. Sapporo and Nagasaki have also published the economic impact of their snow festival and lantern festival. This article sorts out attendance and economic impact figures published by organizers and local governments, together with who announced them, the year covered and how they were calculated. Because the calculation conditions differ, we do not compare or rank the events.

Why attendance and economic impact of light events are being scrutinized now

In the background are policies seeking to harness the evening and night hours for tourism. The national government’s fifth Basic Plan for the Promotion of a Tourism-Oriented Country, approved by the Cabinet on March 27, 2026, covers fiscal 2026–2030. Its summary lists “promoting early-morning and nighttime experiences of cultural properties and the like” as one of its “measures against excessive congestion,” and sets a target of ¥15 trillion in spending by international visitors in 2030.

Local governments also position light events as nighttime tourism measures. TOKYO Night & Light, the projection mapping at the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, is one example; the metropolitan government describes it as an initiative advancing “Promoting nighttime tourism” under Strategy 14 of its 2050 Tokyo Strategy. The Osaka Festival of the Lights official website notes that the event is carried out using the accommodation tax.

For events that receive public funds, measuring figures is also a program requirement. The Tokyo Convention & Visitors Bureau’s “Fiscal 2026 Application Guidelines for the Projection Mapping Promotion Support Grant” make measuring attendance mandatory, and further require grantees to measure effects through economic ripple effects, questionnaire surveys and the like and report the results to the bureau. The cost of measuring effects is not eligible for the grant, and any measurement method is acceptable. The program as a whole is laid out in our article on subsidies for light events.

Osaka Festival of the Lights 2025: Osaka Prefecture estimates a cumulative 45 million visitors and an economic ripple effect of about ¥803.2 billion

The Osaka Festival of the Lights is held with Midosuji Illumination and OSAKA Hikari no Renaissance as its core programs, plus area programs. According to Osaka Prefecture’s announcement (March 27, 2026), cumulative attendance from April 9, 2025 to January 31, 2026 was about 45 million. The breakdown is as follows.

• Expo special lighting period (April 9 – November 2, 2025): about 17.35 million

• Midosuji Illumination 2025: about 7.15 million (fiscal 2024: about 6.11 million)

• OSAKA Hikari no Renaissance 2025: about 4.35 million (fiscal 2024: about 3.88 million)

• Area programs: about 16.15 million (fiscal 2024: about 18.76 million)

The economic ripple effect was estimated at about ¥803.2 billion: about ¥618 billion for the Expo special lighting period, and about ¥185.2 billion (fiscal 2024: about ¥121.5 billion) for November 3, 2025 to January 31, 2026, when the core and area programs were held.

On the calculation method, the prefecture says attendance was “calculated on the basis of pedestrian-traffic surveys and the like.” The economic ripple effect was calculated by a commissioned private think tank using the Osaka Prefecture input-output tables. According to the prefecture, these tables represent the interrelationships among the goods and services produced by each industry in the prefecture as it interacts with industries inside and outside the region, in a commodity-by-commodity matrix format.

Questionnaires conducted at each program received 4,141 responses, with about 93% answering “very good” or “good.” The 2026 program is introduced in our article on the Osaka Festival of the Lights 2026.

The Sapporo Snow Festival and night-view tourism: Sapporo City’s economic impact surveys

According to the timeline on the Sapporo Snow Festival’s official website, attendance was 1.75 million in 2023 (73rd), 2,389,000 in 2024 (74th), 2,327,000 in 2025 (75th) and 2,539,000 in 2026 (76th). The light-up at the Odori venue runs until 22:00, and in 2026 projection mapping was also held at night at the “Doshin Snow Square” in 5-chome.

Sapporo City conducts its own surveys of the snow festival’s economic impact. One is the “Fiscal 2022 Sapporo City Tourism Event Economic Impact Survey (73rd Sapporo Snow Festival) Report,” compiled in March 2023 by the Tourism and MICE Promotion Department of the Economic and Tourism Bureau. The report estimated visitors’ total spending in the city at ¥45.6 billion, and put the induced production in the city’s economy at ¥67.9 billion, induced gross value added at ¥35.2 billion, induced employment at 6,219 people and the tax revenue effect at ¥1.8 billion.

The survey’s purpose was to understand how much effect holding the event has on the city’s economy, as a reference for considering future policy. The visitor survey was conducted on February 4 and 5, 2023, at the Odori Park 1-chome to 8-chome venues, by showing a QR code for respondents to answer on the spot, collecting 1,005 samples. Per-person spending in the city was ¥2,407 for Sapporo residents, ¥45,343 for visitors from outside Hokkaido (staying overnight) and ¥107,599 for international visitors.

Sapporo City has also surveyed the economic impact of night-view tourism. The February 2019 “Sapporo City Night View Tourism Economic Impact Survey Report” introduces Sapporo as “certified as one of Japan’s New Top Three Night View Cities.” Its purpose was to serve as a reference for considering future policy. It covered nine sites, including Jozankei Nature Luminarie, the illumination at Shiroi Koibito Park, the Sea Fountain show at Moerenuma Park, Sapporo TV Tower and the Mt. Moiwa Ropeway.

The report estimated night-view tourism visitors at about 890,000 and night-view tourism spending at ¥29 billion (of which ¥25.4 billion was the direct effect on industries in the city). It put induced production at ¥40 billion, induced gross value added at ¥22.4 billion, induced employment at about 4,000 people and the tax revenue effect at ¥1.1 billion. The survey was conducted from October 19 to December 19, 2018, with 1,009 valid responses to the survey on visitor spending and related matters. The 2027 snow festival is covered in our article on the 2027 Sapporo Snow Festival.

Kobe Luminarie, Nagasaki Lantern Festival, and projections at the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building and Matsumoto Castle: published attendance examples

According to its official website, Kobe Luminarie, which began in 1995, drew 2.54 million visitors during its first 11-day run. Hyogo Prefecture says about 2.33 million visited the 31st edition held in January 2026. Neither gives a calculation method. According to the prefecture, the event is supported by corporate sponsorship, corporate donations, individual donations and visitors’ “¥100 per person” donations, among other sources.

According to Nagasaki City’s “2024 Nagasaki City Tourism Statistics [Preliminary Edition]” (published June 2025), the 2024 Nagasaki Lantern Festival was held at full scale for the first time in four years and drew 1.21 million visitors, the most since the event began in 1994. The same document gives the economic ripple effect of the 2024 Lantern Festival as ¥10,384,000 thousand (¥10.384 billion), without stating the calculation method.

Among permanent projection mapping, TOKYO Night & Light at the Tokyo Metropolitan Government No. 1 Building publishes cumulative viewer numbers. On August 7, 2026, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Bureau of Industrial and Labor Affairs and the Tokyo Projection Mapping Executive Committee announced that cumulative viewers had reached 1.55 million, having passed 1 million in October 2025 since the project began in February 2024. The metropolitan government says it is becoming established as a new nighttime tourist spot. No measurement method is given. Showtimes and other details are compiled in our guide to TOKYO Night & Light.

An example set at a castle is the “National Treasure Matsumoto Castle Keep Projection Mapping 2024–2025,” held at Matsumoto Castle Park in Matsumoto, Nagano Prefecture, from December 14, 2024 to February 16, 2025, and organized by the Castle Town Matsumoto Festa Organizing Committee. According to the production company’s announcement (March 11, 2025), attendance was 172,905, compared with 154,437 for the previous year’s event.

There are also examples of private executive committees publishing cumulative figures. On April 14, 2025, the Festa Luce Executive Committee announced that cumulative attendance at its light event Festa Luce nationwide from 2017 to 2024 had reached about 1.02 million. The fiscal 2024 Wakayama Marina City venue (November 2, 2024 – February 24, 2025) drew 100,213.

How economic impact is calculated: direct effects and ripple effects

The estimates by Osaka Prefecture and Sapporo City both use regional input-output tables. Sapporo’s snow festival survey derived per-person spending in the city for each visitor category from a visitor questionnaire, then multiplied it by the number of visitors in each category to arrive at total spending in the city. It applied that amount to the “2015 Sapporo City Input-Output Table” to estimate the direct effect, the first-round indirect effect and the second-round indirect effect.

According to the report, the direct effect is the increase in production resulting from new demand, obtained by multiplying the amount of new demand by the regional self-sufficiency rate. The “equilibrium output model” used to calculate induced production measures the increase in regional production that corresponds to a given final demand. The report notes that the second-round indirect effect was estimated by summing the induced production at each stage, and that many studies limit their analysis to second-round effects.

The categories were Sapporo residents, other Hokkaido residents, visitors from outside Hokkaido and international visitors, and the number of visitors in each category was estimated from Sapporo Snow Festival Executive Committee data. For Hokkaido residents living outside Sapporo and visitors from outside Hokkaido, the portion of package tour prices spent in the city was estimated and added to spending; this was not done for international visitors. The night-view tourism survey breaks down the ¥40 billion in induced production into ¥33.5 billion for the direct and first-round indirect effects and ¥6.5 billion for the second-round indirect effect.

Nagasaki City’s tourism statistics present the economic ripple effect of tourism as a “total effect,” adding first- and second-round indirect ripple effects to the direct effect. The total effect on Nagasaki Prefecture from people who visited Nagasaki City in 2024 was ¥317.5 billion, about 1.65 times the direct effect of ¥192 billion. The ripple effects broke down into ¥82.2 billion for the first round and ¥43.3 billion for the second round, and the employment-inducing effect was 37,676 people.

Osaka Prefecture says its figures were calculated by a commissioned private think tank using the Osaka Prefecture input-output tables. The announcement does not give breakdowns such as visitor spending or project costs.

Editor’s perspective

Setting the published figures side by side shows that each announcing body measures the scale of light events differently. Osaka Prefecture calculated a cumulative headcount from pedestrian-traffic surveys and the like, while Sapporo City built up its figures from visitor numbers and per-person spending by category. The periods covered by the economic impact figures also differ: April 9, 2025 to January 31, 2026 for Osaka Prefecture, and the eight-day run for Sapporo’s snow festival survey.

The announcements for Kobe Luminarie, the Nagasaki Lantern Festival and TOKYO Night & Light, on the other hand, did not state how attendance was calculated. The Tokyo Convention & Visitors Bureau’s grant also makes measuring attendance mandatory while accepting any method. Sapporo City states explicitly that the purpose of its surveys is to serve as a reference for considering future policy. When reading the figures, checking who announced them, the period covered and the calculation method is a prerequisite. Official attendance figures for light festivals abroad are introduced in our article on light festivals around the world in 2026–2027. Berlin’s Festival of Lights announced about 3 million visitors in 2026 but did not explain how they were counted. Seoul’s Seoul Light DDP publishes changes in passenger numbers at the nearest station alongside attendance figures.

Frequently asked questions

How is attendance at light events counted?

It differs by announcement. Osaka Prefecture says attendance at the Osaka Festival of the Lights 2025 was calculated from pedestrian-traffic surveys and the like. Sapporo’s snow festival economic impact survey estimated visitor numbers by category from executive committee data. The announcements for Kobe Luminarie, the Nagasaki Lantern Festival and TOKYO Night & Light give no calculation method.

What should I check when reading economic ripple effect figures?

Check who announced them, the period covered and the input-output table used. Osaka Prefecture’s roughly ¥803.2 billion was calculated for April 9, 2025 to January 31, 2026 using the Osaka Prefecture input-output tables. Sapporo City’s ¥67.9 billion (induced production) was estimated from spending in the city by visitors to the 73rd festival using the 2015 Sapporo City Input-Output Table. Because the conditions differ, this article does not line up the figures and rank them.

Why do local governments survey economic impact?

Sapporo City’s surveys of the snow festival and night-view tourism both state that their purpose is to serve as a reference for considering future policy. The Tokyo Convention & Visitors Bureau’s grant requires grantees to report attendance measurements and the results of effect measurement to the bureau.

Articles organized by each stage of planning are gathered in our guide for those planning projection mapping and light events.

The budgets, attendance and economic ripple effect calculations of 13 local government cases are compared in our comparison of 13 local government light events.

*Top image: Record photo of the projection mapping on the wall of the Osaka City Central Public Hall at OSAKA Hikari no Renaissance 2025 in December 2025 (from HITOHATA, INC.’s press release)

*This article was compiled by the TOKYO ART SPHERE editorial team based on official announcements and public materials from each agency and organizer (as of October 21, 2026).

Text: TOKYO ART SPHERE Editorial Team

A note from the publisher

*Disclosure: Among the events covered in this article, HITOHATA, INC., an affiliate of HITOHATA ASSOCIATION, the general incorporated association that operates TOKYO ART SPHERE, was involved in the Matsumoto Castle projection mapping and the projection on the Osaka City Central Public Hall shown in the top image (About us).

HITOHATA, INC., an affiliate of HITOHATA ASSOCIATION, the general incorporated association that operates TOKYO ART SPHERE, plans, directs, produces and operates projection mapping at National Treasures, Important Cultural Properties, World Heritage Sites and urban landmarks, as well as immersive exhibitions. Planning for events intended to draw visitors and benefit the local area is also within the scope of its consultations. Inquiries, including those at the stage before a budget is set, are accepted through HITOHATA, INC.’s contact form (which has an option for local government and public projects). The company’s past work is introduced on HITOHATA, INC.’s project portfolio page.