Japanese food in London
A map of Japanese food chains across London, grouped by what they serve: sushi (grab-and-go counters, supermarket kiosks, conveyor belts and sit-down rooms — Itsu, Wasabi, YO! Sushi, Taro and more), ramen (Tonkotsu, Shoryu, Ippudo, Bone Daddies, Kanada-Ya, Koi Ramen Bar), udon (Marugame Udon, Koya, Kineya Mugimaru), donburi rice bowls (Donburi & Co), and teppanyaki (Benihana). Tick a category on or off to show or hide everything in it, or narrow further to individual chains — useful when you know you want a bowl of ramen and just need the nearest one.
The dots load live from OpenStreetMap, so it’s the full set of branches OSM knows about, not a hand-picked list. Tap a dot for the branch name and street address, and a link to open it in your phone’s maps app or Google Maps for directions. Tap the button on the map to drop a pin on your current location and zoom to it.
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The chains
Thirty-nine chains across five categories. Most are here because they’re widespread across London and easy to just walk into or find on a station concourse; a handful of destination restaurants are included too, and marked as such. Branch counts shift as shops open and close and as OpenStreetMap is updated — each chain’s own site is linked for the authoritative list.
Sushi
Twenty-eight chains, grouped by how you eat them.
Grab-and-go, everywhere
- Itsu — the ubiquitous one: bright green counters in stations and on high streets, with the daily half-price clear-out in the evenings.
- Wasabi — sushi and hot bento side by side; a fixture of the London commute.
- Kokoro — sushi and made-to-order Japanese-Korean hot food, growing fast.
- Abokado — sushi, poke and wraps; a smaller grab-and-go chain around the centre.
- Sushi Shop — the French chain; smarter takeaway boxes and platters, strong on delivery.
- You Me Sushi — takeaway sushi counters since 2008, from a Marylebone flagship grown into the widest-spread independent chain on this map.
Supermarket kiosks
- Sushi Daily — hand-rolled counters tucked inside supermarkets (Waitrose, Tesco and more), so often the closest tray to wherever you’re shopping.
- Sushi Gourmet — the other in-supermarket counter, from the same mould: sushi rolled fresh where you’re already shopping.
Conveyor belt & sit-down
- YO! Sushi — the colour-coded conveyor belt; the sit-down chain most people picture first.
- K10 — conveyor-belt lunch spots in the City, built for the office crowd.
- Sticks’n’Sushi — the polished Danish-Japanese rooms; sushi and yakitori sticks, a proper meal out.
- Eat Tokyo — generous, good-value Japanese restaurants; sushi sets and a full izakaya menu.
- Sushimania — order-all-you-like sushi at gentle prices; a north-London favourite grown into a small chain.
- Taro — the Soho stalwart grown into a family of neighbourhood Japanese restaurants; sushi sets alongside katsu and ramen.
- The Sushi Co — “live sushi kitchens” made to order, plus poke bowls, bao and bubble tea; casual dine-in rooms across the suburbs.
- The Japanese Canteen — canteen-style dining since 1995 in Islington, one of London’s earliest inexpensive Japanese restaurants; sushi, donburi, bento and noodle soup made from scratch daily.
Specialists
- Feng Sushi — sustainably-sourced fish; sit in or take away from a handful of branches.
- Atari-Ya — the sushi-grade fishmonger and counter; where a lot of London chefs get their fish, plus takeaway sushi of its own.
- Sushi Like — the hand-roll bar from the Kintan Japanese BBQ group; a small counter where you watch each roll made to order, one location so far.
- SushiDog — build-your-own sushi burritos, bowls and salads, made in front of you; founded 2018, grown fast on investment since 2023.
Destination dining
Higher-end, mostly single-site restaurants rather than a chain you’d stumble into — included for completeness, but book ahead rather than walk in.
- Zuma — Rainer Becker’s izakaya-style room in Knightsbridge since 2002, sushi counter and robata grill under one roof; grown into a worldwide group from here.
- Roka — Becker’s sister concept to Zuma, built around the robata grill since 2004; three London rooms (Charlotte Street, Mayfair, Canary Wharf).
- Chotto Matte — Nikkei, Japanese technique meeting Peruvian ingredients, on a two-floor Soho site with its own robata grill and sushi bar; founded 2013.
- SushiSamba — a three-way fusion of Japanese, Brazilian and Peruvian cooking on a Covent Garden rooftop; sushi and robata alongside churrasco and ceviche.
- Umu — Michelin-starred Kyoto kaiseki in Mayfair since 2004; a multi-course tasting menu, not a quick bowl.
- Tokimeite — a Mayfair sushi and robata room on Conduit Street.
- Engawa — Soho specialist in whole-imported Wagyu, butchered in house, alongside sushi and sashimi.
- Nobu — Nobu Matsuhisa’s Japanese-Peruvian fusion, the template the genre is named after; three London rooms (Old Park Lane, Portman Square, Shoreditch).
Ramen
Six chains — the first five all opened in London between 2009 and 2014, as the city’s ramen scene took off, with one newer arrival.
- Tonkotsu — opened on Dean Street, Soho in 2012 by Ken Yamada and Emma Reynolds after years of cooking a different regional ramen every week; known for its 16-hour pork broth.
- Shoryu — launched in 2012 by Tak Tokumine, the Fukuoka-born founder of Japan Centre; specialises in Hakata-style tonkotsu ramen from his home city.
- Ippudo (一風堂) — the global Japanese chain itself, founded in Fukuoka in 1985; its London branches, from 2014, were the first ramen import straight from Japan.
- Bone Daddies — opened on Peter Street, Soho in 2012 by chef Ross Shonhan (ex-Zuma, ex-Nobu); the same group behind sister restaurants Flesh & Buns and Shackfuyu, which share its OpenStreetMap brand tag.
- Kanada-Ya — founded in Fukuoka in 2009 by ex-professional cyclist Kazuhiro Kanada, brought to London in 2014; a tonkotsu specialist, broth simmered for 18 hours.
- Koi Ramen Bar — started as a 2016 market stall on Brixton Station Road, now in the railway arches there and a couple of south-London branches; tonkotsu and miso bowls with a strong vegan range.
Udon
Three chains, all specialising in thick wheat noodles rather than ramen’s thinner egg noodles.
- Marugame Udon — the global chain (as Marugame Seimen) from Marugame, Kagawa, the Japanese town regarded as the birthplace of sanuki udon; noodles made fresh in view of the counter.
- Koya — opened on Frith Street, Soho in 2010 by chef Shuko Oda and John Devitt; a handmade-udon specialist that’s since added Koya City (Bloomberg Arcade) and Koya Ko (Hackney).
- Kineya Mugimaru (杵屋麦丸) — the London outpost of the Osaka udon house Kineya; good-value bowls, with a counter on Villiers Street near Embankment.
Donburi
One chain, for rice bowls rather than noodles or sushi — on this map because its menu is Japanese enough to place it here, though it serves Korean dishes alongside them.
- Donburi & Co — Japanese-Korean rice bowls across several south and east London branches (Spitalfields, Brixton, Earlsfield, Croydon, Balham); the Spicy Pork BBQ Donburi is the signature order.
Teppanyaki
One chain, for the tableside hibachi-grill show rather than noodles, rice or raw fish.
- Benihana — the chain that invented teppanyaki theatre — a chef cooking and flipping food at your table — since 1964; three London rooms (Chelsea, Covent Garden, St Paul’s).
How it’s built
One self-contained page, all free and open tools, no API key anywhere. Leaflet draws the map; OpenStreetMap serves the tiles; and the locations are fetched at load time from the Overpass API, which queries live OpenStreetMap data — here, every point tagged with one of the chain brands inside a box around Greater London. The street address in each popup comes from that same OpenStreetMap record.
So the map appears instantly, it first draws a saved snapshot that ships with the page (and, on repeat visits, your browser’s cached copy of the last live result), then quietly refreshes from the live Overpass API in the background and swaps in anything that’s changed. If the live service is busy or unreachable, you still get the full snapshot rather than a blank map.
A caveat on the data
The locations come from OpenStreetMap, which is community-maintained: a branch that recently opened or closed may be missing or stale, a few points can be slightly off, and not every record carries a full street address. More importantly, a chain being on the map is not a promise about the food — opening hours, how fresh the counter is, and whether a branch is a sit-down room or a takeaway counter all vary spot to spot. Always check current opening hours. Treat this as a starting point, not the last word.