Starbucks Reserve Roastery Tokyo: Prices, Booking, With Kids

The Starbucks Reserve Roastery Tokyo is the largest Starbucks in the world, it sits on the Meguro River in Nakameguro, and a drink there costs between ¥1,100 and ¥2,400. We went as a family of four, on a morning that turned out to be Tanabata, and ended up writing wishes on paper strips with our two kids instead of doing whatever we had planned for that morning.

This is what it costs, how to get in without queueing, what is actually on each of the four floors, and the honest version of whether it is worth doing with children.

The short version

• Address: 2-19-23 Aobadai, Meguro-ku — about a 14-minute walk from the west exit of Nakameguro Station.
• Hours: 07:00–22:00, last order 21:30.
• Booking: reserve a time slot online in advance. Same-day numbered QR tickets exist but can run out by mid-morning at weekends.
• Cost: drinks ¥1,100–2,400. Budget ¥1,000–3,000 per person with food.
• With kids: yes if they will sit and look at machinery for an hour. No if you are hoping for a children’s menu or a play area — there is neither.
• Go at opening. It is the single highest-value piece of advice on this page.

Where is the Starbucks Reserve Roastery in Tokyo?

Nakameguro, at 2-19-23 Aobadai, Meguro-ku, on the bank of the Meguro River. From Nakameguro Station’s west exit it is roughly 14 minutes on foot — long enough that it is worth knowing in advance, short enough that it is not a problem. The walk follows the river, which is lined with the cherry trees that make this stretch one of Tokyo’s most photographed hanami spots in spring.

Nakameguro itself is a good reason to come. It is a low-rise neighbourhood of small shops and cafés along the canal, and it is a completely different Tokyo from Shibuya twenty minutes away. If your itinerary is otherwise all neon and crowds, this is the morning that resets it.

Do you need a reservation for the Starbucks Roastery Tokyo?

Book a time slot online in advance. You can also take a same-day numbered QR ticket and wait, but at weekends those can be gone by the middle of the morning, and “wait” with two children on a Tokyo pavement in July is not a plan.

The slot secures your place in the entry order within a 30-minute window. It does not reserve a table — nothing does. Which brings us to the only advice that really matters: arrive at opening. At 07:00 you walk in, you get a seat, and you watch the building wake up. By 11:00 it is a queue with a coffee shop attached.

What’s on each floor?

Four floors, and they are genuinely different rather than four versions of the same café. The building was designed by Kengo Kuma, and the four-storey copper cask in the middle — the one all the pipes run out of — is the thing everyone photographs.

• 1F — the main coffee bar, the roasting equipment on full display, the Princi bakery counter and the merchandise.
• 2F — the Teavana tea bar, under an origami ceiling. This is the floor most visitors skip and the one I would send you to.
• 3F — the Arriviamo cocktail bar and the outdoor terrace over the Meguro River.
• 4F — the automated bean packing line and the AMU lounge.

Children, in my experience, care about exactly one thing in this building, and it is the pipes. The beans move between floors through transparent tubes, and you can stand and follow them. That is the attraction. Everything else is for you.

What does it cost?

Drinks run ¥1,100 to ¥2,400. Realistically, budget ¥1,000–3,000 per person once food is involved. For a family of four that is a meaningful line in a Tokyo day — comparable to a decent lunch out, for coffee and pastries.

They take credit cards, Suica and PASMO, which is worth noting in a country where plenty of places still don’t.

Is it expensive? Yes, plainly. It is three to four times a normal Starbucks. What you are paying for is the building and the rare single-origin beans, and whether that is worth it is a question about you, not about the coffee. What I would say is that it is a morning, not a coffee stop — if you treat it as somewhere to sit for an hour and a half, the maths feels different than if you treat it as a ¥1,400 latte on the way somewhere.

Tanabata at the Roastery

We happened to be there during Tanabata, the star festival, when people write a wish on a tanzaku — a narrow strip of coloured paper — and tie it to a bamboo branch. The Roastery had the bamboo set up, and our two wrote theirs and tied them on alongside everyone else’s.

It is the thing I remember about the morning, and it is a fair illustration of why this place is more interesting than its price tag suggests: it is a global luxury coffee brand that nonetheless puts up a bamboo branch in July because that is what you do in July.

Is the Starbucks Reserve Roastery worth it with kids?

Honest answer: it depends entirely on whether your children will sit still in a beautiful building for an hour.

It works if they are old enough to be interested in how a thing is made. The roasting, the tubes, the cask, the packing line on the fourth floor — this is a factory you can have breakfast in, and for a certain kind of child that is genuinely good.

It doesn’t work if you need a children’s menu, a high chair every time, or somewhere they can be loud. There is no kids’ offering. It is a quiet, adult, expensive room, and the third floor is a cocktail bar. Nobody will be rude to you, but you will be managing them the whole time.

What I would do: go at opening, take the 2nd floor Teavana bar rather than the ground-floor scrum, give the kids something cold and something sweet, spend forty minutes, and then walk the river. Do not build the whole morning around sitting in here.

Where it fits in a Tokyo itinerary

Nakameguro is a morning, not a destination. It sits well at the start of a day that continues into Shibuya or Daikanyama, and it pairs badly with anything that needs a timed entry later the same morning.

We fitted it into our four-day Tokyo itinerary with kids, and it was the quietest hour of the four days — which after teamLab Planets was not nothing. If you are still deciding where to base yourself, we went through the areas in where to stay in Tokyo with kids.

Frequently asked questions about the Starbucks Reserve Roastery Tokyo

Where is the Starbucks Reserve Roastery in Tokyo?

At 2-19-23 Aobadai, Meguro-ku, on the Meguro River in Nakameguro. It is about a 14-minute walk from the west exit of Nakameguro Station, following the river.

Do you need a reservation for the Starbucks Reserve Roastery Tokyo?

Booking a time slot online in advance is strongly recommended. Same-day numbered QR tickets are available on site, but at weekends they can run out by the middle of the morning. A slot secures your place in the entry order within a 30-minute window; it does not reserve a table.

How much does the Starbucks Reserve Roastery Tokyo cost?

Drinks range from ¥1,100 to ¥2,400, and a realistic budget is ¥1,000 to ¥3,000 per person once food is included. That is roughly three to four times the price of a standard Starbucks. Credit cards, Suica and PASMO are all accepted.

What are the opening hours of the Starbucks Roastery Tokyo?

07:00 to 22:00, with last orders at 21:30. Arriving at opening is the easiest way to get a seat without queueing, and it is the single most useful piece of planning advice for this place.

What is on each floor of the Tokyo Roastery?

The ground floor has the main coffee bar, the roasting equipment and the Princi bakery. The second floor is the Teavana tea bar under an origami ceiling. The third floor holds the Arriviamo cocktail bar and a terrace over the Meguro River. The fourth floor has the automated bean packing line and the AMU lounge.

Is the Starbucks Reserve Roastery Tokyo good with children?

It works for children old enough to be interested in how things are made — the beans travel between floors through transparent pipes, which is the part that holds them. There is no children’s menu, no play area and no space to be loud, and the third floor is a cocktail bar. Go at opening, sit on the second floor, stay about forty minutes, and then walk the river.