Michelin Announces 2020 Stars for Tokyo

The latest city-specific dining guide from French tire company Michelin is also its most twinkly: Michelin’s 13th guide to Tokyo includes 226 restaurants with Michelin stars, more than any other city, including one new three-star restaurant, three new two-star restaurants, and 20 new restaurants with one star.

After more than a decade with two Michelin stars, Michelin awarded kaiseki restaurant Kadowaki a third star in the 2020 guide. The addition brings Tokyo’s three-star total to 11, down from 13 last year. Sukiyabashi Jiro Honten (the Jiro of the famous documentary) and Sushi Saito were dropped from the list because they stopped accepting reservations from the public, making them too exclusive even for Michelin.

Among the new two-star restaurants, kaiseki restaurant Ginza Shinohara is the only selection serving traditional Japanese cuisine. Inua, the Scandinavian-inflected tasting menu from Noma’s former head of R&D Thomas Frebel, joins Noma in Michelin’s estimation with two stars. Prisma, now the only Italian restaurant in Tokyo with two Michelin stars, rounds out the new additions to the category.

According to Michelin, the new one-star restaurants, along with 35 new additions to Michelin’s affordably priced Bib Gourmand category, represent 17 different cuisine types. Michelin also notes in its announcement post that the guide highlights more female chefs than in previous years. However, of the 25 restaurants led by women in the guide, only three are in the starred categories.

Although Tokyo still has more Michelin stars than anywhere else with 226, the number has shrunk in recent years. In 2018, there were 234 starred restaurants, up from 227 the previous year; but in the 2019 guide there were 230 starred restaurants, and now, four fewer than that. Click through for the full list of Tokyo’s Michelin stars.

• MICHELIN Guide Tokyo 2020 Selection [Michelin]