Over 40% of Japan’s Photo Booth Locations Are in Arcades: Three Industry Layers and the Parents of Ten Chains

Summary

More than 40% of Japan’s photo booth locations are inside ten arcade chains, while specialist photo booth stores account for only a small share. As of September 25, 2026, the Japanese database at photobooth.joelin.cc listed 2,226 photo booth locations, including ファミプリ machines at tourist facilities added in September. Of these, 965 locations, or approximately 43%, were branches of ten arcade and entertainment facility chains: GiGO 250, モーリーファンタジー 216, namco 161, タイトーステーション 122, ラウンドワン 98, 楽市楽座 46, プラサカプコン 25, NICOPA 30, アドアーズ 15, and ME TOKYO 2. These are branches that this site has confirmed have photo booths, rather than each company’s total store count.

The industry has three layers: manufacturers such as FURYU and SEGA make the machines; venue operators, chiefly arcades, install them; and brands such as girls mignon, brooming, and eggnam run specialist stores. Among the 965 operator branches, 943 have FURYU machines, 247 have SEGA machines, and 69 have machines from the Korean brand Photoism. Machine supply is highly concentrated; operators distinguish themselves through service.

Operators are also developing their own photo booth brands. タイトー’s official brooming page lists 20 locations, including three entire stores named brooming; namco’s eggnam has two stores; カプコン’s プリマート has at least six locations; and イオンファンタジー’s PURI SPOT PALO has one. Their parent companies span game and intellectual property businesses—スクウェア・エニックス, バンダイナムコ, and カプコン—the entertainment platform GENDA, the retail group AEON, the multi-activity leisure business ラウンドワン, Fukuoka’s ワイドレジャー, Nagoya’s カーゾック, and the pachinko company マルハン. GiGO began as SEGA’s arcade business, was sold to GENDA in November 2020, and was renamed in January 2022.

Costume lending, known as コスプリ, is decided store by store. It is available at brooming locations, GiGO 池袋2号館, namco HEP FIVE, eggnam in Yokohama, and ME TOKYO in Shinjuku. ラウンドワン explicitly states that it does not offer the service.

Key facts

• As of September 25, 2026, photobooth.joelin.cc’s Japanese database listed 2,226 photo booth locations. Of these, 965 were branches of ten arcade and entertainment facility chains, accounting for approximately 43%.
• The branches this site has confirmed have photo booths are: GiGO 250, モーリーファンタジー 216, namco 161, タイトーステーション 122, ラウンドワン 98, 楽市楽座 46, プラサカプコン 25, NICOPA 30, アドアーズ 15, and ME TOKYO 2. These are branch counts, not the companies’ total store counts.
• Store counts from official websites, checked on September 24, 2026, were: GiGO 427 stores as of September 1; モーリーファンタジー 380; ラウンドワン 100 as of May; 楽市楽座 55; カプコン’s amusement facilities 61 for the fiscal year ended March 2026; NICOPA operator カーゾック 56; and ME TOKYO 2.
• Among the 965 operator branches, 943 had FURYU machines, 247 had SEGA machines, and 69 had machines from the Korean brand Photoism, as of September 25, 2026. Most of the data comes from manufacturers’ official installation maps; it indicates broad patterns and cannot be treated as market share.
• The official brand page for タイトー’s photo booth area brand brooming lists 20 locations. Three—アスナル金山, 浜松メイワン, and イオン富士宮—use brooming as the store name itself.
• バンダイナムコ’s specialist photo booth brand eggnam officially lists two stores: Osaka’s HEP FIVE and 横浜ワールドポーターズ.
• GiGO originated as SEGA’s arcade business. In November 2020, SEGA sold an 85.1% stake in SEGA Entertainment to GENDA; store signs changed to GiGO in January 2022.
• モーリーファンタジー operator イオンファンタジー is a listed subsidiary in which AEON holds 60.47%. KeyHolder sold アドアーズ to Fukuoka’s ワイドレジャー in 2018; it was absorbed through a merger in 2022 and now belongs to the same company as 楽市楽座.
• Costume lending is decided store by store; no chain offers it at every location. ラウンドワン’s official FAQ explicitly says it does not lend costumes. ME TOKYO officially follows a gender-neutral policy and allows groups of men to use its photo booths.

The original Chinese article was published on September 24, 2026, and last updated on September 30, 2026. The research dates and database snapshots below refer to that original article.

In Japan, most photo booths are not in “photo booth stores”; they are inside arcades. The photo booth database I maintain, photobooth.joelin.cc’s Japan page, listed 2,226 Japanese photo booth locations as of September 25, 2026. Of these, 965 were branches of ten arcade and entertainment facility chains, accounting for approximately 43%.

This business operates across three layers: manufacturers make the machines, venue operators install them, and brands run specialist stores. This article separates those three layers, places the ten operators alongside their parent companies, and then examines one service that reveals their differences particularly clearly: costume lending.

Three layers: Who makes the machines, who installs them, and who runs specialist stores?

Each of the Japanese photo booth industry’s three layers handles a different part of the business.

• Manufacturers develop and sell machines. Japan’s leading examples are FURYU and SEGA. In recent years, FURYU’s profit focus has been shifting from machines toward photo sales and IP merchandise; see the FURYU company study for details.
• Venue operators provide space and foot traffic. Arcades place photo booths alongside claw machines, capsule toy machines, and token-operated games. Photo booths are simply one of the many types of machines in the store.
• Brands operate specialist stores devoted exclusively to photo booths. Examples include FURYU’s directly operated girls mignon, as well as brooming and eggnam, brands developed by venue operators themselves that we will discuss below.

I established this classification while organizing the database in September 2026. It clears up a common misunderstanding: when looking for a photo booth in Japan, most of the time you are actually looking for an arcade rather than a particular photo booth brand. Shopping mall locations, such as those in AEON and PARCO, have a different structure. They are covered separately and are not included in this series.

Ten operators in one table

The table has two numerical columns that measure different things; you cannot subtract one from the other. “Listed on this site” counts branches where the database has confirmed photo booths location by location. “Official store count” is the total number of stores published by each company. Definitions and reference dates differ: some totals include stores without photo booths, and some include other sub-brands. GiGO’s 250 versus 427 and モーリーファンタジー’s 216 versus 380 therefore do not mean that “the remaining stores have no photo booths.” They only indicate how many this site has confirmed so far.

This image brings together the operators and photo booth brands whose official identity images were obtained from their brand websites. None were obtained for namco, 楽市楽座, NICOPA, アドアーズ, or brooming, so they were left out rather than represented by substitutes.

What they look like on the street

The following six photographs show these operators’ premises in Japan. They come from openly licensed photographs on Wikimedia Commons and were taken in different years. For current signage and floor layouts, refer to each store’s present arrangements.

GiGO Building 3 in Akihabara, Tokyo, in May 2026. GiGO has the most branches listed on this site: 250 with confirmed photo booths. Photograph: BWard 1997, CC BY 4.0, original image.

モーリーファンタジー inside イオンモール登美ヶ丘 in Nara, March 2012. Located in an AEON shopping mall and catering primarily to families, it looks quite different from a street-front arcade. Photograph: Tokumeigakarinoaoshima, CC0 public domain, original image.

ナムコランド in Umeda, Osaka, in October 2010, before refurbishment. At the time of this article, namco’s Japanese arcades were operated by バンダイナムコアミューズメント. Photograph: tokumeigakarinoaoshima, CC0 public domain, original image.

タイトーステーション in Namba, Osaka, in February 2018. Of the ten chains in this site’s data, タイトーステーション has the highest proportion of branches with SEGA machines. Photograph: Tokumeigakarinoaoshima, CC BY-SA 4.0, original image.

ラウンドワンスタジアム in Joto-Hanaten, Osaka, in April 2019. ROUND1 combines bowling, sports, and games in one facility; photo booths occupy just one area. Photograph: Tokumeigakarinoaoshima, CC BY-SA 4.0, original image.

Inside プラサカプコン in June 2025; the photographed branch was not identified. This image shows the capsule toy area. カプコン calls its in-store photo booth corners “プリマート.” Photograph: Souka Kinmei, CC BY 4.0, original image.

Almost all branches have FURYU machines; the difference is how operators run the business

Looking at the machine manufacturers recorded across these 965 operator branches as of September 25, 2026, 943 branches had FURYU machines, approximately 98%; 247 had SEGA machines, approximately 26%; and 69 had machines from the Korean brand Photoism, approximately 7%.

The combinations also vary by chain:

• Of タイトーステーション’s 122 branches, 64 had SEGA machines—the highest proportion among the ten chains in this site’s data.
• GiGO had Photoism machines in 40 branches, the largest number among the ten chains in this site’s data.
• All 216 モーリーファンタジー branches had FURYU machines, while only seven had SEGA machines.

These proportions require some caution. Most of this site’s machine data comes from manufacturers’ official installation maps, and their completeness varies. The figures can therefore indicate broad patterns, but cannot be treated as market share. Even so, the pattern makes one point clear: machines are heavily concentrated around a single manufacturer. Customers entering different chains are likely to encounter the same machines. The real difference between operators is how much extra effort they are willing to put into photo booths.

Operators are developing their own photo booth brands

Some operators are no longer content simply to install machines. They have begun naming and branding their own photo booth areas. Their levels of brand development fall roughly into four tiers.

Read this table from top to bottom: the distance a brand still has to travel from “a name” to “a store” grows progressively larger. brooming has gone furthest. Most locations remain dedicated areas inside タイトーステーション stores, but the three in Kanayama, Hamamatsu, and Fujinomiya have changed the whole store’s signage to brooming. eggnam has fewer locations, but has had distinct store names from the outset. プリマート and PURI SPOT PALO remain at the stage of “an in-store corner with a name.”

There are also three approaches that have not yet become separate brands but point in the same direction:

• The official Instagram and X accounts for GiGO 池袋2号館 describe it as a “プリ専門店,” or specialist photo booth store. Its official store page, however, still lists photo booths alongside card games and capsule toys, and its name remains GiGO.
• namco has a store in the イオンモール in Natori, Miyagi Prefecture, whose name is explicitly “シールプリント専門店namco”—a namco store specializing in photo sticker printing. This is the only such location found so far.
• ME TOKYO’s Shinjuku store has devoted its entire third floor to photo booths, but has not given it a separate brand name.

Taken together, these examples reveal a common starting point for operators developing photo booth brands: first expand the photo booth area in a branch with strong foot traffic, then give it a name, and only afterward consider changing the entire store’s signage. This is the reverse of the route taken by manufacturer-operated stores such as girls mignon.

The parent companies: Game companies, entertainment platforms, retail groups, and pachinko

The ten operators’ parent companies have very different core businesses. For all of them, photo booths are just one type of machine. How much each is willing to invest in photo booths therefore depends substantially on what its parent company does.

Game and IP companies

• タイトー is a wholly owned subsidiary of スクウェア・エニックス・ホールディングス. It was delisted after becoming a wholly owned subsidiary in 2006.
• namco’s operating company, バンダイナムコアミューズメント, gained an additional intermediate holding company, バンダイナムコエクスペリエンス, above it in April 2025. At the top is バンダイナムコホールディングス, listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange Prime Market.
• カプコン’s arcades are not a subsidiary; they belong to the company’s directly operated amusement business division. Store names include プラサカプコン and CAPCOMIX.

Entertainment platforms

GiGO began as SEGA’s arcade business. In November 2020, SEGA sold an 85.1% stake in its arcade business, SEGA Entertainment, to GENDA. Store signs changed to GiGO in January 2022; see the main photo booth industry article for the full history. GENDA positions itself as an entertainment platform connecting IP with fans, and its businesses also include karaoke. GiGO has overseas locations too, including “GiGO台湾” in Taiwan.

Retail groups

モーリーファンタジー operator イオンファンタジー is a listed subsidiary in which AEON holds 60.47%. It began in 1988 as an internal venture at ジャスコ, AEON’s predecessor. Almost all its venues are inside AEON shopping malls, targeting parents, children, and families. Its official brand page does not list photo booths among its signature facilities, yet it still ranks second among these ten chains by the number of branches listed on this site. Photo booths are an ancillary offering here, supported by mall foot traffic.

Multi-activity leisure and regional operators

• ラウンドワン’s core business is a complex combining bowling, sports facilities, karaoke, and arcade machines. Photo booths are just one item in its arcade machine category.
• 楽市楽座 and アドアーズ both belong to Fukuoka-based ワイドレジャー. アドアーズ was originally a KeyHolder subsidiary, was sold to ワイドレジャー in 2018, and was absorbed through a merger in 2022. Only its brand name remains. 楽市楽座 mainly operates as stores within AEON malls.
• NICOPA operator カーゾック was established in 1971. In January 2026, it announced that it would begin moving its headquarters from Suzuka, Mie Prefecture, to Nagoya in February. Most of its stores are in shopping centers and target families. For its history and revenue, see カーゾック, the company behind NICOPA.

Pachinko companies

ME TOKYO is an entertainment venue created for Generation Z by major pachinko company マルハン. Its operator, マルハン東日本カンパニー, is an internal business unit under the company’s internal company system, rather than a subsidiary. The Shinjuku store has devoted its entire third floor to photo booths, and its official press release lists supporting amenities such as costume lending and makeup stations.

Costume lending: Where the differences are clearest

Borrowing an outfit at a Japanese photo booth store, changing into it, and then taking pictures is called “コスプリ,” a combination of コスプレ, cosplay, and プリ, photo booths. This service reveals how much an operator invests in photo booths: it requires staff to manage clothing and space to accommodate it, while not directly increasing the number of paid machine sessions.

The conclusion first: no chain offers it at every location. The service is decided store by store. Locations where outfits can be borrowed have been compiled into the list of Japanese コスプリ locations. A separate feature on コスプリ in Japan examines which companies run this niche business and how they publicize it officially. Here, we will focus only on differences among the ten operators. The following is based on official information checked on September 24, 2026:

• タイトー’s official brooming brand page lists costume lending, makeup stations, curling irons, and changing rooms among its services, and identifies the branches offering each service. Among the ten chains’ official materials, this was the only branch-by-branch list we found.
• GiGO 池袋2号館 promotes costume lending as a key attraction. Its official social media says it has at least 300 types of outfits. GiGO in Shibuya has a costume rental area on the third floor.
• namco’s Osaka HEP FIVE store and eggnam’s 横浜ワールドポーターズ store offer costume lending.
• ME TOKYO’s official press release for the opening of its Shinjuku store listed costume lending, along with makeup stations in both the men’s and women’s restrooms.
• ラウンドワン’s official FAQ explicitly says that costume lending is not offered.
• No information about costume lending was found in the official materials for モーリーファンタジー, 楽市楽座, アドアーズ, プラサカプコン, or NICOPA.

This list almost overlaps with the earlier section on operators developing photo booth brands. The two brands that have gone furthest—brooming and eggnam—and branches that make photo booths a signature attraction, such as GiGO 池袋2号館 and ME TOKYO Shinjuku, are the ones offering this service. None was found among the mall-based operators targeting families. Prices and service hours differ by store and change frequently, so this article does not list figures. Check each store’s official page before visiting.

Another difference is whether men may enter the photo booth area. An official ME TOKYO article contrasts its policy with the industry’s common restriction against men using photo booths on their own. It explains that ME TOKYO follows a gender-neutral policy and permits groups of men to use the machines. No chain-wide policy on this issue was found in the other nine operators’ official materials.

Company-by-company research: A ten-article series

This article is an overview. The company stories behind the ten operators are covered in separate articles, with an additional feature on dressing up for photo booth sessions:

• GiGO’s origins: From SEGA’s arcades to GENDA’s entertainment platform
• Who runs モーリーファンタジー? Family play areas inside AEON malls
• eggnam and Cross Store: How バンダイナムコ turned photo booths from arcade machines into specialist stores
• Why would an arcade create a separate photo booth brand? The positioning of タイトー and brooming
• ラウンドワン (ROUND1) company study: A complex combining bowling, sports, and games
• How Fukuoka’s ワイドレジャー acquired Tokyo’s アドアーズ: 楽市楽座 and アドアーズ
• A game company running its own arcades: カプコン’s プラサカプコン and プリマート
• カーゾック behind NICOPA: Nagoya’s family arcades inside shopping centers
• ME TOKYO is run by pachinko company マルハン: A Generation Z entertainment venue and Shinjuku’s third-floor photo booth area
• Japan’s niche market for dressing up at photo booths, コスプリ: Which companies are behind 36 locations?

The list follows the order of the “Ten operators” table above, arranged from most to fewest branches listed on this site. 楽市楽座 and アドアーズ belong to the same company and are covered together in one article.

Related reading

• A historical report on the development of Taiwan’s photo booth and Korean-style photo booth industries—the main photo booth industry article, covering developments in Japan, Korea, and Taiwan from 1995 onward, with an index to the database for the entire topic
• The transformation of FURYU, Japan’s photo booth leader—financial reports and the manufacturer’s business transition
• Visiting a girls mignon photo booth store in Okinawa—what a manufacturer’s directly operated brand store looks like
• How do you say “photo booth” in Japanese? A guide to using プリクラ—Japanese photo booth terminology and how to find booths on site
• Japan photo booth map—all 2,226 locations, searchable by city and brand
• A guide to Japan’s specialist photo booth stores—stores whose primary business is photo booths, including girls mignon and Photoism, organized by prefecture
• Lists of photo booths in Japanese shopping malls, including floor information: AEON, PARCO, LaLaport, youme town, Ito-Yokado, Ario, and 丸井
• Photo booth guides for Japanese cities: Nagoya, Sapporo, Fukuoka City, Saitama City, Kawasaki, Machida, Tachikawa, Hachioji, and Kichijoji

Sources: The chains’ official websites and social media accounts (GENDA GiGO Entertainment corporate information, タイトー brooming, バンダイナムコアミューズメント eggnam, イオンファンタジー company profile, ラウンドワン: ROUND1 in numbers, ラウンドワン FAQ, 楽市楽座 RAKUPA, ワイドレジャー company information, カプコン supplementary financial results materials for the fiscal year ended March 2026, カーゾック store directory, ME TOKYO, and マルハン東日本カンパニー), along with the Japanese data layer maintained by this site at photobooth.joelin.cc. Unless otherwise noted, information was checked on September 24, 2026. Location and machine counts in this site’s database were updated through September 25, 2026.

Article keywords: Japanese photo booths, Japanese arcades, プリクラ, GiGO, タイトーステーション, namco, モーリーファンタジー, ラウンドワン, 楽市楽座, アドアーズ, プラサカプコン, NICOPA, ME TOKYO, brooming, eggnam, コスプリ, costume lending at Japanese photo booths

FAQ

Where are most photo booths in Japan?

More than 40% are inside arcades. As of September 25, 2026, photobooth.joelin.cc’s Japanese database listed 2,226 photo booth locations. Of these, 965 were branches of ten arcade and entertainment facility chains, including GiGO, モーリーファンタジー, namco, タイトーステーション, and ラウンドワン, accounting for approximately 43%. Specialist stores devoted exclusively to photo booths, such as FURYU’s directly operated girls mignon, are far fewer in number.

What are brooming and eggnam?

Both are photo booth brands developed by arcade chains themselves. brooming is タイトー’s brand name for the photo booth areas in selected タイトーステーション branches. Its official brand page lists 20 locations, three of which use brooming as the store name itself. eggnam is a specialist photo booth store brand operated by バンダイナムコアミューズメント. Its official page lists two stores: Osaka HEP FIVE and 横浜ワールドポーターズ. This information was checked on September 24, 2026.

Can you borrow outfits and dress up in Japanese arcade photo booth areas?

At some branches, yes, but no chain offers the service at every location. Each store decides whether to provide it. According to official information, costume lending is available in タイトー’s brooming areas, at GiGO 池袋2号館 and GiGO Shibuya, namco HEP FIVE, eggnam 横浜ワールドポーターズ, and ME TOKYO Shinjuku. ラウンドワン explicitly states that it does not offer the service. Prices and service hours vary by store; check each location’s official page before visiting.

Which company makes most of Japan’s photo booths?

In this site’s data as of September 25, 2026, of the 965 branches across the ten arcade chains, 943 had FURYU machines, 247 had SEGA machines, and 69 had machines from the Korean brand Photoism. These figures come from manufacturers’ official installation maps, whose completeness varies. They indicate broad patterns and cannot be treated as market share.