Chosen by the wand at the Harry Potter land in USJ Osaka (& a peek of the rest of the park)

The land of Harry Potter has a lot to offer, we spent most of our day only at this land, started at 9:00 and left around 14:30.

There are two main attractions, I will enter into more detail below at the Hogwarts section. The attractions are good but hands-down the immersive decoration is the best thing of the land, you are able to visit Hogsmeade and some of the stores like Honeydukes or Ollivanders, while others have their store front as decor only (like Madam Puddifoot’s), and eat at the Three Broomsticks. Decoration is at Disney level, the same doesn’t happen with the rest of the park though, but at Harry Potter land you are totally transferred to the magic world created by J.K Rowling & as seen in the movies.

There are several shows, Ollivanders is a must and then some musical shows performed at the open-air stage. They are worthy to watch, specially the one with the frogs. They are performed during the morning one after the other, we watched two seating in the front line (no waits here) and others just casually peeking while visiting the land.

Another important experience is that you can perform magic tricks around the land (more info below!), and of course, you can’t leave without trying the butterbeer.

Grab your wand and check it all out with us!

• Price: The price is completely nuts. And I am talking compared to Disney. While on Disney Resort you will always get the same price for a 1-day ticket, in USJ it depends on the day & occupancy so now try to figure out what it will cost you… no clue…at all! Still the lowest ticket price is “from ￥7,400” (read the from!) which is exactly the same as the price for Disneyland, but with the difference that Disney is always the same price, no hidden evil pricing strategies. We paid ￥8,200 for each ticket.
• Tickets selling system: If the price list is crazy, let’s talk about the purchasing method which may be still worse. If you are an international visitor, you are forced to buy from authorised resellers, whom will also increase you the price (obviously, and I understand it completely), still on the USJ official website you will be threatened with a “Warning: Resale of tickets is strictly prohibited.” message. This message made me felt completely uneasy to buy from a re-seller. (TIP) We instead bought it from the Japanese site, which took us around 1h to complete the purchase, because we had to translate every step (In-site Google Translate will give you errors when sending the forms, so do it separately) and the forms were super large, I don’t think they forgot to ask us anything, maybe only the blood type (ha!), but questions like jobs and family type were surely included. However, we got a fair price and the security that it was 100% official. Just to state the difference with Disney, you are able to purchase from official stores or online, even if you are international, no questions asked.
• Fast pass system: Fast pass are only in paid form, so if you are visiting on a crowded day (like we did!), the only way to make sure you’ll be able to ride the most popular attractions and visit Harry Potter at a nice hour (entrance is also restricted) is to pay an additional ticket. The cheapest one will not get you into Harry Potter’s main attraction, so we took the 4-ride ticket, with fast access to a Cool Japan attraction, which I think was a wise choice, otherwise I am not sure we would be able to enjoy the park as much as we did. I know comparisons are hideous, but in Disney everyone, without having to pay any extra, is able to get a fast pass, they only need to rush to the attraction and take a ticket, which definitely is a much better approach.
• Paid photo spots: There are some cool spots prepared to take photos, like for instance a recreation of a Hogwarts express wagon, or the shark at Jaws, but you have to pay for the photo. I get it if you want to take the professional one, but c’mon not even with my phone?
• Decor (not Harry Potter): I was specially sad with the Jurassic Park land. I am so much in love with this movie, it’s one of my favorites ever, and it’s my childhood, so I was expecting to have my heart beating fast at every corner. However, the door to Jurassic Park view has been blocked by a safety net for the Flying Dinousaur ride, how thoughtless, right? I loved listening to the music, the velociraptors cage inside the store (read more about the merchan below though) and the vending machines. I left with the feeling that so much more could be done decor-wise!
• Merchandising: Knowing how awesome is the merchandising at the Tokyo Disney parks, I was expecting the same commitment level. The only thing I ended up buying was the Harry Potter wand, although I was predisposed to buy ALL the Jurassic Park stuf. JP merch was a little bit of a let down to be honest. Exception to the rule is all the Sailor Moon stuff that I wasn’t lucky to find.
• Night parade: This is the same that happens with the decor, although the crew members are totally dedicated to their tasks, the parade lacks in terms of brilliant dancers and also wow factor (soul?).