PICK UP A LITTLE STORY
Something for the road.
At a station shop, a convenience store or a vending machine, an unfamiliar label can be the start of a small discovery. These are names and flavours to get to know — for the train, a city walk or a quiet break.
Looking for a beer instead? Compare familiar cans and flavours, then follow their breweries beside the tracks.
Shelf and drink photos taken in October 2026 help you recognise the labels. Packaging and stock vary; follow the maker links for current products.
01 / お茶 / TEA
Start with the leaves.
Green, roasted, fragrant or earthy: “tea” on a Japanese shelf has more than one personality. First find the type, then explore the brand.
Green tea
Ryokucha. Fresh and leafy, with a little bitterness. A familiar companion for a bento or rice ball.
Roasted tea
Hōjicha. Roasting brings a toasty aroma. The amber colour does not make it a black tea.
Tea & roasted rice
Genmaicha. The aroma of toasted rice adds a different note to green tea.
Beyond green tea
- 烏龍茶 · Oolong
- Partly oxidised tea, often with a rounded or roasted character.
- ジャスミン茶 · Jasmine
- Tea scented with jasmine flowers. A floral option to look for.
- ルイボス · Rooibos
- A South African herbal infusion. Look at the ingredients if it is a blend.
- 麦茶 · Barley tea
- Mugicha. Roasted barley; see the bottles and labels just below.
Four names on the tea shelf
The large lettering is often the brand. The smaller words tell you which tea.
ITO EN · GREEN TEA & MORE
Oi Ocha
お〜いお茶
The bright green bottle is a useful name to learn before you browse a tea fridge. 緑茶 means green tea; the family also includes roasted tea and tea with toasted rice.
- Ryokucha 緑茶 — a straightforward green tea.
- Hōjicha ほうじ茶 — a roasted aroma.
- Genmaicha 玄米茶 — tea with roasted rice.
Special artwork can change. Recognise the お〜いお茶 lettering as well as the colour.
Official range (Japanese) ↗
KIRIN · ONE NAME, DIFFERENT TEAS
Namacha
生茶
The two large characters are the brand name. In this shelf photo, the orange-red labels mark the roasted tea; the green labels mark the green tea.
- Namacha — green tea with fresh tea leaf extract in the recipe.
- Hōji Sencha ほうじ煎茶 — the roasted member of the family.
Read the smaller words too: the large 生茶 name appears on both.
Official range (Japanese) ↗
SUNTORY · KYOTO FUKUJUEN
Iyemon
伊右衛門
A name to look for when choosing tea at a station kiosk. The label carries 京都福寿園, Kyoto Fukujuen: the tea house whose first proprietor gave the brand its name.
- Iyemon green tea — the starting point, pictured here.
- Hōjicha 焙じ茶 — roasted tea; the spelling differs from ほうじ茶, but the tea type is the same.
- Jasmine tea ジャスミン茶 — look for these extra words for a floral choice.
The brand has several ranges, including Tokucha. Check the full drink name; the selection varies by shop.
Official range (Japanese) ↗
COCA-COLA JAPAN · GREEN TEA
Ayataka
綾鷹
Another large Japanese name to recognise on the tea shelf. Developed with Kyoto’s tea house Kanbayashi Shunshō Honten, Ayataka aims for the taste of green tea brewed in a kyūsu, a Japanese teapot.
Look for: the two characters 綾鷹 and the small teapot mark. The family also has roasted-tea products, so read beyond the brand name.
Official range (Japanese) ↗麦茶 / MUGICHA
Barley tea deserves its own stop.
Brown in the bottle, roasted and refreshing. Mugicha is made from barley, rather than the tea leaves used for green tea or hōjicha. These two everyday examples are unsweetened and caffeine-free — a different choice for a bento or a long journey. Look for 麦茶 or むぎ茶 on the shelf.
COCA-COLA JAPAN · BARLEY TEA
Yakan no Mugicha
やかんの麦茶
Yakan means kettle. This barley tea aims for the fragrant, roasted taste of tea boiled in a kettle, with a clean finish.
Look for: the large 麦茶, the yellow kettle and カフェインゼロ — caffeine zero. The pictured regular product contains no caffeine.
Official range (Japanese) ↗
ITO EN · BARLEY TEA
Kenko Mineral Mugicha
健康ミネラルむぎ茶
Another barley-tea label worth recognising. ITO EN’s version has a roasted aroma and is labelled caffeine-free and calorie-free.
Look for: the blue top band and large むぎ茶 lettering. Here, むぎ spells out the same mugi as the character 麦.
Official range (Japanese) ↗02 / コーヒー / COFFEE
A small can. A lot to read.
Japan’s ready-to-drink coffee stretches from straight black to a sweet, milky break. Three different pieces of information help you find your way.
Milk or no milk?
ブラック · Black
Black means no milk. For no sugar as well, look for 無糖.
カフェオレ / ラテ
Café au lait and latte point you toward milk.
How sweet?
無糖 · Mutō
Unsweetened / sugar-free labelling.
微糖 · Bitō
Reduced sugar, not zero sugar. Sweeteners may also be used.
What kind of drink?
コーヒー / コーヒー飲料
Coffee / coffee beverage.
These are product categories related to coffee content. They are not a sweetness scale or a quality ranking. Some milky products have a milk-based category instead.
Label guide: Black (Japanese) ↗, Sugar labels (Japanese) ↗, Coffee categories (Japanese) ↗
Meet three coffee families
Choose the drink name, not only the maker’s logo.
UCC · TWO VERY DIFFERENT STARTING POINTS
UCC
ユーシーシー
UCC is an easy place to see the breadth of Japan’s ready-to-drink coffee: a sweet milk coffee and an unsweetened black can share the same maker.
- BLACK Unsweetened ブラック無糖 — coffee without sugar or milk. The shelf photo shows UCC BLACK 無糖 黒の余韻 at the left.
- Milk Coffee ミルクコーヒー — a sweet, milky drink in the familiar brown-striped can.
SUNTORY · MORE THAN ONE BOSS
BOSS
ボス
The pipe-smoking face marks a big family, not one flavour. Here, CRAFT BOSS bottles put black coffee beside milky choices.
- Unsweetened Black 無糖ブラック — no sugar or milk.
- Zeitaku Bitō 贅沢微糖 — milk and reduced sugar; still sweetened.
- Café au Lait カフェオレ — sweet and milky.
- CRAFT BOSS — larger, resealable bottles. Read the drink name: this family also includes drinks beyond coffee.
ASAHI · TWO CANS TO COMPARE
WONDA
ワンダ
The Japanese name sounds like “Wanda”; the cans say WONDA. The gold can on the left and red can on the right show two different milk-coffee choices.
- Kin no Bitō 金の微糖 — the gold can: reduced sugar with milk, not sugar-free.
- Morning Shot モーニングショット — the red can: coffee with milk and sugar, marketed for the morning.
- Black — another part of the range. Look for 無糖 if you want an unsweetened option.
03 / 清涼飲料水 / MORE DRINKS
Something familiar. Something new.
Move past the global cola names and there is plenty to explore: a blue sports drink, a milky-looking classic, mountain water and bottles full of bubbles.
OTSUKA · SPORTS DRINK
Pocari Sweat
ポカリスエット
A sweet, lightly tangy electrolyte drink. The blue-and-white label is a familiar sight in Japan — and it appears on a building beside the Shinkansen too.
Look for: the big white POCARI SWEAT letters.
See the Fukuroi factory ↓Official range (Japanese) ↗
ASAHI · SWEET & TANGY
Calpis Water
カルピスウォーター
A milky-looking, sweet-and-tangy drink made with fermented milk. The word “Water” means this version is ready to drink — it is not plain water.
Water or Soda? Calpis Water is still; カルピスソーダ adds bubbles. It contains milk.
Official range (Japanese) ↗
ASAHI · A JAPANESE SODA CLASSIC
Mitsuya Cider
三ツ矢サイダー
Here, “cider” is a sweet, non-alcoholic fizzy drink. The classic clear soda is a good name to know before exploring the brand’s changing fruit flavours.
Look for: 三ツ矢, “three arrows”. The original is a soda, not an alcoholic apple cider.
Official range (Japanese) ↗
PLAIN WATER · READ THE FULL NAME
Natural water
天然水 · い・ろ・は・す
For plain water, look for 天然水 — tennensui, natural water. The green pinwheel on these bottles marks I LOHAS, a Japanese natural mineral water brand.
Plain or flavoured? I LOHAS also has fruit drinks, including pear and peach. The brand name alone does not mean plain, unsweetened water.
Suntory Tennensui is another name to know. Its four source areas are Minami Alps, Kita Alps, Oku-Daisen and Aso: read the source name on your bottle for a tiny geography lesson.
I LOHAS (Japanese) ↗ Suntory’s four sources (Japanese) ↗
OTSUKA · SMALL BOTTLE, BIG FIZZ
Oronamin C
オロナミンC
A small brown bottle with a red label, a sweet citrus-like taste and carbonation. A longstanding Japanese vitamin drink, distinct from the larger energy-drink cans.
On the same shelf: energy drinks such as ZONe are another category to explore. Check the can’s caffeine information and serving size.
Oronamin C (Japanese) ↗ ZONe (Japanese) ↗
MANY LOCAL MAKERS · MARBLE BOTTLE
Ramune
ラムネ
The marble in the neck is part of the fun. This fizzy drink often turns up around festivals, sightseeing streets and souvenir shops.
A small ritual: follow the bottle’s instructions to push the marble down. It is a drink to open when you have a moment to stop.
A Japanese ramune maker ↗Photo credits & reading notes
This is an independent editorial guide. Brand names identify the drinks; no maker endorses this page. The shelf and drink photographs marked October 2026 show products found on that visit. Other photographs are dated individually. The official links describe current ranges; stock varies by store and season.
Commons photographs are credited individually below. The linked licence applies to each image, not to the whole page. Trademark rights remain with their owners.
- Mitsuya Cider Bottle.jpg — RadioActive~commonswiki (attribution on Commons). CC BY-SA 3.0. Displayed without cropping.
- Otsuka - Oronamin C Drink.jpg — Quercus acuta. CC0. Displayed without cropping.
- Ramune by Kimura Drink Co Ltd.jpg — Alexande rKlink. CC BY 4.0. Displayed without cropping.
Product and label references were checked on 3 October 2026; the tea, barley-tea and water additions were checked on 5 October 2026. Maker links in each section are the starting point for ingredients, allergens and current packaging.
