Pokemon Karaoke Manekineko 30th Anniversary 2026 Guide

Last updated: April 20, 2026. Dates, store counts, and giveaway rules re-checked against the official Karaoke Manekineko collaboration page and the Koshidaka Holdings press release on the same day.

Pokemon 30th x Karaoke Manekineko — one themed collab room per prefecture, launching April 24, 2026

Pokemon 30th Anniversary x Karaoke Manekineko opens April 24, 2026 at 13:00 JST across about 700 Manekineko stores nationwide, with 45 dedicated Pokemon collab rooms — one room in each of 45 prefectures (the full list of Japan's 47 prefectures minus the two where Manekineko does not operate) — and 100 stores carrying the three-tier premium pack plans. The campaign runs through June 14, 2026, the Pokemon Room top-up is a flat ¥1,500 per person tax included on top of the standard Manekineko room rate, the theme is "singing" (utau 歌う) tied to Pokemon's 30th anniversary year, and the roster stars Meowth (ニャース) and Sprigatito (ニャオハ) alongside the rest of the cat-name (neko/nya) Pokemon family. Collab-room reservations opened at 18:00 JST on April 20, 2026, which is today.

I have sung karaoke at Manekineko branches in Shinjuku, Namba, and Sapporo during past campaigns, and the "one themed room per prefecture" idea is a first in the chain's history. If you are planning a Japan trip in late April, Golden Week, or May, this is the rare collab that works the same way if you land in Tokyo, Fukuoka, or Naha — and the Meowth beer mug is the first piece of Pokemon 30th merch you cannot buy anywhere else.

Quick booking: lock in your JR Pass on Klook — the collab rooms are spread across 45 prefectures, so a JR Pass makes it cheap to hit two or three on the same trip (Tokyo + Osaka + Kyoto is the easy combo).

At a Glance

What Is the Pokemon 30th x Karaoke Manekineko Collab?

This is Koshidaka's biggest single-brand karaoke campaign since the chain's founding, and the first time in Manekineko's history that one IP takes over dedicated themed rooms in every prefecture simultaneously. The press release frames it around the 30th anniversary's "singing" theme, and the creative hook is that every featured Pokemon shares the cat or nya (ニャ) sound — the official miki800 mirror quotes Koshidaka as calling it a gathering of "ネコ・ニャのつくポケモンとその仲間たち" ("the Pokemon with cat or nya in their names, and their friends").

The chain runs three layers at once. First, all 700 participating stores get the campaign visuals, the 9 original wallpaper images awarded randomly for singing designated songs, and the 21 playback-style cards handed out one per food order. Second, 100 selected stores sell the three tiered premium pack plans (Monsterball, Superball, Hyperball) that bundle a room rate, a drink bar, and exclusive randomized merch. Third, 45 dedicated Pokemon collab rooms — one per prefecture — give room-level themed decor plus a limited one-design clear file only room users receive.

What makes it different: the entry cost is lower than almost any other Pokemon experience in Japan. PokePark Kanto tickets run to the high thousands of yen; the Pokemon Center DX cafe is usually reservation-locked weeks in advance. At Manekineko you pay the normal per-person room rate (weekday daytime is as low as single-digit to low hundreds of yen per 30 minutes), plus the one-drink-per-person minimum, and you have a themed Pokemon room for an hour — before any pack plan or food upcharge.

When and Where Can I Visit?

Campaign dates are identical nationwide, but the collab-room store list is staggered across all 45 prefectures. Premium packs are at 100 stores that overlap heavily with the collab-room 45.

Manekineko's 2026 room-rate bands are the same nationwide: ¥10 to ¥200 per 30 minutes before 18:00 or 19:00 depending on region, and ¥250 to ¥500 per 30 minutes after. First-time visitors pay a ¥200 registration fee and usually need photo ID — a passport is fine.

What Is on the Menu?

Every participating store carries the collab food menu served on a campaign-exclusive original tray, and every food order triggers one randomly-selected playback-style card (全21種). The official lineup published so far includes potato fries and wakadori karaage (young-chicken fried chicken), with additional items to be revealed store-side on the April 24 launch.

The pack plans bundle the room rate, the drink bar, and exclusive merch. Here is the official tier breakdown from Koshidaka's announcement as carried by gamebiz and YOUTH TIME JAPAN.

Specific yen prices for the three pack tiers are not yet published on the collaboration page at the time of writing and will be confirmed when April 24 in-store menus go live.

How Do I Actually Book a Collab Room From Overseas?

The reservation system is Japanese-only and the PDF store list uses Japanese prefecture names. This is the part that trips up first-time visitors.

graph TD
    A[Want a Pokemon collab room?] --> B{Speak or read Japanese?}
    B -->|Yes| C[Book at collabo.karaokemanekineko.jp/list/pokemon_30th]
    B -->|No| D{Do you have a Japanese-reading friend?}
    D -->|Yes| C
    D -->|No| E[Ask your hotel concierge to book for you]
    E --> F[Show passport at check-in, pay base room rate plus 1,500 yen per person top-up on site]
    C --> F

If you cannot read Japanese and do not have a hotel concierge, the workaround that works well in past Manekineko collabs is to walk in at a non-collab-room branch, order the pack plan at the counter with a printout of the Japanese pack name, and accept that you will not get the single-design clear file (that one is collab-room-only). You still get the cup, coaster, card, wallpapers, and optional acrylic stick.

For a structured itinerary, the easiest multi-prefecture trip is Tokyo to Kyoto to Osaka to Fukuoka by JR Pass — four collab rooms, three cities, one weekend.

Check JR Pass prices on Klook — the 7-day ordinary pass pays for itself in a single Tokyo-Osaka round trip, and the collab rooms run for 52 days, so any GW or May trip timing works.

What Giveaways Can I Actually Get?

The campaign runs four separate giveaway tracks, each with a different trigger.

1. 9 original wallpaper images (all stores) — sing one of the designated Pokemon campaign songs. The touchscreen remote delivers the wallpaper to your phone by QR code on the spot. All 9 types are randomly distributed.
2. 21 playback-style cards (all stores) — one random card per food item purchased. Order three separate food items, get three cards. Trading with friends in the room is the only realistic way to chase a full set.
3. Meowth beer mug (top 100 singers, all stores) — total singing activity is counted across the campaign period. The top 100 Manekineko-wide singers receive an original Meowth-face beer mug.
4. Clear file (collab-room users only) — one single design. Given automatically to anyone booked into a prefecture collab room.

Why Japanese People Love This

Karaoke in Japan is not a novelty night out — it is the default Friday evening for office workers, the cheapest birthday venue for teenagers, and the rainy-afternoon backup plan for families. Koshidaka's Manekineko chain built its market share on the bring-your-own-food rule and on pricing that starts at single-digit yen per 30 minutes during daytime. When Pokemon and a karaoke brand line up a 30th anniversary crossover, the fan base treats it the way overseas fans treat a limited-edition Starbucks mug drop: Japanese Pokemon collector Twitter users were posting prefecture-hop itineraries within hours of the Koshidaka press release going live. The "one themed room per prefecture" structure is set up as a domestic-travel prompt — a ibasho junrei (居場所巡礼, "place pilgrimage") that rewards anyone who can show photos from rooms in five or six prefectures on their social feeds during Golden Week.

Is This a Good Trip for Families or Solo Travelers?

For solo travelers, a weekday afternoon collab-room slot is the lowest-friction Pokemon experience in Japan — under an hour of total time and about ¥2,000 to ¥2,500 per person once you add the ¥1,500 Pokemon Room top-up, the base room rate, and the one-order minimum. For families, Monsterball or Superball bookings guarantee every kid goes home with a Pokemon cup and coaster; elementary-school children and younger get ¥500 off the Pokemon Room top-up, and Manekineko allows outside food (rare among Japanese karaoke chains), so a budget bento turns the visit into a full Pokemon party.

Anime fans can chain this with the Demon Slayer ufotable rerun cafe for a cafe-then-karaoke day in Tokyo, or with the Apothecary Diaries Oshi-tabi Osaka shinkansen tie-in for a Kansai route.

Book your JR Pass on Klook now — the 52-day campaign window covers Golden Week, May weekends, and the first two weeks of June. Reservations for peak Golden Week slots are already filling. Start with the easiest two-prefecture combo (Tokyo-Kanagawa or Osaka-Kyoto) and expand from there.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Do I need to speak Japanese to use Karaoke Manekineko?

The touchscreen song-selection remote has an English mode — switch it at the pull-down language menu on the main screen. Counter staff speak limited English but are used to passport-only foreign visitors. Food and drink orders are visual enough on the room tablet that pointing works. First-time registration takes about 3 minutes with a passport.

Q: How much does a 60-minute Pokemon Room session cost?

Before 18:00 or 19:00 (depending on region) the standard Manekineko room rate is between ¥10 and ¥200 per 30 minutes per person at most branches. After 18:00 or 19:00 the rate rises to ¥250 to ¥500 per 30 minutes per person. Pokemon Rooms add a flat ¥1,500 per person (tax included) top-up on top of that base rate, regardless of how long your slot runs. Add the one-order-per-person minimum — a drink-bar is usually ¥300 to ¥400 per person, or a soft drink is about ¥300. A weekday afternoon Pokemon Room visit with a solo booking lands around ¥2,000 to ¥2,500 all-in before any pack-plan upgrade; a weekend evening visit can reach ¥3,000 to ¥3,500 per person.

Q: Can I walk in without a reservation?

Yes for the general karaoke experience and the all-store giveaways (wallpapers plus cards). No for the 45 dedicated Pokemon collab rooms — those are reservation-only through the official site. If you want a collab room and peak slots are gone, the backup is the Monsterball pack at any of the 100 pack-plan stores, which still earns you the cup, coaster, and card.

Q: Can I get the Pokemon 30th merch from the campaign without singing?

The clear file requires booking a collab room — no alternative. The 21 playback cards require a food order. The 9 wallpapers require singing a designated campaign song, which you can do without any pack plan upgrade. The top-100 Meowth beer mug is campaign-wide volume ranking and is out of reach for a one-visit tourist.

Q: Will the same room decor be in every prefecture?

The collab-room artwork uses the same core lineup of cat-family Pokemon (led by Meowth and Sprigatito), but the specific room layout varies by store. Koshidaka has not confirmed prefecture-unique variants, so the "45 rooms = 45 themes" hope is unconfirmed as of April 20. Treat the 45 rooms as one single themed environment distributed nationally.

Sources

• Karaoke Manekineko official collaboration page (Japanese) — campaign period, ¥1,500 per person Pokemon Room top-up, reservation timing, pack plan visuals
• Koshidaka Holdings press release on PR TIMES (Japanese) — 45-prefecture collab-room count, 700-store scope
• YOUTH TIME JAPAN event coverage (Japanese) — pack-tier breakdown, giveaway mechanics, food menu hints
• collabo-cafe.com campaign brief (Japanese) — 21-card playback giveaway rule, 9-wallpaper rule, ¥500 elementary-and-younger discount

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