Related
This discussion has been locked.
You can no longer post new replies to this discussion. If you have a question you can start a new discussion

Can I use Garmin Pay + Suica in Japan?

VJ.Xess
over 3 years ago

I see now Garmin Pay support Japanese IC Card Suica. If I already have vivoactive 4 bought outside Japan and travel to Japan , can I add suica card to my vivoactive 4 and use for pay train transit or not? 

  • +1 over 3 years ago

    The Garmin Japan site says it is only available for Japanese versions.

    URL (Japanese): https://support.garmin.com/ja-JP/?faq=yRQe6HwAE84G0jTwQcfF79&searchQuery=KM1355197

    Japan's myriad NFC services like Suica, iD, Nanaco, Edy, etc. all use the Sony-developed FeliCa (NFC-F) standard, which is different from most services in the rest of the world which use NFC-A/B.

    As a result, a lot of manufacturers leave out NFC-F support to save money unless a device is specifically targeted at the Japanese market. Many people visiting Japan are bummed out to find that they can't put Suica or other Japanese NFC services on their foreign phone because it doesn't support FeliCa. (Unless they are iPhone users because Apple doesn't make a specific Japanese version of its phones, so all of its phones support FeliCa)

    I don't know if this is the reason why Garmin Pay isn't available on non-Japanese watches, but it's likely to be the case. Otherwise it might be a licensing issue with JR East.

    If you are only visiting Japan temporarily, virtual Suica cards like the one offered with Garmin Pay aren't a good deal anyway because you cannot get the balance refunded when you no longer need it unless you have a Japanese bank account for them to transfer the funds to. It's better to get the card version because you can get the balance refunded as cash when you leave. Or you can just spend the balance and keep the card as a memento.

  • 0 over 2 years ago

    Hello,

    So have you been able to use suica on your watch in Japan? 

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to Kinotora

    Only if your Garmin watch is a Japanese model. Non-Japanese models don't support Suica.

    Other Asian models might be able to use Suica if the right software is downloaded to the device, but non-Asian models do not have the right NFC hardware to support Suica.