Shibu-no-yu
渋の湯
Does Shibu-no-yu allow tattoos? Yes!
A district bathhouse whose scalding source used to be diluted until a compact bamboo cooling rack was fitted, and now it runs undiluted at full strength. Steam bursts out of the ground next to it, not in a steady stream but in breaths.
The building belongs to Beppu City and the Kannawa district runs it, and both of the city’s channels say tattoos are fine here: the facility page on its onsen site and the タトゥー可 mark in its tourism data. Payment is the oddity, not the tattoo. You put a hundred-yen coin in the locker, and that stands as your entry fee.
The bath
There is no counter and nobody to pay. You put a hundred-yen coin into the coin locker, and that coin is the entry fee.
The bathing room is laid and tubbed in Towada stone, the bluish stone out of Aomori, which gives the place a cooler cast than white tile would. What brings people back is the mineral load, and metasilicic acid in particular. The bath was mixed until about seventy-five years ago, when the men’s and women’s entrances were divided; the partition inside the bathing room itself is younger still, about sixty years old, so the room keeps the shape of the older arrangement. Behind the building are the remains of Taki-no-yu, the waterfall bath that used to stand there, and two stones cut as a sun and a moon.
Open 06:30 to 21:00 with last entry at 20:30. Nothing is supplied and there is no car park. Beppu City owns the building and the Kannawa district runs it.
What is good about it
- A hundred-yen coin in the locker, and that is your admission, since nobody is on the desk.
- Towada stone in the room and the tub, bluish, and cooler in tone than tile.
- Last entry 20:30, nothing supplied, so bring soap and a towel; there is no parking either.
Getting there
A minute uphill from the municipal steam bath in Kannawa. The Kannawa bus stop is about twenty minutes from the west exit of JR Beppu STN, and the bath is three or four minutes on foot from the stop.
Beppu Daigaku STN · JR Nippo line; buses 2, 5, 7 and 41 run to Kannawa from the west exit of Beppu STN
About 20 minutes by bus, then 3 or 4 minutes on foot uphill.
No parking; use the Kannawa district lots.
Where it is
Hakata STN
JR Sonic limited express 1 h 55
Kokura STN
Oita STN
✈Oita Airport
LocationBeppu Daigaku STN
What happens when you arrive
Check in and go to the bath. There is no seal to buy and nothing to declare.
How we know
Confirmed from the operator side (Beppu City, which owns the bath): its enjoyONSEN facility page and the タトゥー可 mark on the city tourism listing, dated 30 June 2026
Read on: enjoyonsen.city.beppu-jp.com/onsen/shibunoyu/
TATTOO：Allowed
The operator’s own wording on that page. Nothing here needs showing at a desk. If anyone does ask, show them this. It is the operator’s own wording.
Best for: Source water cooled without a drop of added water, for the price of a locker
06:30–21:00, last entry 20:30, 100 yen through the coin locker, which counts as admission. No parking. The 85°C source is cooled to about 60°C by a small bamboo cooling rack of the kind Hyotan Onsen developed, so no water is added. Look for the sun and moon stones on the back wall.
Find a hotel nearby →Booking through this button costs you nothing extra and sends a small commission our way — it’s what keeps this guide free for our tattoo community, and every policy on it checked. Thank you.