Where Can You Eat Standing Udon Near Akihabara? Oniyanma Ochanomizu, Priced and Photographed

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I ate here on 31 October 2026 at about 7:20 pm and photographed the sign, the ticket machine and the payment stickers. Every price below is what the machine showed that evening.

Oniyanma in Ochanomizu is a standing-only udon counter with a ticket machine that has an English mode. A plain bowl is ¥380 and the bowl I ate, with five pieces of tempura in large size, is ¥1,060. It does not take cash: you pay by credit card, transport IC card or a QR app. It opens at 7am and is a short walk from JR Ochanomizu station, about fifteen minutes on foot from Akihabara by my estimate.

What is Oniyanma?

A standing udon shop. The sign says udon in large brush letters and おにやんま in hiragana beside a dragonfly. I have not seen the name written in roman letters on the shop itself; the Tabelog English page spells it Oniyanma, so that is the spelling I use here. The shop is named Oniyanma Ochanomizu-ten, the Ochanomizu branch.

There is no seating. The shop is a narrow room with a single wooden counter along one wall. You order and pay at the ticket machine in the doorway, carry the paper ticket inside, and eat standing up.

How far is it from Akihabara?

About fifteen minutes on foot from JR Akihabara station, going west towards Ochanomizu. That figure is my estimate and I did not time it. What I can confirm is the other end: Tabelog lists the shop at 73 metres from JR Ochanomizu station, at the Hijiri-bashi exit side.

If you are on my Akihabara anime tour, I would not walk here just for lunch. If you are already at the Ochanomizu end for the instrument shops or the Kanda river, it is a quick, cheap meal.

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Does it really not take cash?

Correct, it does not take cash, and it does take cards. There is a handwritten notice beside the machine that reads 現金は使えません, "cash cannot be used". The payment screen on the machine offers three choices only: credit card, electronic money and barcode payment. There is no cash slot option.

The sticker sheet shows these, as printed:

• Credit cards: Visa, Mastercard, JCB, American Express, Diners Club, Discover.
• Electronic money: Suica and the other regional transport IC cards, WAON, nanaco, Rakuten Edy, iD.
• QR and barcode: PayPay, au PAY, d払い, Rakuten Pay, Merpay, Yucho Pay, WeChat Pay, Alipay.

So a foreign Visa card and a phone wallet with an IC card are both fine. Whether a contactless tap on a foreign card works is something I did not test.

Does the ticket machine have English?

Yes. The start screen has 日本語 and English buttons, and the ordering screen has a Language button at the top. In English mode each dish gets a description under the Japanese name. The English is rough ("chiken", "Big s…" cut off), but the price is printed clearly under every item, which is all you need.

Tabs across the top, in English on the machine: Warm Udon with Dashi, Cold udon (two tabs), topping, and Monthly / Weekly. Every hot dish has a 並 (regular) and a 大 (large) button side by side. Pick the dish, press Enter, choose how to pay, take the ticket.

What does it cost?

¥380 for a plain hot bowl, up to ¥1,260 for the large Deluxe. These are the hot udon prices from the machine, regular and large as printed side by side.

A chalkboard outside also lists cold bukkake udon, from ¥380, and says toppings start at ¥50. A handwritten card on the machine advertises a weekly special, squid tempura at ¥200. I did not order from the cold tabs and did not photograph the topping tab, so I cannot list those prices from the machine.

The shop advertises the Chicken Tempura and Fish Cake bowl as its recommendation: it carries the 〜おすすめ〜 (recommended) mark on the machine and the board marks the cold chicken-tempura bowl as the most popular.

What I ate. The large Five-Piece Tempura udon, which is ¥1,060 on the machine. The ticket reads 温「大」特上天ぷら and the bowl came with two prawns, a sweet potato piece, a carrot piece and chopped green onion.

How does standing work?

You buy the ticket first, then go in. A sign by the door says to buy a food ticket before lining up. The entrance has a notice asking people not to queue in front of the doorway, and a small board saying the ticket machine and the entrance are on the left. The door in the middle of the front is marked 出口, the exit.

Inside, there is one long counter, narrow enough that only one line of people can stand along it, with clear dividers between places and a cloth for wiping your spot. Bags are put on the floor beside you. I did not count the places, so I cannot say how many people fit.

When is it open?

07:00 to 22:30 on weekdays and 07:00 to 22:00 on Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays. This is printed on a small notice at the entrance, and Tabelog lists the same hours (checked 4 November 2026). A blackboard by the door says 無休, which means no regular closing day. Tabelog also advises checking before you go, as hours can change.

Is there anything for vegetarians?

Unconfirmed, and I would assume no. The machine describes the hot bowls as "hot udon in hot soup", and the soup is dashi. Udon dashi in Japan is usually made with fish, but I have not confirmed what this shop uses and I did not ask. The chikuwa bowl is described on the machine as "chicken tempura and fish", and the beef bowls are obviously meat. If you are strictly vegetarian or vegan, ask the staff before you pay, because you cannot undo a ticket.

Is there an English menu?

The ticket machine is the menu, and it has English. There is no separate English menu that I saw. The chalkboard outside is Japanese only. See the machine section above for how the English mode looks.

How does it compare to the other cheap places?

It is the budget and speed option, and the one on this site that is in Ochanomizu rather than Akihabara. For a sit-down meal I would go to the places on Where should you eat in Akihabara?, which also has the ramen shop IFU and the other places I have photographed. Oniyanma is for a quick hot bowl, standing, early in the morning or late at night.

In one table

Frequently asked questions

Can I use my Visa or Mastercard at Oniyanma? The sticker sheet shows Visa and Mastercard, and the machine has a credit card option. I did not test a foreign card myself.

Do I need to speak Japanese? No. The machine has an English mode, prices are on every button, and you hand the printed ticket to the staff at the counter.

Is it open early for breakfast? It opens at 07:00 every day. Tabelog reviewers mention a morning udon set; I did not see it on the machine or the board and cannot tell you what it includes.

Can I bring luggage? It is a narrow standing counter and I saw customers putting bags on the floor beside them. There is no luggage space that I saw. Leave a big case elsewhere.

Sources and honesty note

Prices, dish names, the English mode, the payment screen, the payment stickers, the cash notice and the opening hours notice are transcribed from my own photographs taken on 31 October 2026. The address (4-5 Kanda-Surugadai, Chiyoda-ku) and the 73 m distance from JR Ochanomizu come from the Tabelog English page, checked on 4 November 2026; its hours match the notice I photographed. I could not load the shop's official website. The walking time from Akihabara is my estimate and not timed. The soup ingredients, number of places, morning set and cold and topping prices are unconfirmed.

No affiliate links. I wrote this page because guests ask where to eat cheaply, quickly and standing up, and because the cash-free rule is the thing that catches people out.

About the author. I am Yuuki, an anime tour guide based in Akihabara. I run private anime tours in English most weeks, and I have watched over 1,500 anime series, which is either a qualification or a warning depending on your point of view.

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