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Suica is available for free as a mobile payment method on modern phones and works perfectly. It’s only physical card sales that were suspended in some places.

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Sucia requires Osaifu-Keita [1] technology. From my research, the hardware is only available in international iPhone models or models of Android phones that are (largely) sold in Japan.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osaifu-Keitai

For Apple, the details are at https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207154

iPhone 8/8-plus or later, Apple Watch Series 3 or later, you’re fine, regardless of where you bought the phone.

Thanks. I suspected there was more to it on the iPhone side, but I'm an Android user and hadn't dug in to it as much.

I was not able to register my foreign phone for Suica when in Japan last February, I had to get a physical card. Maybe it's changed since then?

iPhones work but foreign (outside of Japan) purchased Android devices don't

My understanding is that Android phones purchased in Japan can activate a Suica card. Foreign iPhones are able to register Suica without issue. The only hiccup I had was loading a balance on Suica wasn’t possible with Visa cards. This was the case during my trip this past October.

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