LEGOLAND Discovery Center Tokyo – Our Review

LEGOLAND Discovery Center Tokyo is an indoor playground for all lego lovers. Here is a review of our visit over there with our family.

On our trip to Japan, we visited the local LEGOLAND Discovery Center which is in Tokyo. We were hoping for a relaxing and fun day since we were quite exhausted from touring around the country.

We have a LEGOLAND Discovery Center very close to where we live in California, and we knew that our daughter would for sure enjoy this visit. Legos have been a big part of her childhood and she started playing with them already when she was quite small. She has had everything from Duplos to Lego Juniors and Classics, and has always enjoyed building different lego sets.

Tokyo Legoland Discovery Center is located on the island of Odaiba at Tokyo Beach Island Mall. Getting to Odaiba from all over Tokyo is very easy with the local train. We used trains everyday during our Japan trip since we had the Japan Rail Pass, and it was very convenient.

What is the difference between Legoland and Legoland Discovery Center?

We have all heard about the big LEGOLAND Parks that originated from Billund, Denmark. LEGOLAND is a big, outdoor amusement park, whereas LEGOLAND Discovery Center on the other hand is a smaller, inside playground. Both of them are lego themed but very different from each other.

There are a total of 11 LEGOLAND Parks all around the world, and yes, they do also have one in Japan too. But that is not to be confused with the LEGOLAND Discovery Center. LEGOLAND Discovery Center is locater in Tokyo but the LEGOLAND Japan Resort is actually in Nagoya.

LEGOLAND Discovery Center is a perfect place for a few hours of fun. There is usually several play areas, lego building areas and one or two rides. Some of them also have restaurants in them. LEGOLAND Parks however, have enough things to do and see for a whole day.

Our experience of Legoland Discovery Center in Tokyo

We started our tour of the LEGOLAND Discovery Center Tokyo from their Miniland. This is perhaps the area that the adults will enjoy the most as it has different cities and places built from legos. There were many places we had just seen in Japan and recognised, and it was so much fun.

Most of the Miniland cities were lit and we thought it was amazing how they were able to build all that out of legos. This area has over 1.5 million legos!

They also had a 4D Cinema where they were showing a Lego movie but we skipped that because we wanted to spend our time playing and staying active.

We headed out to the play areas where you can build and play with legos, and as you can probably guess they had several of those. For example the Duplo Village and Model Builder’s Workshop were fun, so was the City Builders area.

At Lego Factory you can learn how legos are made. You can craft your own lego piece and watch it come down from the tubes. They make over 100,000 special lego brick every year.

There is also a separate play area without legos and a karaoke for kids. Our daughter made some new friends while playing there even though they didn’t have a mutual language. It was very cute!

The LEGOLAND Discovery Center only has two rides. The other one is Merlin themed from the tale Sword in the Stone. Merlin’s Apprentice is basically just a carousel where the cars went up and down. And the other ride is called The Kingdom Quest ride. On that one you try to save a princess from trolls.

Smaller kids must be accompanied by an adult for both rides.

The City Builders area was downstairs and we saw many warning signs saying that once we take the stairs down, we wont be able to return. This was a little confusing since we didn’t know how big the downstairs area would be and we weren’t sure if we were ready to leave yet.

The downstairs only had The City Builders area which wasn’t huge, a souvenir shop and a restaurant. We didn’t end up eating there, but I can see that could be a fun place for a birthday party for example.  

Our tip: Buy the tickets from online beforehand as they are more expensive if you purchase them from the door!

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In overall the LEGOLAND Discovery Center is great if you are looking for a couple hours of fun and your kid is really into legos. Otherwise we felt like we went through the whole place very quickly, and I definitely wouldn’t make a trip over there from far away.

Since we had prepared to spend a whole day there and we didn’t, we quickly noticed that the Tokyo Beach Island Mall had many other things to do with kids too. You could easily combine a whole fun day over there by visiting all the places it offers. We ended up going to the Trick Art Museum there and it was so much fun!

During our two weeks in Japan we also visited many places our daughter loved. For example the Kawaii Monster Cafe and the Moomin Cafe. Japan is really great with kids and we hope to go back soon again!

🇯🇵 OUR JAPAN TRAVEL RESOURCES 🇯🇵

⛩ Read from here about the things your should know before traveling to Japan.
🍣 While in Japan, make sure to try out at least these foods and treats.
🗝 Hotels & Vacation Rentals: We usually find the best hotel deals here and also check this site.
Vacation homes and condos we book through VRBO.
🚗 Car Rentals: We compare rental car prices on DiscoverCars to find the best deals worldwide.
🚄 Train: If you are visiting multiple cities in Japan we recommend taking the train. Here is
everything you need to know about traveling by train in Japan. We got our JR Pass from here.
🗺 Tours & Activities: We usually book tours through Viator or GetYourGuide.
Both have huge selections and easy cancellation.
✈️ Flights & Online Security: We use VPN when searching for flights.
📞 Travel eSIM & Data: For mobile data in Japan, we used Yesim and it worked well for that.
🩹 Travel Insurance: We always travel with insurance and use SafetyWing on our trips.