Japanese railway company JR East has been announcing a slew of changes recently to Suica, its popular IC transportation card. Most of these changes have been greeted with open arms by Suica users. However, one change has Suica fans in an uproar.
No more Suica penguin in 2026
Picture: DepositPhotos
The Suica card debuted in 2001. Sporting the “Made in Japan” FeliCa integrated circuit chip, it’s used not just for transit fares, but as a form of cashless payment at over two million locations across Japan. The name is short for “Super Urban Intelligent Card,” and is also the Japanese word for “watermelon” (hence its green color).
Visually, the card is also known for its mascot, a penguin. The now-iconic character is the work of illustrator and children’s book author Sakazaki Chiharu, taken from a series of books she began writing in 1998. While the character has no official name, some fans have taken to calling it “Suippi.”
The Suica penguin has adorned the card for over two decades. However, all good things must come to an end (apparently, for some reason).
This week, JR East announced that end will come in 2026, when the Suica penguin will officially retire. The company says it will replace him with a new character yet to be designed. It will solicit customer feedback on the new design using methods still to be determined.
Users online are heartbroken
A bronze statue of the Suica penguin near Tokyo’s Shinjuku Station. (Picture: Kangsadarn.S / Shutterstock)
Japanese users online have reacted to the news with a huge helping of sadness and nostalgia. The LiveDoor News X post on this story has 130K likes and almost 2,000 comments – most of them confused.
“Is there a reason for the change?” one pondered. “This character has transcended JR. Throwing away such a beloved character is like Hanshin replacing the tiger.”
Another user was less polite. “Wha? Cut this shit out! If you fire the penguin, I’m no longer using JR East.”
(JR East operates several critical lines in Tokyo, including the Yamanote. So…good luck with that, buddy.)
Yet another decided instead to wax nostalgic by reposting the first ad ever run for the card back in 2001:
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“The penguin, arriving from the distant South Pole in Tokyo, was confused,” the copy reads. “While he could get around in the ocean swimmingly, he couldn’t navigate Tokyo. Then, one day, he met Suica.”
Others called for JR East to reconsider its decision. One popular post is a graphic reading, “We Resolutely Demand Rescinding His Retirement,” along with the hashtag “We oppose the Suica penguin’s retirement.”
Even other train companies got in on the act. The official account for Koto-chan, the mascot for Kotoden (Takamatsu-Kotohira Electric Railroad) in Kagawa Prefecture, wrote: “An unforeseen retirement – thanks for everything. I’m a squid, but that’s penguin-adjacent, so I’m available to sub in.”
The changing face of Suica
The move comes as JR East makes sweeping changes to the Suica card to keep pace with a changing market.
In recent months, the company has said it will add new services to the card, such as a subscription service for regular riders. It also plans to launch a GPS-based card in 2028 to enable gateless entry.
The company is also making moves to make Suica more attractive as a cashless payment option. Next year, it will raise the card’s paltry 20,000 yen ($129) prepaid balance to several hundred thousand yen, which will enable users to make larger purchases at locations such as shopping malls. (JR East owns and operates the popular Atre shopping malls inside its train stations.)
The move is intended to position Suica better against PayPay, which is currently Japan’s leading app for cashless payments. PayPay uses QR codes and barcodes, making it cheaper to implement. By contrast, Suica’s FeliCa chip is notoriously expensive to implement and support, giving PayPay a massive foothold in many smaller businesses across Japan. To counter this advantage, the Suica app will also support QR code and barcode scans in a future release.
Hands off the mascot
Don Quixote is also working to retire its iconic mascot, Donpen. (Picture: Unseen Japan)
None of this, of course, explains why JR East thinks that means they need to replace a character beloved by so many. Indeed, one would think they would have learned from other companies’ mistakes.
In 2022, quirky 24-hour retailer Don Quixote announced it would replace its beloved character, Donpen, with a new logo – a stylistic variation on the Japanese katakana character “do” (ド). Fans were outraged, and the company swiftly backed down.
At the time, customers accused Donki of crafting a fake announcement to garner social media attention. Company reps denied the allegation.
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“Noah [at Unseen Japan] put together an itinerary that didn’t lock us in and we could travel at our own pace. In Tokyo, he guided us personally on a walking tour. Overall, he made our Japan trip an experience not to forget.” – Kate and Simon S., Australia
See a side of Tokyo that other tourists can’t. Book a tour with Unseen Japan Tours – we’ll tailor your trip to your interests and guide you through experiences usually closed off to non-Japanese speakers.
Want more news and views from Japan? Donate $5/month ($60 one-time donation) to the Unseen Japan Journalism Fund to join Unseen Japan Insider. You’ll get our Insider newsletter with more news and deep dives, a chance to get your burning Japan questions answered, and a voice in our future editorial direction.
Could this all be a PR campaign by JR East designed to grab eyeballs? Possibly. It’s also possible that the company just failed to think this through. I guess we’ll know in a few days whether it intends to stick to its guns.
Sources
ＪＲ東日本「Ｓｕｉｃａ」のペンギン、来年度末で「卒業」…新キャラクターにバトンタッチへ. LiveDoor News
Suica. Wikipedia JP
ドンペン卒業一転、続投へ ドン・キホーテが謝罪文「大変お騒がせしました」ネタ説は否定 公式キャラクター交代に批判殺到. Kobe Shimbun
AloJapan.com