This post may contain affiliate links to tours and hotels. These help us earn a small commission at no additional charge to you.
A little bit of Italy in Japan, Saizeriya is a cheap and cheerful Italian chain restaurant in Italy which is popular with younger diners, families and budget travellers (so us!).
Whilst the quality of food varies, Saizeriya in Japan is certainly a very cheap place to eat out in Japan and hugely popular with locations in cities like Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya.
From the price of pizzas to menus and specialities (and their ridiculously cheap wine), here is our guide to the Saizeriya Italian restaurant chain in Japan.
What is Saizeriya?
Saizeriya is a successful chain of Italian style restaurants operating in Japan (its biggest location), Taiwan, China and Singapore.
Saiyeriya serves up Italian style dishes like pizza and pasta at low prices and in high volumes.
As well as standard dishes like margarita pizza or carbonara pasta and spaghetti bolognese, Saizerya is popular for pan-European dishes like grilled snails (escargot) and incredibly cheap wine and other alcohol, plus their all you eat salad bar and all you can drink soft drink bar.
In early 2024, Saizeriya (headquartered in Yoshikawa, Saitama) announced their profits had recently doubled on the back of both Japanese and Chinese customers visiting Saizeriya more because of their low prices and current recession.
You might like – Guide to the Cup Noodles Museum in Yokohama >
The history of Saizeriya
Saizeriya began in Japan in 1974, starting life as western style restaurant in Ichikawa, Chiba.
The current president of Saizeriya Yasuhiko Shōgaki started off in a junior position in the restaurant and quickly became promoted, transforming this one off restaurant into an Italian food focussed eatery.
People stopped coming until huge price discounts made it very popular and eventually, the model was rolled out nationwide, becoming a huge chain of Italian restaurants across Japan. Va bene (OK in Italian).
In Japanese, Saizeriya is “ サイゼリヤ” and sometimes shortened to “Saize” (サイゼ) – interestingly, most of its ingredients (and cheap wine) is sourced and manufactured in Australia.
You might like – Guide to Don Quijote stores in Japan >
How many Saizeriya restaurants are there in Japan?
As of 2024, there are over 1,100 Saizeriya restaurants in Japan (now that is a LOT of pizza and pasta!).
There are also around 30 Saizeriya restaurants in Singapore plus around another 500 Saizeriya Italian restaurants spread across China, Taiwan and Hong Kong (source, Saizeriya Annual Report 2023).
In total, there are around 1600 Saizeriya restaurants worldwide as of early 2024.
Saizeriya’s philosophy across all its restaurants across Asia is ‘La Buona Tavola’ which means (roughly) good food or fine dining.
The restaurant achieved sales of 183,244 million Yen in 2023 so pizza and pasta is big business!
You might like – Guide to 7-Eleven stores in Japan >
Saizeriya Japan prices
The main reason for Saizeriya’s popularity in Japan? Put simply, Saizeriya is very low cost with pizzas starting from only 364 Yen plus tax. This is the equivalent of £1.90 / $2.40 USD / €2.20 Euros.
Pasta dishes at Saizeriya are also very cheap – their cheapest pasta dish is Spaghetti Peporoncino which costs just 273 Yen plus tax.
Other pasta dishes cost 455 Yen for spaghetti carbonara and 391 Yen for Penne Arrabbiata.
Unlike other Japanese restaurants, there is no service charge on top (plus all the tax prices are clearly labelled on the menu).
And it isn’t just the food that is cheap – Saizeriya has an unlimited drink bar (soft drinks, tea and coffee) that costs just 182 Yen (200 Yen with tax) when you order an item of food.
We’ll also talk about Saizeriya alcohol (wine and beer) prices in more detail later but just to say wine starts at 91 Yen (100 Yen with tax) per glass of wine or 200 Yen for a 250ml decanter of wine!
Please note all Saizeriya Japan prices are correct as of March 2024
Love cheap Japanese chain restaurants? Check out our guide to Kura Sushi conveyor belt restaurants >
Arriving / How to order at Saizeriya Restaurants
Such is their popularity, you’ll often have to queue to get into the restaurant during peak periods (usually weekends and early evenings).
Some restaurants have a basic queue system where you join a line or others ask you to add your name to a list and wait until you are called.
Once you are seated, the staff will give you a huge 16 page menu of food and drink. On your table, you’ll find a small ordering sheet which you complete with a pen. Write down the numbers associated with the food and drink on the sheet.
When you are ready to order, ring the bell / buzzer on your table and the staff will magically appear seconds later.
Ordering at Saizeriya is generally pretty easy, even with the language barrier. The one thing that took us a while to understand was that if you order wine, they’ll ask if you want one or two etc glasses as you can’t put this on the sheet.
You might like – Things to do in Yokohama, Japan >
Saizeriya Italian food and drink menu
The food and drink menu at Saizeriya is extensive – we are talking 16 pages of doubled side (and rather nicely designed) menus.
The biggest menu sections are the pizza and pasta dishes (plus dorias and hamburger steaks) – more on this later.
Saizeriya Pizza
Pizza choices include pizza margarita, pizza with triple buffalo mozzarella, pizza with mushrooms and vegetable salsa, sweetcorn pizza plus our favourite, sausage / pepperoni pizza.
The sausage / pepperoni pizza costs just 400 Yen including tax – we ate this one quite a lot.
Whilst the meat quality isn’t great (it is more frankfurt type sausage than the usual pepperoni you get elsewhere), it is very good value.
BRAND NEW FOR MAY 2024
Join our Facebook Japan Travel Tips Group!
Need help with your Japan itinerary or have any questions?
Head on over to our Facebook group and ask the experts!
Click here to join our group >
Saizeriya Pasta
Pasta dishes include traditional pasta dishes like carbonara, penne arrabbiata and bolognese – vegetarian pasta dishes are also available.
There are often seasonal or special / localised pasta dishes including shrimp and pollock roe spaghetti or umami squid ink pasta.
You might like – Guide to the cult of Japanese egg sandwiches from convenience stores >
Saizeriya offers / discounts
As well as the 200 Yen all-you-can drink bar (soft drinks, tea and coffee), at lunchtimes, Saizeriya also do specials like 500 Yen set menus or help-your-self salad bars and free soup.
At the time of writing (early 2024), some branches are offering a special hamburger steak lunch menu which includes unlimited rice and soup for 600 Yen a portion (including tax).
If you want to save money whilst travelling in Japan and want something a little different from traditional Japanese, the Saizeriya lunch sets (‘setto’) are very good value – to be fair, Saizeriya is cheap any time of the day!
Saizeriya wine and beer / alcohol prices
Other than the inexpensive food items at Saizeriya, another reason for its popularity and ‘cheap and cheerful’ charm is its alcohol prices.
Glasses of wine start from just 100 Yen per glass including tax or 250 Yen for a decanter (250ml) of wine. You can even buy 1,500ml (1.5 litres) of wine for 1100 Yen (like £5.50 / $7 USD).
But is the Saizeriya wine any good?
To be honest, no it isn’t great (our tooth enamel would agree) but for the price, it is certainly drinkable / quaffable and does the job. You can get very ‘merry’ on Saizeriya wine for very little money – it is one of the cheapest places to drink in Japan.
Other wine types are available too like chianti and lambrusco.
Beer at Saizeriya is usually Kirin Ichiban and a mug of beer costs 400 Yen or 300 Yen for the smaller ‘glass’ size. Kanpai!
You might like – Guide to Denny’s Japan – a cheap Japanese and Western food chain restaurant >
Saizeriya specialties / other popular food
Although Saizeriya is predominantly an Italian restaurant chain Japan, they are famous for several other dishes including:
Grilled Snails / Escargot
Snails at Saizeriya are seriously popular!
Everytime we visit a Saizeriya anywhere in Japan, there is an epic amount of escargot and sizable snail selections being swallowed (try saying that after several glasses of cheap Saizeriya wine!)
Grilled snails also include a white wine sauce with garlic butter and cost 400 Yen for six simmering snails.
Hamburger steaks and chicken steaks
See that sizzling dish in Saizeriya? That’ll be one of their popular hamburger steaks which include varieties such as hamburger steak with vegetable sauce or a cheesy topping.
All of the hamburger steaks at Saizeriya are made from Australian beef and all are served with corn and roasted potatoes plus lots of demi-glaze sauce. Sizzling lamb and chicken steaks are available too.
You might like – the cult of Japanese 3D billboards >
Doria and Gratins
Doria is a popular cheesy rice dish (gratin) in Japan.
Saizeriya use white sauce made from Australian milk and popular doria dishes include meat sauce doria and pollock and shrimp sauce doria – most cost around the 300 Yen mark.
Soups and Salads
Offering a salad bar and soup special at lunch is a clever move to keep diners coming in.
You can also order a la carte soups and salads any time of day including an onion gratin soup for 300 Yen, cream of corn soup for 150 Yen or country style minestrone soup for 300 yen.
Bread is available with the soup including garlic toast and petit focaccias sprinkled with cinnamon.
Salads include seaweed salad for 350 Yen, chicken salad for 300 Yen and a mozzarella salad for 400 yen.
You might like – the cult of Lawson’s chicken nuggets >
Saizeriya in Japan – is it worth it?
So Saizeriya is a very inexpensive and iconic Italian chain restaurant in Japan but is it worth it? Yes, in purely financial terms, you cannot go wrong with Saizeriya.
The food is inexpensive and often served speedily with no mess or fuss.
Yes, you should really be trying traditional Japanese food whilst exploring the Land of the Rising Sun but if you want a night off or have had oodles of noodles and need a night off, Saizeriya is a no frills restaurant experience where you can eat lots for very little money.
And the wine is sooooo cheap at Saizeriya and whilst not the best, is certainly a good way to unwind after a day of sightseeing and walking all over the city.
To mention pasta sizes are quite small so we’d normally recommend ordering two or three dishes per couple.
You might like – The cult of Japanese Pocky >
Saizeriya Gachapons
Such is the cult of and popularity of Saizeriya in Japan, you can even buy Saizeriya gachapon toys. Their range of gachapon toys are widely available across many gachapon stores in Japan.
There have been several series of Saizeriya Gachapon toys which include kawaii capsule toys like mini grilled escargot dishes, puny pasta plates or dainty doria – you can even get the Saizeriya signboard in gachapon form.
And it isn’t just Saizeriya getting into gachapons – most Japanese chain restaurants have some form of gachapon toy collection such as Kura Sushi, Coco Ichibanya, Denny’s, Gindaco and Mos Burger.
You might like – Guide to the coolest gachapon toy capsules in Japan >
Saizeriya – a social media phenomenon
Many people and social media influencers are switching onto the cult of Saizeriya with bloggers and vloggers including them in their run down of the cheapest Japanese restaurant chains, or in videos such as ‘Eating only Saizeriya for 24 hours’.
You might like – Things to do in Odaiba, Tokyo (including a huge Statue Of Liberty and Gundam) >
Where can you find Saizeiyas in Japan
With over around 1100 Saizeriya restaurants in Japan (as of 2024), you are never far from this (pizza) slice of heaven.
For instance, there are around 600 Saizeriya restaurants in the Kanto area, 180 restaurants in the Kinki area, 160 in the Chibu area and 70 in the Hokkaido and Tohoku area.
Drilling down, as of March 2024, there are 197 Saizeriya restaurants in Tokyo, 74 in Osaka and 20 in Kyoto.
You might like – Things to do in Tokyo’s Ginza neighbourhood or the hipster Nakano neighbourhood
Other things to know about Saizeriya in Japan:
- The solo booths at Saizeriya are popular working spaces and get snapped up quickly in the daytime. These solo booths with electrical chargers and sockets were set up during pandemic and COVID times and many restaurants have retained them including Tachikawa Kitaguchi and Roppongi Saizeriya branches in Tokyo.
- Free Wifi is available in most branches of Saizeriya
- Toilets are widely available in their restaurants (but more often than not in a cold corridor outside).
- There is no service cost at Saizeriya restaurants in Japan, Singapore or Taiwan.
- Saizeriya also operate a small chain of hamburger shops called “Eat Run” (イートラン) – we haven’t been to one yet
Found this article helpful?
Did you enjoy our blog post? Let us know in the comments or by sharing it on social media.
You can follow us on:
Instagram
Tik Tok
Facebook
Pinterest
YouTube
You might also like to read…
Everything you wanted to know about Don Quijote stores in Japan
Japanese Gachapons – The Coolest Gachapon Toys in Japan
Yokohama, Japan – Things To Do Guide + Photos
Cult of Convenience Store Egg Sandwiches in Japan
Odaiba, Tokyo – Things To Do + Photos
Cult of Dragon Quest Lawson – a themed convenience store in Osaka
Guide to Kura Sushi – Japan’s popular conveyor belt sushi restaurant