八海山麓スキー場の魅力がつまったPV、ご覧ください!!
By: hakkaisanroku · 2021-03-29
Hakkai Sanroku Ski Area is a ski area in Niigata, Japan, on slopes between roughly 200 and 409 m. Its mapped area is about 1.1 km across, with 6 marked runs and 2 lifts (about 3.3 km of piste in all).
Over the last twelve winters the ERA5 weather model gives it 451 cm of snowfall a season, 48th of the 397 ski areas we measure in Japan. It swings a lot from year to year: the biggest winter, 2014/15 (676 cm), brought more than twice as much as the leanest, 2019/20 (239 cm). January is usually the snowiest month, with about 165 cm. Weather models read low in the mountains: a Japan Meteorological Agency station 7.7 km away measured 596 cm a winter over the last three seasons, against 492 cm from the model. Snowfall days average −0.5 °C at mid-mountain, close to freezing, so the snow is often heavy, and its snow-quality score ranks 269th of 397 in Japan.
The nearest city of any size is Niigata, about 85 km away. Below is a link to its official live camera.
Snow depth and the seven-day outlook appear here once snow starts to fall. Until then, the long-run record comes first.
Temperature
15.9℃
Max wind
6.5km/h
Elevation (est.)
200–409m
Across
1.1km
Elevation range is estimated by sampling points across the ski area.
How much snow it gets
Measured by us across 3,069 ski areas by one identical method. These are not the resort’s own published figures.
Seasonal snowfall
451 cm
per season
Worst of 12 winters
239 cm
A typical winter: 419 cm. The best: 676 cm.
World rank
107
of 3,069 worldwide
Rank in country
48
of 397 in Japan
Elevation rank
308
Highest to lowest, of 397 in Japan. The centre point sits at 322 m, 444 m below the national median.
Quality rank
269
of 397 in Japan
Temp when snowing
-0.5°C
Japanese median: -3.5°C
Rain days
44%
Japanese median: 16%
Days over 5 cm
31%
Japanese median: 15%
Wind when snowing
14 km/h
Dryness 0.18
Frequency 0.90
Freedom from rain 0.35
Calm when snowing 1.00
The tick marks the median across every Japanese ski area we measure. All four bars run the same way — longer is better.
The quality score deliberately excludes how much snow falls — it uses temperature, frequency, rain and wind. Snowing a lot and snowing well are different things.
Compared with what is nearby
Within 50 km straight line. Measured the same way, so the ranks compare directly. Ski areas a few kilometres apart share a weather grid cell and can return the same figure.
| Ski area | Distance | Seasonal snowfall | World rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Muikamachi Hakkaisan | 4.7 km | 728 cm | 5 |
| Koide Ski Area | 8.0 km | 370 cm | 226 |
| Yakushi Ski Area | 8.5 km | 532 cm | 72 |
| Itsukamachi Ski Area | 8.5 km | 412 cm | 158 |
| Muica Snow Resort | 15 km | 546 cm | 67 |
When it falls, and how winters differ
Month by month
Month by month, the most snow falls in January. March brings 30% of January’s snowfall. That is a steeper fall than the median for ski areas in Japan (52%): the snow here is concentrated early in the season. In amount, March brings 50 cm, about the same as the median of 46 cm.
124cmDec
165cmJan
111cmFeb
50cmMar
Winter by winter
Across the 12 winters measured, the average is 451 cm, and 8 of them fell short of it. The leanest was 2019/20 with 239 cm; the biggest was 2014/15 with 676 cm (2.8 times as much).
676
239
14/1515/1616/1717/1818/1919/2020/2121/2222/2323/2424/2525/26
Snowfall each winter (December–March total). The dashed line is the average; the numbers mark the leanest and the biggest winter.
Runs and lifts
Counted from the runs and lifts drawn on OpenStreetMap, within the boundary of the ski area. These are not the resort’s own published figures.
Marked runs
6
Run length
3.3km
Lifts
2
Vertical
202m
Top 415 m · base 212 m
Run map
EasyIntermediateAdvanced Lift
The shape of the mountain
Longest run on the map0.9 km
Steepest pitch27°measured over at least 30 m
Average gradient of the runs12.1°
Which way the slopes face
North 0%
East 1%
South 78%
West 21%
Only 1% of the vertical on the runs descends to the north or east. More of the terrain faces the sun.
By difficulty
Easy 1
Intermediate 3
Advanced 2
Lift types
- Chairlift2
See past trail maps on Skimap.org ↗
Source: OpenSkiMap (© OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL 1.0). How finely ski areas are drawn varies by region, so treat the counts as indicative. Vertical is the difference between the highest and lowest points of the mapped runs and lifts.
Live Cameras
This ski area does not put a camera on its own slopes. The nearest live view is the road below.
Road conditions decide whether you can get there at all. Check before you leave.
Footage remains the copyright of each operator. JAPANSNOWLINE neither stores nor redistributes it.
Minami-Uonuma webcams & snow report — all 6 ski areas →
See the snow in motion
Videos remain the copyright of whoever filmed them. JAPANSNOWLINE stores no video and plays everything through the standard YouTube player.
What was actually measured nearby
Total snowfall from December to March recorded at the 小出 weather station — 7.7 km from this ski area, 206 m below its mid-slope.
| Three-season average | 596 cm |
| 2023/24 | 412 cm |
| 2024/25 | 699 cm |
| 2025/26 | 676 cm |
The figure calculated on this page is 492 cm.
A weather station is not a ski slope. We picked one at a similar elevation, but it stands in a valley or a village. More snow falls on the mountain above it. We have not tried to guess how much more.
Source: Japan Meteorological Agency historical records
Hot springs nearby, as analysed
2 hot spring sources with published analyses lie within 5 km of this ski area, nearest first (the hottest is 27.6 °C).
| Source | Distance | Temperature | pH | Type | Analysed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 大和町大崎湯咲花源泉 | 4.2 km | 27℃ lukewarm | 9.2 alkaline | alkaline simple | — |
| 柳古新田 | 4.4 km | 27.6℃ lukewarm | 9 alkaline | alkaline simple | — |
These are analyses of hot spring sources, not a list of baths you can visit. They date from 1910 to 2005, many from decades ago, so today’s temperature and chemistry may differ. Names are as recorded in Japanese. Temperature and pH bands follow Japan’s standard for analysing hot springs.
Source: processed from the hot spring analysis data in the Geothermal Information Database (GRES-DB), Geological Survey of Japan, AIST
Worth seeing nearby
Places within 20 km of this ski area, for a day off the slopes or an evening. Chosen from those most read about on Wikipedia, favouring places with an English Wikipedia article, and listed nearest first.
| Place | Type | Distance |
|---|---|---|
| Hakkaisan Ropeway八海山ロープウェー | Nature | 4.7 km |
| Mount Hakkai八海山 | Mountain | 7.4 km |
| Niigata Prefectural Road Route 50新潟県道50号小出奥只見線 | Landmark | 8.3 km |
| Echigo Sanzan-Tadami Quasi-National Park越後三山只見国定公園 | Nature | 9.2 km |
| Mount Echigo-Komagatake越後駒ヶ岳 | Mountain | 9.6 km |
| Mount Makihata巻機山 | Mountain | 20 km |
Based on the Japanese Wikipedia lists of sights in each prefecture, as compiled in travel-log-data (CC BY-SA 4.0). English names from Wikidata (CC0). The content of this section is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Map
Where it sits relative to nearby resorts. For a piste map, see the official site.
Official piste map ↗ Coordinates: 37.1583, 138.9758
Places to stay nearby
2 properties on Rakuten Travel lie within 3 km of this ski area, listed cheapest first.
| Property | From | Rating | Distance | Getting there |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 八海山麓サイクリングターミナル | — | 4.00 9 reviews | 0.5 km | ＪＲ上越新幹線 「上越線 浦佐駅」より六日町行きバスで「荒金入口」下車、徒歩１０分 |
| 丸善旅館 | — | — | 0.8 km | 上越新幹線 浦佐駅より車で１０分 |
Contains advertising · Property data by Rakuten Travel (Supported by Rakuten Developers)
Stay nearby
1 places within 12 km of the slopes. Most of them do not take online bookings — open the map for contact details.
Accommodation data: OpenStreetMap
More places to look
Guides covering Niigata
- Which Ski Resort Gets the Most Snow in the World? We measured snowfall at all 3,069 ski areas on earth the same way. The top two both shut in winter because they get too much snow: a Norwegian glacier at 783 cm that opens in May, and Okutadami Maruyama in Niigata at 765 cm. 46 of the top 100 are Japanese.
- How Japan's Early-Bird Lift Tickets Work: At Hakuba Happo-One, Eight of the Nine Need a Japanese ID Card Hakuba Happo-One opened early-bird sales at 10:00 on 1 October. A day costs ¥6,400 against ¥9,800 at the window, 35% off. But every ticket on the list except one needs a My Number Card and a Japanese phone app. A visitor from abroad can buy exactly one of them, at 15% off.
- Japan Lift Ticket Prices for 2026/27: What a Day Costs at Twelve Big Resorts, and the Weeks It Costs Half We checked the 2026/27 adult day ticket on each resort's own site. At the window it runs from ¥7,000 at Akakura Kanko to ¥16,700 at Rusutsu. Buying online saves up to ¥3,500, and the first and last weeks of the season cost up to half. For those cheap spring weeks, we add which way each resort's slopes face.
Updated: 8 Oct 2026, 00:52