🇯🇵 Japan · Miyagi

Onikobe Ski Area

オニコウベスキー場

Off season Official site Buy on Asoview PR

Onikobe Ski Area is a ski area in Miyagi, Japan, on slopes between roughly 345 and 1,034 m. Its mapped area is about 2.2 km across, with 8 marked runs and 6 lifts (about 4.8 km of piste in all).

Over the last twelve winters the ERA5 weather model gives it 260 cm of snowfall a season, 174th of the 397 ski areas we measure in Japan. It swings a lot from year to year: the biggest winter, 2017/18 (352 cm), brought more than twice as much as the leanest, 2015/16 (141 cm). January is usually the snowiest month, with about 89 cm. Snowfall days average −3.5 °C at mid-mountain, and its snow-quality score ranks 196th of 397 in Japan.

Below are links to 3 official live cameras.

Snow depth and the seven-day outlook appear here once snow starts to fall. Until then, the long-run record comes first.

Temperature

12.6℃

Max wind

10.7km/h

Elevation (est.)

345–1034m

Across

2.2km

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

260 cm

per season

Worst of 12 winters

141 cm

A typical winter: 262 cm. The best: 352 cm.

World rank

667

of 3,069 worldwide

Rank in country

174

of 397 in Japan

Elevation rank

240

Highest to lowest, of 397 in Japan. The centre point sits at 610 m, 156 m below the national median.

Quality rank

196

of 397 in Japan

Temp when snowing

-3.5°C

Japanese median: -3.5°C

Rain days

20%

Japanese median: 16%

Days over 5 cm

18%

Japanese median: 15%

Wind when snowing

24 km/h

Dryness 0.39

Frequency 0.50

Freedom from rain 0.49

Calm when snowing 0.89

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
Uenono Ski Area	8.7 km	178 cm	1335
Yakurai Garden Ski Area	24 km	139 cm	1816
Green Valley Kamuro Ski Area	26 km	277 cm	586
Hanagasa Kogen Ski Area	30 km	321 cm	401
Kurobushi Kogen Snow Park Jangle Jungle	39 km	302 cm	472

When it falls, and how winters differ

Month by month

Month by month, the most snow falls in January. March brings 51% of January’s snowfall. That is in line with the median for ski areas in Japan (52%). In amount, March brings 45 cm, about the same as the median of 46 cm.

71cm

Dec

89cm

Jan

56cm

Feb

45cm

Mar

Average snowfall by month, last 12 winters

Winter by winter

Across the 12 winters measured, the average is 260 cm, and 5 of them fell short of it. The leanest was 2015/16 with 141 cm; the biggest was 2017/18 with 352 cm (2.5 times as much). For 63% of the 397 ski areas in Japan, the leanest winter was the same 2015/16: bad winters tend to hit a whole region at once.

141

352

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

Run length

4.8km

Lifts

Vertical

677m

Top 1,038 m · base 361 m

Run map

NoviceEasyIntermediate Lift

North is up. Runs are coloured by difficulty; black lines are lifts.

The shape of the mountain

Longest run on the map1.2 km

Steepest pitch37°measured over at least 30 m

Average gradient of the runs15.7°

Which way the slopes face

North 67%

East 25%

South 1%

West 8%

92% of the vertical on the runs descends to the north or east. Those slopes get the least sun, so the snow lasts longer.

By difficulty

Novice 1

Easy 5

Intermediate 2

Lift types

Chairlift6

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

Roads nearby国道47号 ↗From the resort: 5.3 kmOperated by: 東北地方整備局山形河川国道事務所 Roads nearby国道47号 ↗From the resort: 6 kmOperated by: 東北地方整備局仙台河川国道事務所

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.

See the snow in motion

【オニコウベスキー場】速報テレキャビンゴンドラ復活！その先のチロリアンロード

By: Kuniesta 8 · 2026-01-10

Videos remain the copyright of whoever filmed them. JAPANSNOWLINE stores no video and plays everything through the standard YouTube player.

Official YouTube channel

More than we show here.

Hot springs nearby, as analysed

5 hot spring sources with published analyses lie within 5 km of this ski area, nearest first (the hottest is 100 °C).

Source	Distance	Temperature	pH	Type	Analysed
轟轟の湯2号	3.1 km	78.6℃ hot	7.8 mildly alkaline	simple	—
間欠泉かんけつ荘弁天	3.7 km	100℃ hot	8.7 alkaline	—	—
宮沢元湯	3.9 km	99.5℃ hot	8.3 mildly alkaline	—	—
吹上吹上第2	4 km	97.7℃ hot	8.8 alkaline	—	—
鬼首柏木原No.5	4.2 km	40.8℃ warm	7.4 neutral	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
Naruko Dam鳴子ダム	Nature	6.8 km
Naruko Canyon鳴子峡	Nature	7.1 km
Onikōbe Caldera鬼首カルデラ	Mountain	7.5 km
Kurikoma Quasi-National Park栗駒国定公園	Nature	8.7 km
Katanuma潟沼	Nature	9.4 km
Mount Kamuro神室山	Mountain	18.2 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 ↗

Nearby resorts

Get directions ↗ Open in Google Maps ↗

Places to stay nearby

7 properties on Rakuten Travel lie within 3 km of this ski area, listed cheapest first.

Property	From	Rating	Distance	Getting there
鬼首温泉　リゾートパーク　ホテル　オニコウベ	¥3,850	4.41 460 reviews	0.8 km	東北自動車道古川ICより47号線を鳴子方面へ、岩下こけし資料館前交差点から108号線を秋田方面に入り約20分
ペンションふうらいぼー	¥9,800	4.00 76 reviews	1.0 km	ＪＲ陸羽東線　鳴子温泉駅よりバスにて35分(リゾートパークオニコウベ)
ホテルＷＡＭＡＲＥオニコウベ	¥11,700	—	0.8 km	ＪＲ鳴子温泉駅より車で約２０分
鳴子温泉郷　とどろき旅館	¥13,750	4.29 48 reviews	3.1 km	鳴子温泉駅から車で２０分／市営バス有り
ペンション　ＡＮＮＥＸ	—	—	0.8 km	ＪＲ　鳴子温泉駅より車で２０分、バスにて４０分
鳴子温泉　ペンション　森りんこ	—	—	1.0 km	ＪＲ　鳴子温泉駅よりバスにて約４０分
大新館	—	—	3.8 km	陵羽東線・鳴子温泉駅／国道４７号線・鳴子→１０８号線（１３ｋ）→吹上方面に１ｋ