Yakushi Ski Area is a ski area in Niigata, Japan. The terrain spans roughly 132–251 m above sea level. The mapped ski area covers about 0.5 km². Within 1.9 km of the centre, the map shows 5 marked runs and 1 lift, totalling about 1.4 km of piste. There is no settled snow at the moment — the season has not started here yet. Over the last three winters the ERA5 reanalysis gives it 586 cm of snowfall a season, 47th of the 3,112 ski areas we measure worldwide. The model runs well below what resorts report, so the ranking is the meaningful part rather than the centimetre figure. The nearest city of any size is Niigata, about 77 km away. 1 official live camera is linked below. 130 other ski areas lie within 120 km. Snow figures and the Powder Score are recalculated every day.
Elevation range is estimated by sampling points across the ski area.
Score breakdown
Powder Score v1.0.0
7-day outlook
| Date | Snow | Temp | Wind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🌦️ 27 Sept | 0 | 18.2 / 24.8 | 4.7 |
| 🌧️ 28 Sept | 0 | 18.7 / 22.4 | 6.5 |
| 🌧️ 29 Sept | 0 | 16.1 / 20.8 | 5.1 |
| ☁️ 30 Sept | 0 | 15.6 / 23.9 | 7 |
| 🌧️ 1 Oct | 0 | 13.3 / 23.7 | 10.7 |
| ⛈️ 2 Oct | 0 | 12.3 / 16.9 | 15.5 |
| 🌤️ 3 Oct | 0 | 11.5 / 18.8 | 9.2 |
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.
Run map
The shape of the mountain
Which way the slopes face
76% 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
Lift types
- Chairlift1
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 →
How much snow it gets
Measured by us across 3,112 ski areas by one identical method. These are not the resort’s own published figures.
The tick marks the median across the 395 Japanese ski areas. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Koide Ski Area | 3.9 km | 438 cm | 132 |
| Hakkai Sanroku Ski Area | 8.5 km | 492 cm | 75 |
| Suhara Ski Area | 11 km | 562 cm | 50 |
| Muikamachi Hakkaisan | 13 km | 738 cm | 10 |
| Koshi Kogen Ski Area | 13 km | 491 cm | 78 |
When it falls, and how winters differ
Month by month
Month by month, the most snow falls in January. March brings 29% of January’s snowfall. That is a steeper fall than the median for ski areas in Japan (51%): the snow here is concentrated early in the season. For skiing, though, the amount matters more than the share: March brings 54 cm, more than the median of 45 cm.
What was actually measured nearby
Total snowfall from December to March recorded at the 小出 weather station — 2.8 km from this ski area, 93 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 586 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
3 hot spring sources with published analyses lie within 5 km of this ski area, nearest first (the hottest is 34 °C).
| Source | Distance | Temperature | pH | Type | Analysed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 葎沢鉱泉なりくら荘 | 2.1 km | 24.5℃ cold | 7.2 neutral | — | — |
| 芋川芋川入 | 3.7 km | 34℃ warm | 8.5 alkaline | alkaline simple | — |
| 中子沢鉱泉木ノ葉石の湯 | 4.3 km | 13℃ cold | 6.5 neutral | carbon dioxide | — |
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Niigata Prefectural Road Route 50新潟県道50号小出奥只見線 | Landmark | 3 km |
| 湯之谷温泉郷 | Hot spring town | 6.7 km |
| Echigo Sanzan-Tadami Quasi-National Park越後三山只見国定公園 | Nature | 11.3 km |
| Hakkaisan Ropeway八海山ロープウェー | Nature | 12.9 km |
| Mount Echigo-Komagatake越後駒ヶ岳 | Mountain | 14.2 km |
| Mount Hakkai八海山 | Mountain | 14.6 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 ↗Places to stay nearby
1 properties on Rakuten Travel lie within 3 km of this ski area, listed cheapest first.
| Property | From | Rating | Distance | Getting there |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 四季の郷 薬師温泉 やまびこ荘 | ¥7,850 | 4.80 12 reviews | — | 浦佐駅から車で約20分。魚沼IC（旧小出IC）から車で約７分 |
Contains advertising · Property data by Rakuten Travel (Supported by Rakuten Developers)
Stay nearby
4 places within 12 km of the slopes. Most of them do not take online bookings — open the map for contact details.
Nearest: 8.3 km
Nearest first
- 大湯ホテル Hotel 8.3 km
- ホテル湯元 Hotel 8.8 km
- Pension Duke Guest house 8.8 km
- Izumiya Ryokan Hotel 8.9 km
Accommodation data: OpenStreetMap
More places to look
Updated: 26 Sept 2026, 23:28