Spa Metsa Sendai: Saunas, Deep Cold Plunges and a Long Spa Day
Spa Metsa’s ¥1,100 weekday ticket covers the baths and saunas. Add the hot-stone lounge if you plan to read, work, eat or stay for several hours.
Think of Spa Metsa Sendai as a place to settle in, not a quick stop beside Sendai Station. The complex combines 16 baths, three distinct saunas, three cold baths, a restaurant and—at extra cost—a hot-stone lounge with books, manga and work seats. It is especially useful when a group wants different things from the same outing. A quiet, source-focused soak is a different brief; for that, compare Fujitsuka no Yu at Aqua Ignis Sendai, which is built around its natural spring and a smaller post-bath café and library.
What the admission ticket covers
| Charge | Weekday | Weekend / public holiday | Conditions |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard adult admission | ¥1,100 | ¥1,280 | Includes baths and all three saunas |
| Entry by 9 a.m. | ¥950 | ¥1,080 | Price is based on entry time; guests may stay until closing |
| metsä Neliö hot-stone lounge | ¥800 | ¥1,000 | Add-on only; cannot be bought without bath admission |
| Rental towel set | ¥300 | ¥300 | Towels are not included |
Shampoo, conditioner and body wash are provided. Certain peak dates have a separate rate; check the official price page before visiting.
The lounge has six hot-stone rooms, more than 10,000 books and comics, over 50 work seats with Wi-Fi and outlets, semi-private cabins and TV recliners. Add it if you plan to read, work or stay for several hours; the bath ticket covers a shorter visit.
Three saunas, with very different moods
The Date-na Sauna is the signature room, styled around the crescent-crested helmet of Sendai’s historical ruler Date Masamune. Its waterwheel sauna stove runs an automatic steam session at the top of each hour. The herbal salt steam sauna is warmer and humid, with herbs, mud pack and salt available inside. For a quieter session, the meditation sauna uses a slab of camphor more than a century old and allows self-poured steam.
The 2026 Nifty Onsen sauna ranking places Spa Metsa Sendai first in its Hokkaido–Tohoku list. That is a useful sign of its profile among sauna destinations; it is not a measure of every visitor’s preferences. The practical distinction is already clear from the facility itself: this is a broad, equipment-rich complex rather than a single-room specialist sauna.
Cooling down is unusually configurable. The deepest cold bath reaches 162 cm on the men’s side and 100 cm on the women’s side. A seated cold bath is 120 cm deep for men and 80 cm for women, while a separate sub-10°C plunge is available to men only. Those figures describe different pools—depth is not temperature. Use the handrails and check your footing before entering the deep bath; it is fine to choose a shallower option.
Not every bath is a natural hot spring
The facility lists 16 baths, including six carbonated baths and a set of natural-spring baths. The high-concentration carbonated bath is made by dissolving carbon dioxide into the water; it should not be mistaken for a naturally carbonated spring. The online bath guide identifies the natural-spring section, but does not give a readable, pool-by-pool breakdown of source, treatment and water-analysis figures. If exact spring composition is your priority, do not infer it from the total bath count.
There are also several places to cool down outdoors, including foot and seated baths in winter. Families should note that the shallow children’s carbonated bath is reserved for children who are not yet toilet-trained; babies may use that bath only. Sauna and cold-bath use starts at junior-high-school age, and the hot-stone lounge is also limited to junior-high students and older.
Getting there takes one transfer
From Sendai, take the subway to Izumi-Chuo, the northern terminus, then use platform 5 at the bus terminal. On weekdays, take a bus bound for Aeon Tomiya; on weekends and public holidays, use a service bound for Kamisakuragi-Oshimizu. Get off at Akashidai 4-chome Kita and walk about five minutes. Check the return timetable before you head out, especially if you are planning an evening visit.
| Access or schedule | Detail |
|---|---|
| Parking | More than 650 free spaces |
| Baths | 6 a.m.–2 a.m.; last admission 1:30 a.m. |
| Hot-stone lounge | Closes 1:30 a.m.; last admission 12:30 a.m. |
The late hours are not overnight accommodation. Leaving the building and returning requires another admission.
A few rules worth knowing before you go
Spa Metsa generally refuses guests with tattoos, including tattoo stickers. An exception is allowed only when the tattoo can be completely covered with no more than two of the facility’s designated cover stickers. Children below elementary-school age cannot enter alone, and mixed-gender bathing is not allowed for elementary-school-age children and older. Guests under 18 cannot enter after 11 p.m.
