Suica
proximity card
Suica (occasionally written in Japanese as スイカ, Suika) is a prepaid, rechargeable, contactless smart card and electronic money system used as a fare card on train lines and other public transport systems in Japan, launched on November 18, 2001, by the East Japan Railway Company (JR East). The card can be used across the nation as part of Japan's Nationwide Mutual Usage Service, including support on virtually any train, tramway, or bus system in the Greater Tokyo Area. The card is also widely used as electronic money for purchases at stores and kiosks, especially at convenience stores, chain restaurants, and shops within train stations.
Three years after launch, as of October 2004, over 10 million Suica had been sold. In 2018, JR East reported that Suica was used for 6.6 million daily transactions. As of October 2023, a total of 95.64 million Suica (including Mobile Suica) have been issued, and 1.63 million stores accept payment via Suica's digital currency.
Etymology
Suica is a backronym for "Super Urban Intelligent Card". In the logo, the letters "ic" are highlighted, which stand for "integrated circuit" and see use in the term "IC card", the common Japanese word for smart card. An additional meaning comes from the ideophone "sui sui" which means "to move smoothly and swiftly", intended to highlight the simplicity of using the card compared with traditional (paper) train tickets, similar to how penguins can swim smoothly through water. The motif was also chosen due to the Japanese homonym suika (スイカ; "watermelon"); just like penguins in cold climates have never encountered watermelons, as the first major transportation IC card in Japan, the card was promoted as a never-before-seen item for riders.
“Suica” enters the record as proximity card. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Suica, proximity and card can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Suica” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Suica, proximity and card provides the most credible route into that argument.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1370596. None of the 5 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2001, 2004, 2018 and 2023.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Suica”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Suica primary sources, Suica archive and Suica research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Suica”?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Suica” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.