First wave of Tokyo 2020 Olympic tickets up for grabs

AFP  |  Tokyo 

The first tickets for the went on sale on Thursday, with Japanese residents able to enter a to watch the sport of their choice.

Tickets for the 33 range from the cheapest general tickets at 2,500 yen ($23) to an eye-watering 300,000 yen ($2,730) for the best seats at the opening ceremony.

Those lucky enough to score the best seats for the showcase men's 100m final will pay 130,000 yen ($1,200).

But half of all tickets will be priced at 8,000 yen ($73) or less and special tickets priced at 2,020 yen ($18) are available for families resident in with children, senior citizens, and people with impairments.

Prices for domestic residents are "about the same as 2012 but a little higher than the 2016 Rio Games," Yuko Hayakawa, senior 2020 marketing official, told AFP.

The -- only for residents of during an initial period -- runs until May 28, with successful applicants notified on June 20 and payment due a fortnight later.

The website saw high demand upon opening with a queue system in place even though tickets are not sold on a first-come first-served basis and everyone entering the by May 28 having an equal chance of scooping tickets.

Overseas applicants will be able to snap up tickets from June 15 via special "Authorised Ticket Resellers" in each country.

Organisers have not offered a precise number of tickets available as various stadium configurations are still being finalised with just less than 450 days to go until the opening ceremony.

But they said it would be roughly the same as the 7.8 million tickets they estimated when bidding for the right to host the Games.

Of these tickets, an estimated 70-80 percent would be allotted to Japanese residents with the rest going to overseas fans.

The will run from July 24 to August 9.

Tickets for the Paralympics will become available this summer.

Fans wishing to start planning their applications can access the website at https://ticket.tokyo2020.org/?culture=en-us.

tickets are not available as the IOC has frozen preparations for the competition amid a spat with the governing body AIBA.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

First Published: Thu, May 09 2019. 09:50 IST