Japan posted a new tourist arrival record for the first six months of 2019, welcoming an estimated 16.63 million travellers.
It marks a 4.6% rise on 2018.
Spending was up even more at 8.3% to an all-time high of $22 billion, the Japan Tourism Agency said.
The government has set a target of 40 million annual foreign visitors by next year when the Tokyo Olympics take place.
China remained the top source market with more than 4.5 million, which was up 11.7%, thanks to further easing of visa policy.
However, the South Korean market declined 3.8% to 3,862,700.
It could get worse with a growing movement in South Korea to boycott travel to Japan over a diplomatic and trade spat which has been simmering for several weeks.
