Tamagotchi Ring: Price, 2027 Release, Limited Pre-Orders

Prices and dates verified September 2026

Bandai has shrunk the Tamagotchi into a ring. The Tamagotchi ring is 28mm tall, has a colour screen smaller than a fingernail, lets you raise 30 characters from the series’ 30-year history, and costs ¥7,700.

It is also something you can’t walk into a shop and buy: not in Akihabara, not in Harajuku, not at the airport. It’s sold only through Premium Bandai, Bandai’s online store in Japan. The first pre-order wave sold out in about a day and a half, and the second, for April 2027 delivery, is due to close at 23:00 Japan time on 6 October, or sooner if it sells out.

Here’s what it is, what it costs, the dates that matter, why a visitor to Japan can’t simply pick one up, and what you can buy in Tokyo instead.

Die kurze Version

• Preis: ¥7,700 including tax
• Wo: Premium Bandai online only, delivering within Japan
• Deadline: 23:00 JST on 6 October 2026, or earlier if it sells out
• Delivery: April 2027 for anything ordered now

What the Tamagotchi ring is

It’s a wearable version of the virtual pet, built as a ring rather than the classic keychain egg. Bandai spent two years developing it and got it down to 64 parts, 52 electronic and 12 plastic. The current full-size model, Tamagotchi Paradise, uses 116.

The screen is a 0.56-inch colour LCD, the smallest the series has ever used. You still feed your pet, play minigames, clean up after it and watch it grow into different characters depending on how you treat it. There are 30 characters from across the franchise’s history, including some secret ones.

Bandai bills it as the world’s smallest Tamagotchi device, and it was one of the headline products at this year’s Tokyo Toy Show in August.

The design keeps the original’s egg shape and screen, with buttons on either side of the ring, and it charges by sitting in a dedicated charging case, another first for the series.

Tamagotchi ring price, specs and colours

• Preis: ¥7,700 including tax (¥7,000 before tax)
• Size: about 28mm tall and 23mm wide
• Ring size: fits Japanese size 14, or size 10 with the spacer in the box
• Screen: 0.56-inch colour LCD
• Characters: 30, including some secret ones
• Charging: a dedicated charging case
• Colours: Pink & Pearl White, Light Blue & Metallic Gold, Black & Metallic Silver
• Sold by: Premium Bandai, online only, for delivery in Japan
• Limit: two per colour per customer, across both pre-order waves

💡 Japanischer Tipp: You don’t choose a size when you order. The three versions are colours, and each ring fits Japanese size 14, or size 10 with the spacer in the box. As a rough guide, that’s about 54mm and 50mm around the inside. Wrap a strip of paper around the finger you’ll wear it on and measure it in millimetres. If you’re well outside that range it won’t sit right, and there’s no exchange queue for a pre-order that ships in 2027.

The dates that matter

• 27 August 2026, 10:00: first pre-order wave opens
• 28 August 2026, 23:00: first wave closes early after heavy demand (February 2027 delivery)
• 29 August 2026, 09:00: second pre-order wave opens (April 2027 delivery)
• 6 October 2026, 23:00 JST: second wave due to close, earlier if it sells out
• February and April 2027: the two waves ship

This is made to order, not a stocked product. When the second wave shuts, there’s no shelf stock waiting behind it, and Bandai hasn’t said whether there will be a third (report on the early close, in Japanese).

“May close early” is literal. Bandai stops taking pre-orders once the planned production quantity is reached, which is exactly what happened to the first wave. Treat 6 October as the latest possible date, not the date to aim for.

Why you can’t buy one in Tokyo

“Available exclusively in Japan” sounds like “buy it while you’re there”. It isn’t. Four things get in the way:

1. It’s a Premium Bandai exclusive. Premium Bandai is Bandai’s own online store for limited and made-to-order items. The ring doesn’t go to Yodobashi Camera, Don Quijote, Kiddy Land, Bic Camera or airport shops, so there’s no shelf to find it on.

2. The order window is short, and it can close early. The first wave lasted about a day and a half.

3. It ships in 2027. Even a successful order arrives in February or April, long after most trips have ended.

4. Premium Bandai only delivers in Japan. You need a Japanese address, and a hotel won’t hold a parcel for months after you check out.

So if you’re in Japan this autumn hoping to take one home, you can’t. What you can do is order one to an address in Japan and have it sent on.

How ordering works on Premium Bandai

If you, or someone ordering for you, has an address in Japan, the process is straightforward, but the site is in Japanese and there are a few rules worth knowing first.

• Register first. You need a Bandai Namco ID with a Japanese address. Premium Bandai won’t let you register an overseas one.
• Find the right shop. The ring is listed in the BANDAI OFFICIAL TOY SHOP section of Premium Bandai.
• Pick your colours. You can order up to two of each colour, counted across both waves.
• Order means order. You can only cancel while the order window is still open, so decide before it closes.

After that, you wait. February orders were taken in the first wave, so anything you order now arrives in April 2027.

How to get one from outside Japan

Premium Bandai doesn’t ship abroad, and Bandai hasn’t announced sales in any other region. That leaves three routes, in order of reliability:

• A friend or colleague in Japan. Simplest. They order to their address, you settle up, and they post it on or hold it for your next trip.
• A proxy or forwarding service. Companies like Buyee, ZenMarket and FROM JAPAN give you a Japanese address, buy on your behalf and forward the parcel internationally. Expect a service fee, domestic shipping and international postage on top of the ¥7,700, and check that the service will place Premium Bandai pre-orders before you rely on it.
• Wait and buy secondhand. Rings will appear on Mercari and Yahoo! Auctions once they ship, at a markup. Some import shops are already taking pre-orders at well over the retail price.

Budget for more than the sticker price. A proxy order adds the service’s own fee (Buyee, for example, charges ¥500 per order), domestic shipping to the proxy’s warehouse, international postage, and any import tax where you live. It’s still far cheaper than the resale prices already appearing.

One common mix-up: Premium Bandai USA and Bandai’s other regional stores are separate shops with their own, much smaller catalogues. The ring is only on the Japanese Premium Bandai site.

Order early in the window if you go this route. Many proxies handle requests by hand, so there can be a gap of a day or more between you asking and the order actually being placed.

💡 Japanischer Tipp: If you’re using a forwarding service, set it up now, not on 6 October. These services need you to register, verify an address and sometimes pre-fund an account, which takes days, and the window can close early. People miss limited Bandai orders on admin, not on money.

Should you wait for an international release?

Probably not, if you really want one. Some Premium Bandai items do reach Bandai’s overseas stores later, but many never do, and Bandai has said nothing about this one beyond the Japanese pre-order. Waiting means betting on an announcement that may not come, while the Japanese window closes.

If an international release is announced, it will almost certainly be after the Japanese deliveries in 2027, so ordering now through a proxy is still the fastest way to get one.

Is it worth ¥7,700?

Honestly, it depends what you’re buying it for.

As a toy, it’s a lot for a 0.56-inch screen. The current full-size models do more, are easier to see, and cost less.

As an object, it’s genuinely impressive engineering: 64 parts, two years of development, and a working colour display in something you wear on a finger. That’s the appeal, and it’s a real one.

As a collector’s piece, the made-to-order run and the 30th-anniversary tie-in mean it won’t be quietly restocked forever. Import shops are already listing it at around ¥10,000, which tells you where the secondhand price is heading.

• Good fit: collectors, anyone who grew up with the 1996 original, and people who want a conversation piece they can actually wear.
• Good gift: yes, if you order in time. An April 2027 delivery makes it an odd birthday present, but a fine one for a spring occasion.
• Poor fit: young children, who will find a 0.56-inch screen fiddly, and anyone who needs it before spring.

If you want a pet to play with every day, buy a normal full-size model. If the idea of one on your finger delights you, that’s a perfectly good reason, and you have until 6 October at the latest.

Thirty years of Tamagotchi

The original went on sale in Japan on 23 November 1996: an egg-shaped keychain about 50mm tall that demanded feeding at inconvenient hours and died if you ignored it. It became one of the defining toys of the decade.

It went global the following year, launching in the US in 1997, and the craze spread with it.

Colour screens arrived in 2008 with the Tamagotchi Plus Color, which needed alkaline batteries to power the display and grew to 68mm as a result. Making a colour model small again is what took Bandai two years. The ring is 28mm, about 56% of the original’s length, and the 39th model in the main series.

Thirty years on, the core loop is unchanged: feed it, clean up after it, see what it becomes.

What you can buy in Tokyo instead

The ring isn’t in any shop, but the rest of the series is easy to find in Tokyo.

• Current models: the full-size Tamagotchi Paradise and other current devices are sold in big electronics and toy stores such as Yodobashi Camera and Bic Camera, including their Akihabara branches.
• Character goods: Akihabara’s and Ikebukuro’s hobby and character stores carry merchandise alongside everything else.
• Vintage devices: Nakano Broadway’s shops deal in secondhand toys and games, and older models turn up there. It’s one stop from Koenji on the Chuo Line, so pair it with our Koenji guide.
• Big toy stores: Hakuhinkan Toy Park in Ginza and Kiddy Land in Harajuku are two of Tokyo’s best-known toy shops, and good places to see current models and character goods in one go.

If you’re after one to take home this trip, a full-size model is the practical buy. It works the same way, the screen is bigger, and it’s on the shelf today.

💡 Japanischer Tipp: Don’t ask shop staff for the ring. It has never been in a shop, so the best you’ll get is a polite apology. Ask for the current full-size model instead.

A half-day toy route in Tokyo

If Tamagotchi is part of why you’re in Japan, this route covers new and vintage in one afternoon.

• Start in Akihabara for current models and character goods in the big electronics stores.
• Take the JR Chuo-Sobu Line to Nakano, about 30 minutes, for Nakano Broadway’s floors of secondhand toys, games and collectibles. Many of its shops don’t open until around midday, so this leg works better in the afternoon.
• Finish in Koenji, one stop further west, for vintage shops, cheap bars and live music.

It’s the opposite of the ring experience: everything on this route is on a shelf, and you can walk out with it.

More Japan-only buys worth planning around

The Tamagotchi ring is part of a pattern: some of Japan’s most wanted things are sold in ways that don’t suit visitors. Our guide to Japan-exclusive perfumes covers scents you can only buy here, and Shibuya Marui 2026 tracks one of Tokyo’s most talked-about new stores. If you’re in Tokyo for pop culture this autumn, MAPPA EXPO runs until 7 December.

We update this page

This page is maintained rather than published and forgotten. If the second wave closes early, if Bandai opens a third, or if an international release is announced, we’ll update it.

FAQ

If you want one, the clock is the problem

Not the price, not the shipping, not the size: the deadline. The second wave is due to close at 23:00 Japan time on 6 October, possibly sooner, and no shop in Japan will sell you one afterwards.

Last verified: 22 September 2026, against Bandai’s press release (in Japanese) and the official Tamagotchi announcements.