The Dome has four names.
All of them are correct.
It costs nothing, it never closes, and you cannot go inside it. Ten minutes to walk around, and it reads better floodlit at 21:00 than it does at noon. What is worth knowing is what the building was before 8:15, and what happened when UNESCO inscribed it.
Free, unfenced from the riverbank path, open at every hour and exterior only — the shell is stabilised and nobody is admitted inside. Allow 10 to 15 minutes to walk the full circle. The Hiroden stop is called Genbaku Dome-mae and it is about 30 seconds from the railing: line 2 or 6, roughly 15 minutes from Hiroshima Station, flat ¥240.
A working building, full of people, at 8:15
What you are looking atIt was not a monument. It was the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall — a 1915 exhibition and commercial-display building by the Czech architect Jan Letzel, with offices, a gallery and staff who came to work that morning. Everyone inside was killed.
The bomb detonated almost directly overhead, about 600 metres up and roughly 150 metres to the south-east, over what is now the Shima Hospital site. That near-vertical geometry is the only reason anything is standing: the blast pushed straight down through the building rather than across it, so the load-bearing walls and the copper-clad dome frame held while everything around them went flat.
What survives has been stabilised three times — 1967, 1989 and 2002–03 — with steel bracing and resin injection, on the explicit principle of preserving the ruin exactly as it was rather than restoring anything. That is why it looks the same in a 1946 photograph and a 2026 one, and why there is no interior to visit.
Four names, and when to use which
NamesGuides pick one and imply the others are wrong. They are all in current, legitimate use, and knowing which register each belongs to is the difference between reading a sign and understanding it.
| Name | Register | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall | Before 8:15, 6 August 1945 | The building's actual name for 30 years. Using it once, out loud, changes what the ruin is — an office people commuted to, not a memorial that was always a memorial. |
| Genbaku Dome (原爆ドーム) | What Hiroshima calls it | The everyday Japanese name and the name of the tram stop. If you ask for anything else at the counter you will get a pause. |
| A-Bomb Dome | Standard English | What every English sign, map and audio guide in the city uses. Nobody will correct you. |
| Hiroshima Peace Memorial | The formal UNESCO name | The name on the 1996 World Heritage inscription. It is the one you will see on the plaque and almost nowhere else. |
Using both "Genbaku Dome" and "Hiroshima Peace Memorial" — and mentioning what the building did for a living — is better than committing to either alone.
The inscription, and the two objections on the record
1996UNESCO added the Dome to the World Heritage List in December 1996 under criterion (vi) — association with events and ideas of outstanding universal significance. Criterion (vi) is normally applied alongside others; here it was applied on its own, which the World Heritage Committee treats as exceptional. The property is tiny (the ruin and its immediate ground) with a buffer zone covering the surrounding park.
Two states did not join the consensus, and both objections were about framing rather than preservation. China placed a reservation on the record, arguing that inscribing the site risked presenting Japan as the war's victim and displacing the suffering of the countries it invaded. The United States dissociated itself from the decision, arguing that a site of this kind could not be separated from the war that produced it and that a World Heritage listing was the wrong instrument for it. Both positions are paraphrased here — we could not obtain the verbatim text of the committee's Annex V record, so take the wording as a summary of the arguments and not as a quotation.
Knowing that argument exists is useful before you stand there. The Dome is not a neutral object internationally, and the city's own framing — peace rather than grievance — is a deliberate answer to exactly that criticism.
Night, and then early morning
When to comeThe Dome is floodlit after dark and it is much stronger then: the steel cage reads against black sky, the river carries the light, and the daytime crowd of 40 or 50 people at the railing drops to a handful. A night walk from the Dome to the Cenotaph takes about 20 minutes and costs nothing. The second-best hour is before 08:00, when the light is low and the coaches have not arrived.
The worst hour is the middle of the day between 11:00 and 14:00, which is also the worst window inside the museum — so the efficient plan is to see the Dome early or late and put the museum in the reserved 7:30 slot.
How you behave at the railing is a live question and we have written it out honestly on the conduct page: when the Chugoku Shimbun's Peace Media Center asked 50 people standing at the Dome, 70% said seeing visitors flash peace signs there made them uncomfortable and 24% saw no problem. Nobody will stop you. Most of the people beside you will wish you hadn't.
The practical bit
Plan your visitThe A-Bomb Dome — questions people actually ask
FAQPage schema pairedHow much does it cost to see the A-Bomb Dome?
Nothing. There is no ticket, no gate and no opening hour — it stands on an open riverbank path and you can walk up to the railing at 03:00 if you want to. Ten to fifteen minutes covers the full circuit. It is one of the strongest free things in the city.
Can you go inside the A-Bomb Dome?
No. The ruin is exterior-only and has been since preservation began — the shell was stabilised in 1967, 1989 and again in 2002–03 with steel bracing, and there is no floor structure to admit anyone to. You view it from the railing, which runs most of the way around at a distance of a few metres.
What is the A-Bomb Dome's actual name?
It has four names and all are correct: Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall (its name for the 30 years before 1945), Genbaku Dome (what Hiroshima says, and the name of the tram stop), A-Bomb Dome (standard English), and Hiroshima Peace Memorial (the formal name on the 1996 UNESCO inscription).
Why is the A-Bomb Dome a UNESCO World Heritage Site?
It was inscribed in December 1996 under criterion (vi), for its association with events of outstanding universal significance. Criterion (vi) is usually used alongside other criteria; using it alone is treated as exceptional, and this is one of the small number of cases where that was done.
Did any country object to the World Heritage listing?
Two. China entered a reservation on the record, arguing the inscription risked casting Japan as the war's victim and obscuring the suffering of countries it invaded. The United States dissociated itself from the decision, arguing that such a site could not be separated from the war that produced it. Both objections were about framing, not preservation — and both are paraphrased here, because the verbatim committee text was not obtainable.
When is the best time to see the A-Bomb Dome?
After dark, when it is floodlit and the railing holds five people instead of fifty, or before 08:00. Avoid 11:00–14:00, which is peak coach traffic in the park. A night circuit from the Dome to the Cenotaph and back takes about 20 minutes.
How do you get to the A-Bomb Dome from Hiroshima Station?
Hiroden line 2 or 6 to Genbaku Dome-mae, about 15 minutes for the flat ¥240 fare — the stop is roughly 30 seconds' walk from the ruin. The Meipuru-pu loop bus takes about 17 minutes and is free with a JR Pass. Hiroden went to a flat ¥240 adult / ¥120 child fare on 1 February 2025, its first revision in seven years, replacing the old distance-based ¥140–270 scale. The all-day streetcar pass is ¥700, so it pays from your third ride — which is exactly what a Peace Park, castle and station day comes to.
Is it disrespectful to photograph the Dome?
Photographing the building is completely normal — it is the most photographed structure in the city and nobody objects. How you appear in the frame is the live question: in the Chugoku Shimbun's survey of 50 people at the Dome, 70% were uncomfortable with visitors flashing peace signs there and 24% saw no problem. There is no rule, and the peace educator Seiji Horie has argued explicitly against making one.
Booking and getting there
PracticalThe Dome itself is free and needs nothing booked. These are the guided walks that put it in context, and the tower across the road that is the only place you can look down on it from.