Zao Now: Wednesday 10th December 2025
- Dec 10, 2025
- 2 min read
Independent snow and weather reporting from the Zao region of Yamagata
New snowfall at base 4cm
Snowfall at base this season 52cm
Posted on Wednesday 10th December 2025 This is an archived report. The latest Zao Now report can be found here.
Apologies for my absence... a pre-season trip out of Zao was called for.
Anyway, back now and it was snowing earlier on this morning but has eased off now.
The ski area remains open with, as far as I can tell, just the Chuo area is open for skiing/boarding. Very limited just yet.
As with much of northern Japan, we are expecting snow going into Friday morning and then some from early next week.
Hopefully we'll get enough to enable more of the ski-jo to open up.
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The information below is manually checked with official sources and updated for every report.
Please note that details can change quickly and all information is subject to change.
Ski lifts operating (planned):
Chuo Number 1 pair (via Zao Chuo Ropeway)
Ski runs open (planned):
Chuo (part)
Official snow depth (reported by ski area):
Yokokura area: 10cm
Uwanodai area: 20cm
Utopia area: 30cm
Chuo area: 30cm
Paradise area: 20cm
Summit area: 15cm
Zao Now2025-2026 season |
Data as of Wednesday 10th December 2025 Total snowfall at base 52cm Number of days snowfall observed at base 6 days Most snowfall observed in 1 day 23cm (on 4th December) November 2025 snowfall 5cm observed on 2 days December 2025 snowfall 47cm observed on 4 days |
All snowfall data presented on this page is the snowfall measured and observed at base/town level by our reporter based in Zao Onsen. The 'new snowfall' number represents the amount of snow measured since the previous report. All opinions are those of the individual reporters. Information regarding ski area operations is manually checked every morning and is believed to be correct at the time of the report.