Photography is generally allowed in the museum for personal use, but there may be restrictions on using flash or tripods, and some exhibits may prohibit photography altogether. It's best to check the museum's photography policy upon arrival or consult their website in advance.
The museum is located in Nakanoshima, a central area of Osaka. It's easily accessible by public transportation and close to other cultural attractions, making it a convenient destination for visitors.
Traveler reviews
Good for a short visit. The planetarium was pretty cool, but the program we watched was fairly boring, with lots of words (in Japanese only) and didn't utilise the screen as much as it should have. We only realised after the session that other sessions had different content.
The museum has some great interactive displays, but maybe 1/5 of them were out of order. Some displays are clearly very worn, and likely this museum is due for a reinvigoration.
Absolutely fantastic museum for kids of all ages and adults. Very affordable - ¥400 per adult. Great displays and experiments (light, magnetism, electrify, centrifugal force, musical instruments, minerals, space) throughout all the levels and kept my children (4 and 2) entertained the whole time we were there (approximately 1.5-2 hrs).
I think this is a great facility for Japanese school children with many interactive displays. However this is not a tourist attraction for the foreigner, no of the written material giving information on the exhibits is in English.
Alot of the things I saw here I've seen in many other since museums around the World.
The exhibitions are spread across three floors. You initially take the lift to the top, 4th floor which deals with scientific investigation and has a variety of electrical & electro magnetic equipment. The 3rd floor deals with materials, crystals etc whilst the 2nd floor, called "Enjoy science together" has quite a bit of fun stuff eg distorting mirrors, demonstration of Bernoulli's Law etc. At ¥200 it's cheap but not really something for foreign tourists.
A very cool museum that I'm sure I would've loved if I was a young child who can read Japanese. Many of the exhibits are interactive, but if you're a tourist you'll have to settle for wikipedia, because all the explanation placards are in Japanese, except for an English title. I went on a weekend and got my ticket within minutes. 400yen entry, 600 for the planetarium.
There's some cool optical illusion paintings outside the museum at least. The emu is watching you!
We arrived earlier than expected to Osaka and looked for things to do kind of spur of the moment. We were staying close to the Minami-Morimachi Station and decided to walk to the Osaka Science Museum. The walk was really nice (about 30min) along the river with lots to see and art instillations along the way. The Science museum was 3 floors of hands on exhibits (plus the ground floor which has the lobby and planetarium). There were some cool exhibits, just keep in mind, everything is in Japanese. Despite that, our daughter (11 at the time) had a blast trying all of the exhibits. We opted to also do the planetarium show (additional charge) and when it came time (after 2+hrs), my daughter still wanted to stay. For peaking a kid’s interest in science this place definitely gets 5 stars! The planetarium show was a miss for us though, it wasn’t very informative, entertaining nor stimulating. We could have just skipped it and spent that last 45min in the exhibits.
