Hyper Japan London 2026 Mini Report

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I was initially only going to Hyper Japan (my local Japanese culture convention) last month because I wanted to support our friends at Vocafest, who were screening a Vocaloid fan concert on the Saturday of the event, but then I saw the convention announce this:

Granted, I often go to events without much preliminary research, but I don’t remember Crypton Future Media doing anything like this before, either at HJ or any UK conventions for that matter, so I thought I’d check it out and report back! The event happened between Friday 24th and Sunday 26th July, and I visited on the Saturday.

CFM Booth

Crypton Future Media “Hatsune Miku” booth at Hyper Japan London, 2026

Inside of the CFM booth

Information boards about Hatsune Miku/MIKU EXPO

The booth was notably bigger than other stalls, though not huge, and featured a message wall, a couple of tables with assorted merchandise, a history of MIKU EXPO and cardboard cutouts featuring – interestingly – the piapro characters’ V3 and V4x designs (I suppose I’d expect to see their newer designs, but I love these ones so I’m not going to complain):

Llifesize cardboard cutouts of the V3/V4x piapro characters

More than just the presence of a piapro characters’ booth, I was itching to see the event-limited merchandise they were selling. The merch made for European audiences for e.g. past MIKU EXPO shows tended to be a bit different from that made for Asia and NA, mostly because they’d fall into the so-called “ike-miku” (handsome miku) territory. This of course isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but for this year’s Europe tour and CFM’s booth at Hyper Japan, Miku is notably more “feminine”. You can see the full art below (illustration by 玲汰 / Reita):

Seeing as this would possibly be the only time I could buy this stuff, and well… I like collecting vocal synth merch, I bought a couple of items as soon as I got the chance.

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HJ exclusive badge and T-shirt

I found it interesting that they were also selling these blind badges; upon purchase of any number of badges, you would get an opportunity to choose a tiny lottery-style ticket, and if a ticket had a special mark on it, you would win an acrylic block featuring Hyper Japan Miku:

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Prize draw and the prize you’d win (if you were lucky)

Very snazzy indeed.

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I really wanted the acrylic block, so bought six badges, only to find out that unfortunately all six tickets I got were duds… The badges also came in this very interesting packaging, not dissimilar to the bags I use to mail things with. This fact didn’t faze me too much though, as I knew I was going to rip the bags open to see who was inside anyway. Hoping for at least one Rin, I opened them and…

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Interesting packaging for the blind badges, the badges I got

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…I managed to get three Meikos and one Luka!

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Seeing as these random badges were also apparently exclusive to Hyper Japan, I was interested in taking a closer look at the construction. According to the packaging, they were manufactured in the US by Cross Media, and printed and assembled in the UK. I do think the illustrations are cute! However, I also think the plain white background leaves a little to be desired, and when you look closely, the print quality isn’t amazing. CFM has gone under fire for the lower quality of some of their merchandise for MIKU EXPO in NA and Europe in recent years, and as I returned my badges to the safety of their grey plastic envelopes, I wondered if they could do with investing in better production companies to work with.

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Surprisingly for the other merch though, the quality looked good on first inspection! The T-shirt print is crisp and clear, and hopefully it washes well (the label recommends washing inside-out at 30°c, but I’ll probably stick to hand-washing). The badge also has a very nice, clear print quality and gloss to it. But the fan was the stand-out piece for me: an entirely wooden uchiwa-style fan, the print-quality is great and it made for the perfect accessory on what was yet another scorching summer day.

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HJ exclusive bamboo-handled fan

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After my MIKU EXPO 2024 VIP goody bag fan started fraying and broke after a week of use recently, I’m curious to see how this one holds up (though I’m determined to be as gentle as possible with it so something similar doesn’t happen again).

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I was impressed with the T-shirt quality, but I had only seen it in the packaging, so I took it out to get some more photos. Just as I was lauding the quality, I went to fold the shirt up to put in my drawer and… it snagged on something. I have absolutely no idea what it snagged on, since there wasn’t anything sharp around, but it caused the thread to tear somewhat, pulling all of the overlocked threads so they bunched up weirdly. Looking closer, I could tell the quality of the thread wasn’t great, and I’m still not sure how it snagged and ripped in such a weird way with minimal effort.

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T-shirt print and the uh… ripped thread

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For a brand new T-shirt which I hadn’t even worn once, I’m a little disappointed, especially since the snagged thread is on the front. I also noticed that the HJ exclusive badge had a weird scratch on the back, even before I took it out of the packaging. I’d say the T-shirt was quite reasonably priced (£30), since I’ve seen similar collab or concert T-shirts being sold for between £40 ~ £70 new, but maybe this is why the thread quality was so low.

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⬤ Hatsune Miku Hyper Japan 2026 Bamboo-Handled fan: £10 ★★★★★
⬤ Hatsune Miku Hyper Japan 2026 Badge: £6 ★★★★☆
⬤ Hatsune Miku Hyper Japan 2026 T-shirt: £30 ★★★★☆
⬤ Hatsune Miku Hyper Japan 2026 Random Badge: £6 ★★★☆☆

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All things considered though, I’m very happy I had the opportunity to see and buy this exclusive merchandise, something which other international Miku fans might not get to see!

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They did have other merchandise available, but I won’t go into too much detail since it was a mix of merch from different shops and events. That being said, I did find it interesting that they had MILGRAM T-shirts there!

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Figures, MIKU EXPO sticky notes and MILGRAM T-shirts

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MIKU EXPO microfibre towels, Meihua Sannong acrylic stands and MIKU EXPO happi

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By the time I got to the signature wall, all the space had already been filled up, which was surprising since it was still early on the Saturday of the whole weekend, but I managed to write a small message, and later on the staff gave us scrap paper to draw on, which we then decorated the booth tables with:

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A very full message board vs my tiny message

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The Miku I drew and gave to the booth staff

Vocafest Concert

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After a small food intermission, I was able to catch Vocafest’s concert, starting from 18:30!

It was good to see the crowd as hyped as always!

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My phone was dying so I only got a couple of pics, but it was nice to see fans of all ages dancing, waving glowsticks and having fun.

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Trying to squeeze everything I wanted to do into one day (checking out all the booths/tables, meeting friends, watching musical acts) was tough, but I still think I managed to see everything I wanted to see! A part of me wishes I went on the Sunday too so I could see if they had any acrylic blocks left over that they’d consider selling me but… alas…now I’ll never know what happened to the potential leftover goods.

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All in all, I definitely enjoyed myself. It was really nice to see CFM present at an event local to me, and I’m not sure if they’ll return any time soon (aside from for MIKU EXPO later this year), but if they do, I’ll try my best to be there!

Links

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Hyper Japan

⬤ Official Website
⬤ Instagram
⬤ X (formerly Twitter)

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Vocafest UK

⬤ Website
⬤ Instagram
⬤ TikTok
⬤ X (formerly Twitter)
⬤ YouTube
⬤ Vocamerch (online shop)

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