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The general purpose of the paper is to identify main trends in merchandise trade between the Visegrad Group countries (V4) and Japan during the first two decades of the 21st century. Our analysis is based on descriptive statistics of the merchandise trade between V4 countries and Japan in 1999-2018, with extracted shorter sub-periods allowing to investigate an eventual influence of: 1) V4 membership in the European Union (2004) and 2) the global financial and economic crisis (2008/2009). On the basis of our analysis we have found that merchandise trade between the parties has been compatible with general EUJapan trends: V4 imports from Japan in the analyzed timeframe was rather stable, with a very low growth rate, while exports of V4 countries to Japan have expanded significantly (mostly in relative values). We have also concluded that the importance of Japan as a merchandise trade partner for V4 countries has eroded. This negative trend in relative trade importance applies also to V4 exports to Japan where an upward trend was recorded in nominal values. In general conclusions we have stressed that the value of V4 merchandises sold at the Japanese market does not reflect the trade and economic potential of the parties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]