Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s visit to New Delhi has considerable importance, given the breadth and depth of India-Japan relations. This relationship has historically been strongest in the economic sphere: Japanese corporations have been big investors in India and Japanese agencies have been a major source of infrastructure finance. For Tokyo, India remains a major economic and geo-economic partner — though Japanese policymakers have also felt let down by India’s unwillingness to not only refuse to enter the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, but also its cold shoulder to the trade vertical of the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework. Indian policymakers should prioritise explaining the country’s new approach to trade and openness to their Japanese counterparts, given the centrality of the economic partnership.