Hayabusa, Tokyo - Shin-Aomori/Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto limited-stop, starting 5 March 2011
Hayate, Morioka/Shin-Aomori - Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto limited-stop, starting December 2002
Yamabiko, Tokyo - Sendai limited-stop, and all-stations to Morioka, starting June 1982
Nasuno, Tokyo - Oyama/Nasushiobara/Kōriyama all-stations, starting 1995
One service has been discontinued:
Aoba, Tokyo - Sendai all-stations, June 1982 - October 1997
Through trains on the Akita Shinkansen and Yamagata Shinkansen lines also run on Tōhoku Shinkansen tracks from Morioka and Fukushima respectively. As of 16 March 2013, the maximum line speed is between Tokyo and Ōmiya, between Ōmiya and Utsunomiya, between Utsunomiya and Morioka, and between Morioka and Shin-Aomori. On 30 October 2012, JR East announced that it is pursuing research and development to increase speeds to on the Tohoku Shinkansen. Work seems to be ongoing to upgrade the section between Morioka and Shin-Aomori to 320 km/h, primarily in the form of improved sound barriers. This should make operating at 360 km/h possible, if the improved noise dampening techniques being tested using the ALFA-X test train are successful. If so, the speed limit is expected to be raised sometime between 2020 and 2030.
October 1998: 1 billionth passenger carried on Tōhoku, Joetsu and Nagano Shinkansen lines.
1 December 2002: The - section opens.
13 April 2010: Test running starts on the extension from Hachinohe to Shin-Aomori.
4 December 2010: The extension from Hachinohe to Shin-Aomori opens.
5 March 2011: New Hayabusa services operating at commence operation between Tokyo and Shin-Aomori using new E5 series trainsets.
23 June 2012: The line's 30th anniversary was celebrated, with approximately 1.93 billion passengers having been transported on the line.
From Shin-Aomori, the line continues to Shin-Hakodate in Hokkaido, passing through the world's longest undersea railway tunnel, the Seikan Tunnel. A further to Sapporo is due to open by 2030. The mountainous terrain that the line passes through has necessitated heavy reliance on tunnels. The Iwate-Ichinohe Tunnel on the Morioka-Hachinohe stretch, completed in 2000, was briefly the world's longest land rail tunnel at, but in 2005 it was superseded by the Hakkōda Tunnel on the extension to Aomori, at. In 2007 the Lötschberg Base Tunnel, and in 2010 the Gotthard Base Tunnel in Switzerland superseded both.
On the afternoon of 11 March 2011, services on the Tohoku Shinkansen were suspended as a result of the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. JR East estimated that around 1,100 repairs would be required for the line between Omiya and Iwate-Numakunai, ranging from collapsed station roofs to bent power pylons. Limited service on the line was restored in segments: Tokyo to was re-opened on 15 March, and Morioka to Shin-Aomori was re-opened on 22 March. The line between Morioka and Ichinoseki re-opened on 7 April, Nasushiobara and Fukushima on 12 April, and the rest of the line on or around 30 April, although not at full speed or a full schedule. The trains returned to full-speed operations on 23 September 2011.
Special event train services
25th anniversary
On 23 June 2007, 10-car set K47 was used for a special Yamabiko 931 service from Omiya to Morioka to mark the 25th anniversary of the opening of the Tohoku Shinkansen.
30th anniversary
On 23 June 2012, 10-car set K47 was used for a special Yamabiko 235 service from Omiya to Morioka to mark the 30th anniversary of the opening of the Tohoku Shinkansen.
