Animating micro-plastics
Ajing is not a retrieve, it is a series of pauses. Two tiny lifts of the rod tip, then nothing for three seconds. Almost every bite I get arrives inside that nothing.
Started July 2026Months of researchUltralight saltwater gameNo sponsors
My Ajing Journey: Ultralight Saltwater Gear & Setup
Ajing is horizon fishing with grams instead of ounces: a 0.8g head, a translucent softbait and a line so thin that the bite arrives in your fingertips before your eyes see it. This page is my initiation, written as I lived it.
I started this in July 2026. That means everything I know is genuinely fresh — no years of habit, no second-hand advice, no folklore repeated because everyone repeats it. I am going to share the learning I did first hand, in the order I did it, including the parts where I got it wrong.
High sensitivity
Ester line and a tip that loads with almost nothing. You feel the bite, not the fish.
Minimal gear
One rod, one reel, one small box. Ajing punishes clutter more than it punishes budget.
Micro weights
0.8g to 2g covers almost everything. The countdown does the rest of the work.
A personal note before the tables
This took months, not an afternoon.
Building this site and compiling this guide took months of hands-on testing, reading, translating Japanese product pages, ordering, waiting, re-ordering and writing. Nothing here is copied from a catalogue.
Every recommendation below comes out of extensive market analysis across European and Japanese shops — prices, stock, shipping, customs, the lot. The point is simple: you should not have to repeat that work. Read this once, buy well, and spend the saved hours on the water instead.
Top pick — high sensitivity lineBest deal: Ajing Store · €18.95
Tict Jack Bright 200m
Ester main line
After trying braid, thin nylon and several ester lines, this is the one I kept on the spool. Ester is the reason ajing feels the way it does: almost no stretch, direct contact with a 1g head, and a bite that registers as a tick rather than a pull.
- High visibility above water, discreet below it
- Extreme sensitivity for micro-bites
- Very low stretch — direct contact with the head
- Optimised for ultra-light jigheads (0.8g–2g)
Tict Jack Bright 200m — European price comparison
Prices observed during my research, with no discounts, coupons or member pricing applied, and shipping excluded. Pre-order listings are not ranked.
| Store | Country | Price | Shipping / availability | Link |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Ajing StoreBest price | 🇵🇹 Portugal | €18.95 | In stock | View store |
Pesca-Mar | 🇪🇸 Spain | €23.95 | In stock | View store |
The Funky Lure | 🇬🇷 Greece | €24.00 | In stock | View store |
Fishing Planet | 🇬🇷 Greece | €24.00 | In stock | View store |
Shopflix | 🇬🇷 Greece | €24.00 | Marketplace listing | View store |
Vartal | 🇬🇷 Greece | €25.00 | In stock | View store |
Ociopesca | 🇪🇸 Spain | €25.95 | In stock | View store |
Pescarias Baixas | 🇪🇸 Spain | €26.50 | Listed in the line catalogue | View store |
Tsouros Marine | 🇬🇷 Greece | €26.60 | In stock | View store |
Voblery.eu | 🇵🇱 Poland | €16.15 | Pre-order only — not ranked | View store |
Tict Online Shop (Japan) | 🇯🇵 Japan | Yen price + import costs | Landed cost estimate below | View store |
Buying it straight from Japan
The Tict online shop sells the line at its Japanese retail price, but that is never the price you pay in Italy. On top of the yen price you add international shipping, 3.7% duty, 22% Italian VAT on goods plus shipping, and the courier's clearance fee — which alone is around €25 here. On a single €15–20 spool the clearance fee dominates everything: a bundled Japanese order can make sense, one spool never does. That is why the Japan row sits outside the ranking rather than at the top of it.
I am keeping the exact yen figure off the table until I place a real order and can show the invoice with shipping and customs on it, the same way I did for the reels.
A note on the Ajing Store claim
Ajing Store describes itself as “The Gateway to Japanese Ajing & Light Game in Europe”. For this article, that claim is indeed correct: it was the cheapest in-stock source of the Tict Jack Bright 200m of every shop I checked, European or Japanese, and it had it on the shelf rather than on pre-order.
My starter setup
The kit I would hand to someone starting ajing today. I am filling this in piece by piece as I confirm each item on the water.
Rod
Slash Silent Vision SV-632ST
A compact solid-tip ajing rod made for precise micro-jighead work. Sensitive enough to register delicate bites and short enough for controlled presentations around rocks and harbour structure.
Reel
1000-size spinning reel
Light body, smooth start-up drag. Stradic FM 1000 today, Vanquish CE 1000SSSPG next.
Price comparisonLures
TICT & MegaBass softbaits
1.5''–2'' finesse tails in clear, glow and chartreuse. Small changes, big differences.
Jighead comparisonTerminal tackle
0.8g–2g heads + fluorocarbon
Fine-wire heads in 0.2g steps and a short fluorocarbon leader knotted straight to the ester.
Gear comparison by tier
Same discipline, three budgets. Pick a tier to see what I would actually buy at that level.
Enough sensitivity to learn the bite without spending a fortune.
| Item | What I would buy | Typical price |
|---|---|---|
| Rod | Slash Silent Vision SV-632ST | €100–150 |
| Reel | Shimano Stradic FM 1000 class | €180–230 |
| Line | Tict Jack Bright ester 200m | €19–26 |
| Leader | TICT Light Game Compact fluorocarbon | €8–12 |
| Jigheads | Budget heads 0.8g–2g + a few TICT | €10–20 |
Field notes & research takeaways
Counting down the column
I count the head down out loud — three, five, eight — and remember the number that produced the fish. The fish are rarely where the water looks most interesting.
Feeling an ester-line bite
With ester the bite is a dry tick, like tapping a fingernail on glass. With braid it is a mushy pull and half of them never register at all. That difference is the whole reason for this line.
Weight before colour
Months of testing and I changed weight far more often than colour. Going from 1.5g to 1g fixed more blank sessions than any softbait swap.
Leader length matters
A short fluorocarbon leader protects the ester at the knot without killing sensitivity. Too long and you lose the tick you paid for.
Shops are part of the gear
Half of this research was not about tackle at all — it was about who actually has stock, who ships fast, and who quietly charges €20 to send a €20 spool. Every order is logged in my shop reviews and ranked in the European shop index.