A total of 38 six-car trainsets (228 cars) were built between 1983 and 1997 in five batches, and the design received the 25th Laurel Prize of the Japan Railfan Club in 1985.

[3] The first 23 sets were not originally fitted with any air-conditioning system due to structure gauge restrictions caused by the small tunnel size of the line.

In 1990, Mitsubishi Electric developed a 240 mm (9.4 in) thick compact air-conditioning unit with a capacity of 16.2 kW.

[6] and in December 2011, set 37 was retrofitted with silicon carbide variable frequency drives for trial purposes.

[13] Three cars of former set 1 (01-101, 01-201, and 01-601), withdrawn from revenue service in 2013, are kept for training purposes at Nakano Depot in Tokyo.