Japan implements language proficiency requirements for certain visa applicants

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/04/15/japan/society/jlpt-visa-requirement/

by mikhael • 3 months ago

172 117 3 months ago

japantimes.co.jp

lamasery• 3 months ago

Key detail:

Immigration authorities say the move is aimed at preventing cases in which foreign workers obtain visas under one category, but then engage in unrelated or lower-skilled work.

The claim appears to be that people were using up visa slots for things like interpreters or other jobs where clearly you'd need good language skills to actually do the job, including in Japanese, with the intent all along of doing some other job instead. An up-front test should let through almost all of the legitimate claimants of these visas, and stop almost all the fraudsters. Probably a lot cheaper than a similarly-effective level of after-the-fact auditing, or more-extensive checks into applicants' work situation.

[EDIT] I mean, in the framing provided by the government, the above appears to be what's going on. Governments may lie, of course.

Tade0• 3 months ago

There's also the issue of people going to Japan to buy out several properties to then rent them out.

socalgal22• 3 months ago

Is that a thing? I remember a few years ago when they added a bunch of regulations to rentals that raised the costs.

0x3f• 3 months ago

There are no residence requirements for buying property in Japan. So... what?

rtpg2• 3 months ago

I don't believe there are residency requirements to ownership so the people doing that do not need to go through this flow at all. Just an entirely separate issue, though it might be tackled.

I do have the impression Tokyo is getting similar dynamics to the rest of the world on this front: builders don't care where the money is coming from and so if money from outside the country can get buildings built they're happy.

A friend of mine moved into a sold-out Yokohama tower mansion recently... and despite the bike and car parking being fully booked even more than 6 months in it was _quite_ empty. I have a feeling a lot of people are buying into the market expecting to get easy rental money and not really seeing it.

kakacik3• 3 months ago

Its not shocking, I see it implemented ie in Switzerland, where half of the world tries to get in. Since each part has their own language and none of that is english, its pretty important to exist in society for anything but brief visitors.

Its not restrictive as this (B2 is pretty high level in any language, here its weak B1) and resefved for 'higher' permits like C, for which you anyway need 10 years of residency in normal circumstances.

But japan is japan and one of most closed societies globally, nobody should be surprised by this.

vr46• 3 months ago

Except the Swiss are total arseholes about it, they won't even grant citizenship to people born there or who've lived there for twenty years and speak the language. Many want to cap total population at 10 million, we'll see what happens in June.

And twelve years ago, the Swiss voted to restrict EU FoM for itself and the backlash was instant.

Can't blame the government, this is the Swiss voting public doing their best to be dickheads.

Japan is a bunch of islands, yes it's pretty closed, but Switzerland is a land-locked village with fewer people than London and entirely dependent on trade and the movement of people and money for all they have, and barely a scrap of a language to call its own. English is super common there, probably as a way of democratically inconveniencing everyone.

nvch• 3 months ago

Not exactly. I got (and renewed) the Swiss permit with zero knowledge of any official language. However, my wife had to present the basic certificate or my promise that she would learn the language.

dudeinjapan5• 3 months ago

Company founder in Japan here. This is largely how I read this specific news--its narrowly scoped to prevent patterns of abuse, which there have indeed been isolated cases tantamount to human trafficking.

That being said, there is a broader trend, that Japan's immigration authorities are becoming more foreigner-hostile, reflecting a broader political view shift in Japanese society (see: Sanseito political party) and one could argue in the US and globally.

One data point: a few months back we had one of our employees denied a Permanent Resident Visa due to a clerical error where our company forgot to notify the immigration bureau of an address change--we literally moved our office across the street, same city block. Our lawyer said such a case was unheard of a few years ago; these were always handled as simple corrections, instead the poor chap had to go to the back of the 9+ month waiting queue.

Our lawyer says the news is too new to know what concrete ramifications it will actually have on us, a tech company which uses English as the main language for engineering roles.

laurieg2• 3 months ago

Relatively small clerical errors causing people to get permanent residency applications denied is becoming a trope. The ones I have heard:

- Client company address changed 4 years ago and the paperwork wasn't filed within 2 weeks.

- A late pension payment 2 years ago.

- Pension and health insurance were paid on time, but the date stamp on the physical payment slips was smudged and so "did not prove" that it was paid on time.

- City hall workers didn't send out health insurance slips in time, applicant (through no fault of their own) couldn't pay by the deadline.

This level of strictness is affecting people's lives, ability to make plans, get mortgages etc.

To add to this, permanent residency application times are now very long. After you complete your application some people are waiting nearly 2 years to get a response. There is a lot of vagueness about what happens if the rules change during your application period.

mc33012• 3 months ago

I hate to say this is a strange "win-win" in the end (politically speaking). It'll be a little harder for Japanese companies to take advantage of foreigners, often trafficking them to quite shady working and living conditions with very little pay. This has potential to protect some foreigners from that situation here. Additionally, this looks like a "win" for the anti-foreigner crowd, because "now it's tougher to get a visa here, haha!"

So it's good for foreigners, while also placating the anti-foreigner group.

I know many foreigners here that work in absolutely atrocious working conditions, getting kicked by bosses, seeing crushing death of their coworkers in the factory (and still expected to return to the same unsafe work the next day), tiny wages while living half-dozen people in tiny apartments. It really is sad, and the problem is the companies... not the foreigners.

kalium-xyz• 3 months ago

Seems like the guys covering his ass. Ive had visas denied in japan over small errors. I dont use visa lawyers anymore and no longer have this issue.

Might ofc also be that the immigration officers got tired of working till 10pm every day

garbawarb• 3 months ago

Are you Japanese? What was your motivation behind founding in Japan?

bena4• 3 months ago

I mean, seems fair.

If I'm applying for a work visa where the work I'm doing would require me to know Japanese, I should know Japanese.

fzeroracer3• 3 months ago

The key thing is that the ESI category includes a lot of work which you don't need to know Japanese. For example, software engineering jobs in Japan are often at either larger multinational companies or companies with enough presence outside of Japan that they have teams which are in English.

Japan has been on a recent anti-immigration kick via making visas harder and more expensive to get while also blaming them for all of their problems which, isn't really gonna work out for multiple reasons.

bena4• 3 months ago

See, I would have figured the "Specialist in Humanities" part of it would not include software development.

I just looked up the definition/qualifications for it and I misunderstood the bit.

I thought it was sub categories. Engineers, who are Specialists in Humanities, who are doing International Services.

But it's more like three different categories. Engineers OR Specialists in Humanities OR International Services.

It seems like they could just move International Services to its own category. (Based on the information in this link: https://portal.jp-mirai.org/en/work/s/highly-skilled-hr/giji...)

pavon• 3 months ago

But the law doesn't apply to all ESI jobs, just a subset which (ostensibly) do need to know Japanese.

bossyTeacher• 3 months ago

software engineering jobs in Japan are often at either larger multinational companies or companies with enough presence outside of Japan that they have teams which are in English.

Just because you work in a multinational company where they have English speaking teams does not mean that you should not know the language. It is weird to assume that just because your first job is with an English speaking team you will always work with those teams or in that company at all.

What about daily life? Communication is a fundamental part of your activity as a civilian imo. Not understanding what is going on in a country without using some device to translate for you is not acceptable. Whether in a train or during an earthquake you must always be able to communicate.

serf• 3 months ago

If I'm applying for a work visa where the work I'm doing would require me to know Japanese, I should know Japanese.

the naturalization act of 1906 and the immigration act of 1917 , in the US, were some of the hardest fought-for and controversial laws ever put in place.

The immigration act got vetod by 3 different sitting presidents in different forms , and the naturalization act included a 'free white persons & natives' clause that screwed over a lot of people.

It was pretty widely seen as a method to minimize poor working people. Both laws were used a ton during the commie red scare against citizens, and the 1917 law is essentially held responsible for the separation of families / 'port of entry tragedies' that separated families based on things like language.

now : i'm not saying that Japan is walking in the same foot-steps, just pointing out that language/culture exclusivity within legal spheres usually ends poorly for the people.

bena4• 3 months ago

Ok, but neither of those are about work visas.

If I'm applying for a work visa, it's because I expect to be in that country to work, not as a permanent resident.

eviks2• 3 months ago

Why do you need that requirement be validated by people and at a level not connection to the place of work?

ryandrake• 3 months ago

Presumably 1. the "places of work" are not doing sufficient validation, and therefore 2. regulation is needed when the non-regulated path is failing.

lo_zamoyski• 3 months ago

Because the government is responsible for border control and immigration?

The alternative is that the company must provide evidence, but I don't see how this is better.

vidarh• 3 months ago

Unless the places of work are vetted, setting up a company to offer a job, and collect fees for offering said "jobs", would seem to be a simple way of committing fraud in that case.

So either you vet the companies offering those jobs, or you vet the visa applicants.

remarkEon2• 3 months ago

Countries are not just places you work, first of all.

dlcarrier• 3 months ago

To prevent fraud. It's the same reason governments have driving tests and tax or grant audits. If the government deferred to applicants for everything, there'd be no point in the application process.

Sure, there's a libertarian argument against limiting visas, imposing taxes, and issuing grants, but if you are going to, it requires some amount of enforcement to prevent rampant fraud.

helsinkiandrew• 3 months ago

The new benchmark has been set at the equivalent of the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) B2 level.

B2 is upper intermediate. Probably 2-5 years of study

https://www.coe.int/en/web/common-european-framework-referen...

pjc502• 3 months ago

Or JLPT N2. Which is quite difficult - approx 4000 words and 1000 kanji. That's several years of learning for all but the most proficient.

(The scale starts at N5 and lower numbers are harder)

fl4regun2• 3 months ago

It should be noted that JLPT is not a direct equivalent to CEFR. CEFR requires you to pass speaking and writing, JLPT does not demand you to be able to write, or speak, at all. IT only tests listening and reading. This ironically means that while yeah, you will be able to read a LOT of kanji with JLPT N2, you might not be anywhere near B2 level at speaking and conversation, and probably not at all when it comes to writing (writing Kanji is a whole other thing beyond being able to read, it requires dedicated practice, but anyways a lot of people now don't need to since you can type it out on your phone or computer, and just copy that onto the form or whatever you are writing on)

cute_boi• 3 months ago

I think every country should do this. What I am seeing these days is that people who deserve visas are struggling with visa issues, while untalented people are getting visas easily

raw_anon_11112• 3 months ago

I agree too. And before the pearl clutching starts, I’m very much practicing what I preach as an American seriously considering retiring to a Spanish speaking country and who just came back from the target country after spending six weeks there - and planning on returning once or twice a year.

I’m learning Spanish and find it disheartening that many of the ex-pats [1] I hung out with don’t even attempt to learn Spanish. I’m currently somewhere around an A2/low B1.

[1] yes I also am against people calling themselves “ex-pats” instead of “immigrants”

optionalsquid• 3 months ago

It depends on the work you are going to be doing. For example, if you are going to do research, then it is more important that you speak and write fluently in English, than whatever language is spoken in the country you'll be working in.

Though being fluent in the local language will, of course, make your life a lot easier

freetime2• 3 months ago

As someone who has been living in Japan for years now, and still has a long way to go learning the language, I generally support language proficiency requirements. First, it should be noted that these are fairly common sense requirements designed to reduce fraud - requiring people applying for work visas that require Japanese proficiency to actually be able to speak Japanese. I suspect there will be more requirements in the future for things like permanent residency, but will wait for those to actually be implemented before commenting one way or another.

And second - it’s really hard to participate in society if you can’t speak the language. I think this creates resentment for both Japanese citizens and foreign residents alike.

I regret not studying sooner and harder, and a clear language requirement probably would have influenced me to try harder.

seanmcdirmid• 3 months ago

I did two years in Lausanne without speaking French and 9 years in Beijing with…maybe 2nd year proficiency in Chinese (better than most foreigners, but hardly fluent!). You can totally live in society without fluency, Switzerland being harder only because I never studied French before.

If you are doing work with a world market, you are kind of expected to speak the language of that work and not necessarily the country you are in.

m4633• 3 months ago

Sounds like freetime2 is taking personal responsibility for his deficiencies which is a pretty japanese way of thinking. YMMV in the rest of the world.

timr2• 3 months ago

And second - it’s really hard to participate in society if you can’t speak the language. I think this creates resentment for both Japanese citizens and foreign residents alike.

I basically agree, but there are two problems with this:

1) the JLPT is a test of fairly academic reading and listening (for those unfamiliar, it’s basically the equivalent of the US SAT reading/vocab section in terms of difficulty). There’s no speaking or communication requirement. I probably cannot pass N2, despite being conversant and functional in everyday life at a high B1 level.

2) The populations who are most likely to abuse the current system are fairly notorious for being able to pass the exam without real communication ability. I know a fair number of people who were able to pass without being able to have even a basic conversation at the time.

Language schools here are essentially factories designed to shove kanji readers through the JLPT in minimum time, with little attention paid to conversation. Overall, this feels like a sledgehammer approach to a screwdriver problem.

maxgashkov• 3 months ago

Not sure why your comment is downvoted, because it hits the issue dead center, namely it's completely possible to pass either of the required tests (N2/J2) and not being able to speak a single word of Japanese in a live conversation.

That's why at least one category of applicants abusing the visa (Chinese) will continue to do so without any issues.

kmeisthax2• 3 months ago

So, on one hand, this is an excusable policy (as in, there are already immigration law apologists in here making excuses for it).

On the other hand, I don't like immigration control as a concept - countries should not operate like hereditary country clubs, and people should not have less freedom of movement than bags of money. More self-interestedly, I'm an American, and I know my country's infrastructure - both political and otherwise - is failing horribly. I don't want out yet, but I know I'm going to need out at some point in my lifetime. So every time I see a favorable country locking their doors, I shudder.

There's probably going to be at least one reply from a European saying this is a good thing - that American citizens (or, if things get really bad, American refugees) should be denied entry, under the theory that immigration is a welfare / free money for thieves program and that letting people leave destroyed countries just rewards people for destroying them.

This is, of course, bullshit, both because it's victim blame-y, AND because it covers up a shortcoming of the country making the excuse. The real reason countries try to avoid taking in refugees is that most countries are built like hereditary country clubs. They don't take in immigrants, so they don't know how to integrate immigrants. Japan in particular has a community of poorly-integrated American emigrants that largely just stick to themselves.

America, ironically enough, is one of the few countries that actually cracked the code on immigration. We used to have really generous family reunion visa programs, we have basically every immigrant population you can think of in every major city, and immigrants that come here integrate way better than ones that go to Europe. So it's not like countries have to be restrictive on immigration.

Instead, what I'm seeing is that immigration is being used by politicians to distract from their own countries' failings. It's the same story as what happened in America[1]: when shit breaks, people get rich off selling the fix, and so they pay[0] politicians to keep the system broken enough that they can continue profiting off of it. But this only works if you give the people some kind of excuse. The politics of scarcity are brutal, but scarcity becomes a far easier sell if you have a scapegoat. Some magical source of systemic burden you can shed without backlash. "The state-run insurance system isn't broken because we don't pay our doctors, it's broken because we have too many poor patients from other countries!"

[0] Not necessarily in the "bribery is free speech" way America does it, of course.

[1] Which would indicate to me that perhaps leaving the country is a fool's errand, if every other country is on the same curve.

laurieg2• 3 months ago

Japan is importing record numbers of workers. Most convenience stores and supermarkets in my town (far from Tokyo) are staffed by 'language school students' (an you can work 28 hours a week on a student visa). Agreements [1] between Japan and other countries to bring more workers are making headlines. At the same time, it's getting harder and harder to stay.

Permanent residency applications are being judged incredibly strictly. Citizenship applications need 10 years of continuous residence up from 5. Business manager visas have gone from needing 5m yen of capital to 30m yen.

It seems pretty clear that the goal is to get workers in for some productive years but make the path for staying difficult. I guess that's one way to solve an aging population problem.

To put things in perspective, Japan is an island and has entry and exit controls on the borders, so it is estimated that 0.05% of the population is illegal immigrants (people not leaving when their visa runs out). And the police can and do stop visible minorities to confirm their residence status on the spot. It is compulsory to carry identification documents if you are a foreigner. (There are questions about the legality of this but it is common and widely practiced).

[1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/business/2025/10/27/india-valua...

workfromspace2• 3 months ago

I'm guessing you never travelled anywhere else in your life?

Japan ... has entry and exit controls on the borders, ... It is compulsory to carry identification documents if you are a foreigner.

This is true for almost all the countries in the world, especially the second part.

Japan implements language proficiency requirements for certain visa applicants

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