Permanent Residence in Japan in 2026: Fees, Approval Rates, and the Rules That Are Changing

Published: July 2026 · Updated: October 2026 with official 2025 statistics, data through July 2026, and the fee and guideline changes now in force

Permanent residence has always been the most valuable — and most scrutinized — status in Japan's immigration system. As of June 2025 there were 932,090 permanent residents in Japan, the single largest residence category, accounting for almost a quarter of the record 3.96 million foreign residents (Immigration Services Agency statistics).

But 2026 is a turning point. Since this was first published, the cost of applying has multiplied, the requirements have been formally rewritten, a decades-old eligibility practice is ending, and — from 2027 — permanent residence becomes revocable for non-payment of taxes. If you are considering applying, the details and the deadlines below matter.

1. The Fee Has Jumped — ¥10,000 to ¥200,000 (In Force Since October 1, 2026)

Update, October 1, 2026: the new fees are now in force — permanent residence is ¥200,000, and extensions/status changes scale from ¥10,000 to ¥75,000 by the period granted. Applications received by September 30, 2026 keep the old fees. Full details and the complete table in our new-fees guide. The section below is kept as our original analysis from July 2026.

Until September 30, 2026, a successful PR applicant paid a ¥10,000 revenue stamp (raised from ¥8,000 in April 2025). That era has ended:

• March 10, 2026: the Cabinet approved a bill amending the Immigration Control Act to raise the statutory ceiling on immigration fees — to ¥300,000 for permanent residence and ¥100,000 for visa extensions and changes of status.
• July 2026: reporting indicates the government plans to implement sharply higher fees from around October 2026, with practitioners widely expecting the PR fee to land around ¥200,000. The exact amount will be fixed by Cabinet Order.
• The government expects roughly ¥225 billion per year in additional revenue, with about 60% earmarked for foreign-resident integration programs and overtourism measures.

Important nuance: the ceiling is not the fee. The actual amounts — and how pending applications will be treated when the new fees take effect — will only be settled by the Cabinet Order. But the direction is unambiguous, and note that the PR stamp is paid on approval, not at filing. With waits now routinely exceeding a year (see below), an application filed in late 2026 could plausibly be approved into the new fee era. Applying earlier is the conservative play.

2. What the Statistics Actually Say About Your Chances

Japan publishes the raw numbers in its official immigration statistics. We compiled every official annual table from 2007 through 2025 and the monthly tables through July 2026 (the latest available) into one series:

Four things stand out:

• Approval was once nearly automatic. In 2007, 86% of processed applications were approved. That era ended in two steps: the 2017–2020 documentation crackdown took the rate to roughly 52%, and after a partial recovery to ~65% in 2022–2024…
• …a second, sharper tightening is underway right now. The official 2025 approval rate is 56.9% (39,865 approved of 70,062 processed) — and January–July 2026 stands at 51.5%, with the spring months dipping below 51%, the lowest levels in the twenty-year series. In 2026, nearly half of all decided applications are being refused.
• Applications are at record highs anyway. 75,968 new applications were filed in 2025 — the most in the series — and 2026 is running far above even that pace: 64,982 in seven months, annualizing to over 110,000. The fee increase (now in force) and the April 2027 requirement changes are visibly pulling applications forward.
• The queue is swelling. Pending applications grew from ~61,000 in January 2025 to over 83,000 by July 2026 — which is exactly why waiting times (next section) have stretched toward 18 months, and why they are unlikely to shorten soon.

Bureau variation adds another layer: annual approval rates at Nagoya and Fukuoka run persistently below the national average, and monthly figures swing hard — in July 2025 the Tokyo bureau approved just 44% of the PR applications it processed that month. Refusals are most often born from tax timing, social insurance gaps, or income continuity. (We cover the specific failure patterns in our guide to avoiding PR rejection.)

The full series behind the chart:

"New applications" counts filings in that year; "processed" counts decisions issued in that year — because PR applications take months or years to decide, many of a year's decisions concern applications filed earlier. Processed exceeding new applications means the backlog shrank that year; the reverse (as in 2025–26) means the queue is growing. "Processed" includes approvals, denials, and withdrawals/other; 2025 shows the ISA's official annual table, published in late 2026 — it confirmed the preliminary figures we published in July to within 40 applications out of 70,000. 2026 is compiled from the monthly tables through July.

3. Waiting Times: Officially ~4 Months, Actually Up to 18

The Immigration Services Agency still lists a "standard processing period" of around 4 months for PR. Its own published processing-time data tells a different story: for applications decided between April 2025 and March 2026, PR processing averaged 279 days — roughly 9–10 months — nationally, with 2025 quarterly releases running as high as ~295 days.

And the averages hide the queue at the big bureaus. Current practitioner-reported ranges:

• Tokyo: 12–18+ months — practitioner case logs show Tokyo applications filed in late 2023 receiving decisions 540–640 days later, and 18-month waits are no longer unusual
• Yokohama: 8–12 months
• Osaka: around 8 months
• Nagoya: around 5 months

Practical consequences: you must keep renewing your current visa normally while the PR application is pending, your circumstances (job, address, family) should stay stable and reported, and any tax or pension payment that falls due during the wait must be paid on time — immigration can and does re-check before deciding.

4. February 2026: The 3-Year Visa Shortcut Is Closing

On February 24, 2026, the Ministry of Justice revised the official Permanent Residence Guidelines. The headline change ends one of the most relied-upon practices in PR screening:

• The guidelines require applicants to hold the "longest period of stay" for their visa. For years, a 3-year period of stay was treated as satisfying this in practice — most successful applicants never held a 5-year visa.
• From April 1, 2027, that ends. Applicants will need an actual 5-year period of stay.
• Transition window: holders of a 3-year period of stay can still apply under the old interpretation until March 31, 2027.
• The revision also made explicit that applicants should meet current landing-permission standards, and sharpened scrutiny of whether taxes were paid by their deadlines — late payment that is later settled still counts against you.

If you currently hold a 3-year visa and meet the residence requirements, the next nine months are your window to apply under the rules as they stand.

5. From 2027, PR Can Be Revoked for Willful Non-Payment

The June 2024 amendment to the Immigration Control Act — expected to take effect around April 2027 — makes permanent residence revocable where the holder willfully fails to pay taxes or social insurance premiums, or receives certain criminal penalties.

Guidelines issued on September 29, 2025 narrow this to genuinely deliberate cases: repeated delinquency, substantial amounts, clear intent to avoid payment. Losing your job or falling ill and missing payments is explicitly excluded. Still, the message is clear — PR is no longer "set and forget." Keep paying national pension, health insurance, and residence tax on schedule, and keep the receipts.

6. October 2026 Update: Most of It Arrived

When first published in July, this section listed proposals. On October 1, 2026 the ISA formally adopted the revised guidelines — our full breakdown of the new requirements covers income, pension, language, and the spouse route in detail. In summary:

• Japanese language requirement — now adopted. The October 1, 2026 guideline revision requires B1-level Japanese (N3 scored 104+, or any passing N2) for applications from April 1, 2027, with exemptions for HSP holders and others — full details in our guide to the new requirements.
• Income benchmark — now adopted, and stricter than floated. The October 2026 revision requires household income continuously above the average of Japanese households of the same size (reference ~¥5.75M) — already in force, including for applications pending since April 2026. See the full breakdown.
• Wider revocation grounds. The ruling party has asked the government to consider expanding the scope of conduct that can trigger PR revocation beyond the 2024 amendment.

Every recent change — fees, the 5-year rule, revocation — has moved in one direction. Whatever your view of the policy, the practical takeaway for eligible applicants is the same: the criteria you qualify under today are unlikely to get easier.

The 2026 Action List

• Check your points. If you score 70+ on the Highly Skilled Professional scale, you may qualify for PR after just 3 years — 80+ points, after 1 year. Use our free PR points calculator; the HSP route is unaffected by the 10-year rule and remains the fastest path.
• On a 3-year visa? You have until March 31, 2027 to apply under the old "longest period" practice — and long processing queues mean filing well before that.
• Fee-sensitive? The 20× fee increase took effect October 1, 2026: PR now costs ¥200,000 for applications received from that date. Applications received by September 30 keep the ¥10,000 fee — see the full new fee schedule.
• Audit your own records first. Five years of income, residence tax, national pension, and health insurance — paid in full, on time. This is where most refusals are born, and where the 2026 guideline revision sharpened its teeth.
• Keep everything clean while you wait. A 10–18 month pending period is long enough for a missed pension payment or an unreported job change to sink an otherwise strong application.

Our permanent residence service covers eligibility assessment, timing strategy, document preparation, and the application itself — including an honest read on whether to file now or strengthen your record first.

Sources: Immigration Services Agency (PR Guidelines, rev. Feb 24, 2026; immigration statistics; published processing periods); Cabinet decision of March 10, 2026 on the Immigration Control Act fee amendment; The Japan Times (Dec 20, 2025 and Jul 3, 2026); Japan Today; ISA revocation guidelines of Sep 29, 2025. Figures current as of July 2026; fee amounts pending final Cabinet Order.