New government data shows a major demographic shift in Japan: 27 municipalities now have foreign residents making up more than 10% of their population—a trend that researchers didn’t expect to see nationwide until around 2070.

Japan’s foreign resident population continues to grow as more international workers, students, and families settle in the country to fill labour shortages and support key industries. As of the end of last year, the total number of foreign residents reached 3.76 million, an increase of 350,000, marking the largest year-on-year rise on record.

Where is the foreign population highest?

Municipalities with above-average foreign resident ratios tend to be:

• Industrial hubs
  
• Tourist destinations
  
• Communities with long-established foreign populations
  

Out of 1,892 municipalities and wards surveyed:

• Shimukappu (Hokkaido) recorded the highest share at 36.6%.
  
• Akaigawa (Hokkaido), Ikuno Ward (Osaka), Oizumi (Gunma), and Kutchan (Hokkaido) each had foreign resident ratios surpassing 20%.
  

These areas attract foreign workers for tourism, manufacturing, and hospitality roles, and some have long histories of multicultural communities.

Overall, nearly 80% of the municipalities that crossed the 10% threshold have already exceeded the foreign population level Japan’s National Institute of Population and Social Security Research predicted for the year 2070.

Growing presence across more regions

Beyond the 27 municipalities that topped 10%, another 151 municipalities across 27 prefectures now have foreign populations above 5%.
Only two villages reported having zero foreign residents.

How Japan reached this point

Foreign resident numbers remained relatively steady at around 600,000 until the 1960s. Growth accelerated after a major change in the immigration law in 1990, which allowed people of Japanese descent to live in Japan as long-term residents.

Since then, the foreign population has gone through several phases:

• Temporarily decreasing during the 2008 global financial crisis
  
• Rising again, then dropping during the COVID-19 pandemic
  
• Now entering a third wave of expansion, driven in part by new visa categories like the Specified Skilled Worker (SSW)
  

Examples of multicultural growth

In Onna Village (Okinawa)—where foreign residents make up 12.4% of the population—the increase is linked to a graduate university established 13 years ago. Many foreign residents now work in hotels, resorts, and restaurants that line the coastline.

A village official shared that despite the rise, there have been no major issues, saying residents seem to be “coexisting well.”