Overview
Key figures and core demographic trends for Japan.
Population
123.4M
Fertility Rate
1.15
Life Expectancy
84.0y
GDP / capita
$36K
Pop. Growth
-0.49%
Net Migration
140.6K
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Provisional fertility nowcast
Source: National Statistical Offices or Ministries of Health / Interior · compiled by @BirthGauge. Full nowcast table · provisional, may be revised.
YTD births (3 mo) +0.2% YoY
TFR 2024
1.15
TFR 2025
1.14
TFR 2026
1.15
Births YTD (3 mo)
163.3K
Rates per 1,000 people per year — not absolute birth or death counts. When the birth rate exceeds the death rate, natural increase is positive (before migration).
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Economy
National accounts and international trade.
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Exports & imports
International trade for Japan — product exports and imports from OEC / BACI.
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Migration
Net migration, permits, and the foreign-born population of Japan, plus where migrants come from and where the diaspora lives.
4,281,026 people at the end of June 2026, up 8.2% from June 2025. The agency’s own comparison is with the end of 2025: +155,631 (3.8%). Bars show the ten largest nationalities. The percentage is the change since June 2025.
Source: Immigration Services Agency of Japan. Mid- to long-term residents plus 263,705 special permanent residents. Short stays, diplomats, and people without a status are excluded. June 2026 press release.
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Largest foreign-born communities in Japan by country of birth (2024) · arrow shows change since 2010.
Source: UN DESA International Migrant Stock 2024
Top destinations for people born in Japan who now live abroad (2024) · arrow shows change since 2010.
Source: UN DESA International Migrant Stock 2024
Demography
Age structure, projections, and population composition.
That is 58% smaller than in 2025. The animation freezes the latest fertility rate. It is a model, not an official forecast. UN World Population Prospects 2024 medium is 77 million in 2100 — higher than this run (low 53 million, high 106 million). UN lets fertility change over the century and includes some migration; this run does not.
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Mortality & longevity
Life expectancy, death rates and child mortality as far back as vital registration and historical reconstructions allow (from 1960), plus infant and maternal mortality.
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Pre-1960 life expectancy and long child-mortality series are from Our World in Data (Riley, Zijdeman et al., HMD, UN). Historic crude death rates cover countries in the Human Mortality Database only — Sweden from 1751, France from 1816, and so on. Crude rates are not age-standardized.
Health, education & infrastructure
Spending, capacity and attainment. Coverage is thinner than for demographic series — most figures come from periodic surveys rather than continuous registration.
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Society, housing & beliefs
Family, crime, housing and religion indicators.
Homicide rate
0.2
Divorce rate
1.6
Births outside marriage
2.4%
Home ownership
61.0%
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- Unaffiliated57.0%
- Buddhist36.0%
- Other5.0%
- Christian2.0%
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7per 1,000
2020
Only one year available — not enough points for a trend line.
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Prefectures & regions
Prefecture fertility on the map, plus the Kyushu / Hokkaido–Tohoku / Tokyo regional contrast.
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Why this country’s demographics matter
Age structure, fertility gaps, and migration change budgets and electorates. This is the constraint, not a manifesto.
Japan is the textbook ultra-low, ultra-aged case: the 2040 workforce is mostly already born.
- TFR has been far below replacement for decades; the pyramid is the exhibit.
- Immigration is small relative to the gap. That is arithmetic, not a verdict on whether inflows should rise.
- Prefecture maps show Tokyo versus the rest.
The longer argument — pensions, schools, coalitions, and what migration does and does not offset — is on why birthrates matter. The case for a pronatal culture as the response is on what's the solution?. To turn this country’s series into a memo you can forward, open the briefing builder — generate a draft, write it yourself, then expand any paragraph.