"I was shocked. It is too much to pay 100,000 yen to extend my visa every three years," said Srijana Sunar, a 29-year-old Nepali woman who has been working at factories in Japan since 2018. She earns 145,000 yen ($900/€790) per month.
In late May, the Japanese government enacted a bill raising the maximum fee for changing residency status or extending a period of stay tenfold from the current 10,000 yen to 100,000 yen by the end of March 2027, according to the Deutsche Welle.
Srijana's husband, Spandan Sunar, who has worked in Japan since 2016 at a transportation company and a Japanese language school, told DW his long-term efforts have "not been rewarded" by Japanese society.
"We are not newcomers. We have proper visa status, we follow the rules and we pay taxes, but our freedom to choose jobs and working conditions is very limited," he said in fluent Japanese.
The young couple, who were married in Japan in 2022, hope to apply for permanent residency — but only if they can afford it.
Under the same bill, the upper limit for permanent residency permit fees would be raised from 10,000 yen to 300,000 yen. This poses another big hurdle for the couple, as an annual individual income of more than 3 million yen has been generally regarded by most applicants as a requirement for permanent residency.
Demographic decline in Japan
As of April 2025, Japanese nationals numbered some 119.7 million, down 941,000 from a year earlier, according to the Statistics Bureau of Japan.
Meanwhile, the number of foreign nationals in Japan has been rising at a pace that offsets roughly 40% of that decline. According to the Immigration Services Agency, there were around 4.125 million foreign nationals in the country at the end of 2025, an increase of over 356,000 from the previous year.
"Foreign workers are indispensable. Without them, society would not function," Toshihiro Menju, an expert on Japanese immigration policy, told DW.
"It is impossible to fully make up for labor shortages through women's participation or the use of robots alone," said Menju, who is also a visiting professor at the Kansai University of International Studies.
"The reality is that the number of foreign workers has been increasing across sectors, from highly skilled professions to front-line caregiving fields. The people who support the fundamental infrastructure of society are declining," he added.
Japan moves to tighten immigration policies
In January, the administration of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi agreed on a package of stricter measures regarding foreign nationals.
The name of the package translates to "comprehensive measures for acceptance and coexistence of foreign nationals." It comes after the government established a "Headquarters for Foreign Nationals Policy" in November 2025.
The tightened measures include doubling the residency requirement for naturalization to 10 consecutive years and introducing Japanese language proficiency requirements for permanent residency.
"Many of our systems were not designed with such a large number of foreign visitors and residents in mind," Takashi Yamashita, a lawmaker from the Liberal Democratic Party who serves as a chair of one of the project teams under the Headquarters for Foreign Nationals Policy, told DW.
"We draw a clear line; we will firmly support those who use the system correctly, while taking a firm stance against misuse, overuse and abuse. We work to eliminate the public sense of unfairness," said Yamashita.
"It is also important to create an environment where legal foreign residents who seek to contribute to Japanese society can live with peace of mind and thrive as members of local communities," he added.
However, some prospective workers in Japan say the new rules have adversely affected their plans.
Yanika Roongpairoj, a 35-year-old Thai researcher working at Chiba University Hospital near Tokyo, said things have gone smoothly so far in building her career in clinical pharmacy, including visa applications and job hunting.
But despite receiving a Ph.D. degree in Japan in 2024, she told DW that "these policy changes have affected my thoughts about my long-term plans in Japan to some extent."
Rising negative sentiment toward foreigners
The push to tighten policies toward foreign nationals comes amid growing public concerns about foreigners across Japan.
According to a Nikkei mail-in opinion poll conducted between October and December 2025, 37% of respondents said they "think it is not good" that the number of foreigners is increasing in Japanese workplaces and communities, a 10-point increase from the previous survey conducted in 2024.
A 26-year-old Japanese consultant in Tokyo, who spoke anonymously with DW, said he is concerned that "coexistence with foreigners has been promoted uncontrolled, without sufficient understanding and compromise when it comes to public safety and social norms."
"For example, there is a certain degree of consensus in Japan regarding the unwritten rule that one should be considerate of others when in public places. However, I see behavior such as playing music without earphones or making phone calls on trains, that makes many people feel uncomfortable. Japanese people tend to avoid directly calling out such behavior, and they feel uneasy but no one says anything," he said.
Young people in Japan are leaving large cities
A 34-year-old Chinese woman who works at an IT company in Tokyo told DW the "reality as an international worker in Japan differs by nationality. For people like me, who are from Asia, we are expected to be more like Japanese," she added.
Koki Yamaguchi, a 27-year-old Japanese graduate student in Osaka, told DW that he feels "a negative sentiment is gradually accumulating among Japanese people that Japanese culture and identity are being threatened by other countries."
Japan's far right makes political gains
The Japanese far-right party Sanseito has tapped into this negative public sentiment with its slogan "Japanese first," and saw significant gains in the July 2025 upper house election.
Sachi Takaya, an associate professor at the University of Tokyo, told DW that "Sanseito succeeded in setting an agenda on the 'foreigners' issue."
"The Takaichi administration claims to draw a clear line between its policies and xenophobia, but it has been making xenophobic policies in practice," she said.
Takaya added that the government of former PM Shinzo Abe claimed it did not even have an official "immigration policy" in a big effort to fend off public criticism. At the same time, Abe expanded the number of foreign workers through what was called a "Specified Skilled Worker" system.
Whether the Takaichi administration's harder line on foreign workers will end up reducing their numbers remains to be seen.
For Spandan Sunar from Nepal, after living and working in Japan for 10 years, the future is concerning. But despite the high costs and tougher policies on foreign workers, he and his wife have little choice but to stay.
"There's no way but to stay in Japan," he said, adding that it would be a "loss" for Japan if new policies forced foreign workers to leave the country.
"Creating an environment where we are encouraged to stay and contribute would benefit Japan in the end," he said.
