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One common question in our Discord community is, “How much money do I need to make to live comfortably in Japan?”
This question can be difficult to answer in a way that is both broadly useful and personally meaningful. Here, I will explain what goes into living expenses in Japan, so that you can better understand what your salary needs to be to maintain the lifestyle you want. With the resources provided here, you can build a rough estimate of your projected monthly expenses based on your spending habits.
How much does it cost to live in Japan?
Living expenses in Japan can be roughly broken down into several categories:
Taxes and benefits
Japan has a progressive income tax system. Employers generally deduct taxes and benefits (such as pension and health insurance) from your paychecks automatically. While most people can expect to lose 20–30% of their salary to taxes, insurance, and pension, the specifics will depend on your location, salary, visa status, employment type, and other particulars.
In Japan, employers must enroll their full-time employees in the Employees’ Health Insurance (健康保険, kenkou hoken or 社会保険, shakai hoken) and Employees’ Pension Insurance (厚生年金保険, kousei nenkin hoken) systems. There are some exceptions, such as employees who work fewer than 20 hours per week, who will be enrolled in National Health Insurance (国民健康保険, kokumin kenkou hoken). Regardless of employment status, everyone must be enrolled in one of those two plans.
We suggest using a tax calculator to get a rough estimate of what your take-home would be.
Housing
Rent can account for up to 30% of most people’s salaries. In fact, many landlords and guarantor companies will draw the line at 30% and make it difficult to rent a unit that is significantly more. You should note that Tokyo has the highest rent in the nation—as of June 2024, the average rent in Tokyo was 79,437 yen, with the next highest being the neighboring Kanagawa and Saitama Prefectures.
Japan has an abundance of rental properties available, such as apartments, share houses, condominiums (マンション, manshon), maisonettes/townhouses, and detached houses. Most of those are self-explanatory, except perhaps for shared houses. Share houses are a type of cheap housing in Japan that do not typically require a guarantor. Most offer a single bedroom with space for a small bed and desk, while all other spaces—kitchen, dining room, living room, showers, bathrooms, etc.—are shared. The amenities and size vary depending on the share house. While share houses offer built-in social interaction with other housemates, it’s often a gamble whether those housemates enhance or worsen the experience.
If you want to dive into the specifics of rental housing in Japan and learn how to search for apartments in specific areas, please take a look at our article on finding an apartment in Japan. However, as long as you have stable employment and are looking at monthly rents less than 30% of your salary, you will be able to find a place to live.
Bills
This category covers utilities for your apartment, cell phone, and internet.
Utility costs can be difficult to judge as they depend on personal preferences and lifestyles, but for a person living alone in a small apartment, it would be reasonable to spend 10,000–30,000 yen per month on utilities. Some small rentals such as LeoPalaces or share houses offer rental contracts that are inclusive of electricity and/or water, but may have further restrictions on how much can be used.
Cell phone bills can range from as little as 1,000 yen per month to multiples of 10,000 yen per month, depending on your plan, add-ons, and whether you’re paying off your phone in installments.
Internet fees can similarly range from as little as 2,000 yen per month to 15,000 yen per month, depending on the type of internet you have and whether you’re also paying for bundled add-ons.
Food
Food expenses can be difficult to estimate. Some people eat frugally and enjoy a steady diet of home-cooked meals consisting of cheaper staples like grains, legumes, and eggs or cheap meat. Others prefer to eat out regularly. Some have special dietary preferences or requirements; meat especially can balloon a food budget.
A person who lives alone and cooks frugally for most meals could spend as little as 10,000–20,000 yen per month on the extreme low end, which might be a steady diet of cheap carbs (rice, pasta, and udon) and eggs with the occasional chicken breast. It’s entirely possible for food preferences to make that number go up to 60,000 yen or more per month as well, especially if you prefer a meat-heavy diet or ingredients that are imported or out of season. Government-collected data shows that the average single person household spent 42,049 yen per month on food in 2023.
Someone who prefers to eat out or buy pre-made meals from a grocery store could expect to spend a minimum of around 30,000 yen per month. Again, this number can change drastically depending on personal preferences. There’s a tremendous financial difference between a beef bowl set from a popular chain (around 500-700 yen) and a dinner at a sit-down restaurant (starting at around 1500-2000 yen). McDonald’s is an international chain that may give you an idea of how Japanese fast food costs compare to those in your own country.
If you want to look up general prices for food to build up your own monthly estimate, there are Japanese sites that present government-gathered data in more digestible formats to make it easy to find average food prices.
Purchases
This is a catch-all category for purchases, such as electronics, furniture, and clothes. It can also cover eating out, celebrations, parties, and activities with friends.
It’s possible to have a fun night out with friends including dinner, drinks, and karaoke for around 5,000 yen. Longer nights or fancier food will, of course, cost more.
For most personal purchases, Amazon Japan is a great source of prices; physical stores are rarely cheaper than Amazon for the dry goods and household items that make up the bulk of its business. However, Amazon is often more expensive for food and clothing.
The websites for Uniqlo, Muji, and GU are also good places to investigate clothing expenses. If you want to check how much it would cost to outfit your apartment with flat-pack furniture and middle-of-the-line goods, Nitori is another good place to start.
Transportation
It’s important to note that Japan is not a car-centric society, and there are many expenses involved in owning a vehicle: annual taxes, inspections every two years, and parking. Japan requires car owners to show proof that they have a place to park their cars, and in most cities, a parking space can cost as much per month as a small apartment in the same area. So owning a car is usually seen as a luxury in urban areas.
Many people get around solely by public transportation or bicycle. Bicycles can be had for as little as 10,000 yen for a standard mamachari-style single speed bicycle, or over 100,000 yen for a road cycle. Electric bicycles that do not require a license to ride (電動アシスト自転車, dendou ashisuto jitensha) start at around 110,000 yen. It’s common to see mothers riding electric bicycles with one toddler on the back and another on the front!
Commuting costs, on the other hand, are generally borne by the employer on a monthly basis. Some companies request that employees map out their commutes and submit their routes, plus the costs, to the employer. Each month, employees pay for their commuting passes and other fees out of pocket, and the employer reimburses that amount in their monthly paycheck.
Another, less common method is a flat commuting stipend included in the paycheck. While this method may not cover the entire commute for some employees, it could allow others to receive a bit more money in the end, if they commute cheaply.
Travel
Travel, both foreign and domestic, can be a large expense.
Many people, especially when they’re new to Japan, want to take advantage of being here to travel all over the country. A shinkansen ticket from Tokyo to Kyoto will cost around 16,000 yen; a plane ticket for the same trip will generally cost around 20,000 yen. There are also night buses (夜行バス, yakou basu) that travel popular routes. A night bus from Tokyo to Kyoto can cost as little as 7,000 yen.
One way to investigate travel costs is by plotting routes on Google Maps. Make sure that you pick a date and time that seems reasonable—searching for a route at 2 a.m. JST will result in strange, often expensive routes.
Foreign immigrants to Japan may also need to travel internationally more often than the average resident. Due to the cheap yen at the time of writing this article, international travel can represent a significant expense, both in plane tickets and also in converted prices while staying in the destination country. It’s entirely conceivable that a one- or two-week trip abroad could represent an entire post-tax paycheck.
Medical expenses
Medical costs in Japan can be relatively cheap compared to other industrialized nations. The prices in this section assume that you have Japanese health insurance, which covers 70% of the total fee. If you do not have insurance or choose to go to a clinic that is not covered under the Japanese health insurance system, then you will need to pay the full price.
In Japan, for a non-specific issue, you often start off with a routine visit to an internist (内科, naika). Clinics include a first-time registration fee, so the first visit would be around 1,500 yen, but subsequent visits are then slightly cheaper at around 1,000 yen. These fees are rough estimates for consultations and prescriptions; if you need other procedures done, such as blood draws or x-rays, they will cost another few thousand yen or so.
Allergy medications and painkillers, if taken daily, are cheaper by prescription than off the shelf, but can still cost a few thousand yen per month. Something like an asthma inhaler can cost around 10,000 yen per month, depending on type and dosage. Patients with diabetes can expect to spend anywhere from 3,000 yen per month for simple management, to 20,000 yen per month for insulin four times daily plus related medications.
If you rely on specific medication, it is important to do your research and make sure it’s available in Japan. Some medications are not available here, while others, such as stimulants like Adderall, are illegal to possess and cannot be prescribed. We cannot provide information on every medication available, so please research this on your own.
Hospitalization expenses vary from hospital to hospital, and also based on your treatment and preferences. A standard hospital stay costs around 20,000–30,000 yen per night in a shared room; meals cost around 500 yen each.
Fortunately, Japan allows medical expenses to be counted as income tax deductions once they exceed a certain amount each year. Many municipalities additionally offer stipends (手当, teate) or subsidies (補助金, hojokin) for life events like giving birth.
Other recurring expenses
Another type of pre-existing expense is unfortunately common for immigrants: college loans. Make sure to check the exchange rate and see how much your monthly minimum would cost to pay in yen at current rates.
I also suggest figuring out whether you would be able to afford it if the exchange rate worsens; the yen has been unstable in recent years and it’s better to build in a buffer. Loan repayments may be your second largest monthly expenditure after rent, making it a good baseline for salary expectations to ensure you can enjoy a sustainable lifestyle in Japan.
If you plan to move to Japan with your family, many of these expenses would of course be multiplied. There can also be additional expenses incurred in moving and settling in, especially if you have children. You can explore various options for schooling in Japan, all of which have their own costs.
Conclusion
Living in Japan may be cheaper than in many industrialized nations, but Japan also offers plenty of opportunities to splurge, so your budget will mostly boil down to personal lifestyle preferences. The difference in cultures and markets—especially at current exchange rates!—makes it difficult to judge Japanese salaries purely on a converted currency basis, so it is important to calculate your own projected monthly expenses, to understand if a given salary is practical for the kind of lifestyle you want.
If you have questions or want to rubber duck with like-minded folks, please consider joining our Discord community
