Applying to Graduate School in Japan: Research Students, Supervisors and Entrance Exams

Quick answer

Hi, I'm Miya, and I help newcomers settle into life in Japan. If you are aiming for a master's or a doctorate here, the thing that surprises most applicants is that the process starts with a person rather than a portal: in most laboratories and seminars you are expected to email a prospective supervisor, talk through your research plan, and only then submit a formal application. Many people also pass through a research-student stage first. Requirements and timelines differ by institution, so read each programme's own admissions page alongside this guide.

Why the supervisor comes first

Graduate study here is organised around laboratories and seminars rather than around a department office. A professor takes personal responsibility for the students under them, and each one can only supervise so many at a time. That is why most programmes expect jizen renraku, advance contact, before you submit anything: a short email in which you introduce yourself, outline the research you want to do, and ask whether they would be willing to take you on. It can feel forward if you come from a system where you simply apply online. Here it is the normal first step.

A supervisor's yes is not an admission decision, and it helps to hold those two things apart. They can tell you your topic fits their laboratory and that they would supervise you, and you will still sit the entrance examination like everyone else. What their agreement does is make your application legible: the committee can see which lab you belong in, who vouches for the fit, and that somebody has room for you. Without it, even a strong file can have nowhere to land.

Finding the right person is research in itself. Start from published work rather than from an institution's reputation. Find two or three papers close to what you want to do, notice whose name keeps appearing, then read that person's laboratory page and the recent theses their students have written. A few programmes state that applicants should not approach faculty directly and route everything through an admissions office instead, so check the admissions page before you write and follow whatever it says.

Writing that first email, and what to attach

Keep it short enough to read on a phone. A clear subject line giving your purpose and the intake you are aiming for, one line on who you are and what you studied, two or three sentences on the specific research you want to pursue and why it belongs in that laboratory, a sentence naming one or two of their papers and what you took from them, and a direct closing question: would they be willing to consider supervising you. That is the whole email.

Attach a small, tidy set of PDFs with your own name in the filenames: a curriculum vitae, transcripts and your degree certificate, a one- to two-page draft research plan, and any language test results you hold. Unofficial copies are usually fine at this stage, since certified originals belong with the formal application. If you have a thesis or a published piece, mention it and offer to send it rather than attaching a large file unannounced.

On etiquette, write in the language the laboratory actually publishes and teaches in, and when you are unsure, write in Japanese with an English version below it. Allow a couple of weeks before one polite follow-up, because term time is busy and messages do get buried. Write to one professor at a time within the same institution, and never send identical body text to several people with only the name swapped, since it reads exactly as what it is.

The research plan, and what makes a weak one

The research plan, kenkyu keikakusho, is the document your application turns on. Length limits vary widely, so follow whatever form the programme gives you. What it generally has to contain is stable: the background and why the question matters, a specific question or hypothesis, what has already been done and which gap you are addressing, your method and the data or materials you will work from, a rough schedule across your years of study, and a short list of references.

Weak plans tend to fail in the same few ways. The topic is a field rather than a question, covering the whole of urban policy instead of one mechanism in one setting. The method is a single sentence, or missing entirely, so nobody can tell what you would actually do on a Tuesday afternoon. The plan shows no visible connection to the supervisor's own work. Or it is simply too large to finish in the time the degree allows, which reads as inexperience rather than as ambition.

The remedy is almost always to narrow and to get concrete. Pick a question you could answer with materials you can realistically reach, say plainly which language your sources and fieldwork are in, and show in one paragraph how your plan extends something the laboratory already does. Then send the draft to your prospective supervisor and ask for comment. Revising it two or three times with their input is completely normal, and it is part of how the working relationship starts.

The research-student stage

Many international applicants enter through a research-student position first, called kenkyusei and sometimes translated as non-degree research student. You are attached to a supervisor and to the laboratory, you can usually audit classes and join seminars, and you spend the period preparing for the entrance examination. No degree is awarded and the credits do not generally count towards one. The term is set by semester and is often renewable, subject to each programme's own rules.

People take this route for practical reasons: to bring their academic Japanese up to seminar level, to learn what the entrance examination actually looks like, to refine a research plan with the person who will eventually assess it, and to be physically present in the laboratory before committing years to it. It is not a side entrance, though. Research students apply for the degree programme through the same examination as everyone else, and admission is not automatic.

Practically, the research-student position has its own application round and its own screening, separate from the degree programme, and it carries its own student residence status. Anything touching that status — permission to work part time, how long the period runs, what changes when you move into a degree programme — should come from the Immigration Services Agency's own guidance or your institution's international office. I cannot give you legal or immigration advice, and these rules do change.

Entrance examinations, interviews and intake timing

Entrance examinations are usually built from three or four parts: a document screening of your file and research plan, a written subject examination in your field, a foreign-language component, and an oral interview. Programmes designed for international applicants often reduce this to documents plus an interview, sometimes with a written task based on your research plan. Past papers are frequently available from the department office or its site, and reading two or three of them tells you more about what a programme values than any description can.

The interview is where your plan gets tested out loud. Expect a panel of faculty from the laboratory and often from beyond it, a request to summarise your research in a few minutes, and then questions that probe feasibility: why this method, why this laboratory, what you would do if the data you need does not exist, how you intend to support yourself, and what you plan to do afterwards. Rehearse the summary aloud in the examination language until it feels comfortable. Interviews are often held online for applicants still abroad.

On timing, the academic year begins in spring, and that April intake is the main one, while a smaller autumn intake exists more often in English-taught programmes. Examinations are held well before enrolment and many programmes run more than one round. Working backwards, people typically open contact with a supervisor many months ahead, then apply, sit the examination, and once admitted go through the institution for a certificate of eligibility before applying for the visa. Each of those steps has its own window, so build your schedule from the programme's own admissions page rather than from anyone's general advice, including mine.

The quiet thing that ties it together: a number that reaches you

Look back over that sequence and notice how much of it is simply delivery. Supervisor correspondence you cannot afford to miss, application portals that send a verification code by SMS before they will let you upload anything, interview invitations and rescheduling calls, and then, once you land, campus systems — the student portal, the health clinic, the part-time work paperwork, the bank account — that all assume a Japanese mobile number rather than the one you arrived with.

Sorting that out is refreshingly simple once you are here: you apply online with your residence card, and eSIM-capable phones can often connect the same day, typically in about fifteen minutes, so the number is in place before the first form asks for it. Have a look at our setup guide for eligibility and the step-by-step, and confirm current terms on the page before you apply. Settle that early and you can spend your attention where it belongs, on the research plan and on the person you are writing to. I'll be right here.