Japan's Immigration Services Agency opened a month-long public comment period on August 4, 2026, for a draft ordinance that would add a five-year period of stay to the "Specified Skilled Worker No. 2" visa, alongside the existing three-year, two-year, one-year and six-month terms. Comments must be submitted in Japanese, by post, e-mail or the e-Gov portal, and are due by September 2, 2026.
The change is not a new benefit so much as a fix to an unintended gap in Japan's permanent-residency rules. Applicants generally must hold a residence status carrying the longest period of stay available in their category before they can apply for permanent residency. Most other work-purpose visas already cap out at five years, but Specified Skilled Worker No. 2, whose maximum term has been three years, let holders satisfy that particular test after just three years, a lower bar than the five-year benchmark other skilled migrants must clear. The agency's own overview frames the amendment as necessary so the requirement is not more lenient for No. 2 holders than for people on other work visas. Adding a five-year option brings the category's ceiling in line with everyone else's, which in practice raises, rather than lowers, the residency threshold these workers must eventually meet.
Specified Skilled Worker status was created eight years ago to channel foreign labor into industries the government judges chronically short-staffed. The draft ordinance touches only the stay-period table in the enforcement regulations; the linked comparison of current and proposed text shows the five-year figure inserted alongside the existing three-year, two-year, one-year and six-month options for the No. 2 category, with no other change to who qualifies or how the status works.
If the rule proceeds as drafted, the agency is targeting promulgation for early January 2027, with the ordinance taking effect on the day it is promulgated. The document released this week remains a proposal, provisionally signed by the justice minister, and is subject to change based on comments received during the review window.
For employers, the near-term effect is administrative before it is anything else: a five-year permit means fewer renewal filings for workers who qualify. The permanent-residency arithmetic, however, is quietly getting stricter, not easier, for a visa category built to keep skilled foreign workers in Japan for the long run.