For people moving to Japan

Japan's paperwork has deadlines.
Nobody tells you what they are.

You have 14 days to register at city hall. Extension applications generally open about three months before your period of stay ends. Daruma turns all of it into a plan built around your visa, your city and your arrival date.

Read the guides

On the App Store now. Android to follow.

14 days to register your address,
by law

About 3 months before an extension can
usually be filed

Longest period specified for your
status — one PR condition

Everything the ward office assumes you already know.

Five things the app does, from the letter you can't read to the deadline three years out.

Scan

Point it at the letter you can't read.

Japanese post arrives without warning and without English. Scan the envelope's contents and Daruma tells you what it is, what it costs, and when it's due — then turns it into a task with the deadline already attached.

The payment slip stays in the app, so you're not hunting for it on the day.

A task list ordered by deadline, showing health insurance payment and city hall address registration with a progress bar.

Track

Every deadline, in the order they hit.

Move-in registration is a legal 14-day deadline, and Daruma marks what's required by law differently from what's merely a good idea.

Reminders start about three months before your period of stay ends, when an extension can generally be filed. Save any deadline to your phone's calendar in one tap, and confirm your exact window with Immigration.

A city hall address registration guide with the Japanese phrases for the counter, shown in Japanese, romaji and English.

Know

The words you need, at the window you're standing at.

Knowing the procedure isn't the hard part. The hard part is the moment someone asks you a question in Japanese and you have thirty seconds to answer.

Every errand carries the phrases for that specific counter — city hall, health insurance, the pension office, the bank — in Japanese, romaji and English. Tap to hear it read aloud, or just turn the screen around and point.

Works offline-first for the things you'll need at a counter, because ward offices have famously terrible signal.

The Daruma Coach chat answering a question about what to do first after arriving in Tokyo.

Ask

Ask the question you're embarrassed to ask.

An AI coach that answers questions about visas, city hall procedures, housing and daily life in plain English — and knows where you are in your move, so you're not re-explaining your situation every time.

Speak it or type it. "What's a guarantor and why does everyone want one?" is a perfectly good question, and you shouldn't have to ask a stranger on Reddit.

It can be wrong, and it says so. Anything consequential still gets confirmed with the actual office.

A year view listing recurring Japanese deadlines: year-end tax adjustment, furusato nozei, and the residence card renewal window.

Plan

Years ahead, not weeks.

Year-end tax adjustment in November. Furusato nozei by 31 December. A renewal window that opens three months before your card expires.

These come round every year for as long as you live in Japan, and nobody sends a reminder in English. Daruma keeps the whole horizon in view, so nothing arrives as a surprise.

More to keep you on top of it

A plan for your situation

Tell it your visa, nationality, destination city and arrival date. Someone landing on a work visa gets a different list from someone moving wards after three years, or bringing a partner and children.

Your documents, in one place

Residence card, visa paperwork, contracts. Scan them once and they're there at the counter, instead of scrolling your camera roll while a queue forms behind you.

Straight into your calendar

Save any deadline to your phone's calendar in one tap, so it sits alongside everything else in your life rather than inside an app you might forget to open.

Dated, so you can judge it

Japanese rules change — twice in 2026 alone. Every guide carries a "last reviewed" date, so you can see how current it is rather than trusting it was right whenever it was written.

An illustrated long-term foreign resident holding a coffee and a phone

Built in Tokyo, by someone who did all of this the hard way

Daruma is made by a long-term resident of Japan who has been through the ward office queues, the guarantor conversations, the renewal panic, and the specific indignity of realising a form needed a stamp you didn't own.

Timely tax, pension and health-insurance compliance already matters for permanent residency, and serious non-payment can count against a residence-status change or extension now. From June 2027, Immigration plans to check National Health Insurance payment information electronically.

And it's not miserable

Bureaucracy is grim enough without an app that feels like a tax form. Daruma is a small red character who reacts to how your move is going — pleased when you clear a deadline, visibly stressed when a receipt total surprises you, asleep when you should be too. He is not a productivity streak and he will not guilt you.

What it isn't

Daruma is an organisational tool, not legal or immigration advice. Rules change, and different municipalities apply them differently. We tell you what's in force, flag what's only been proposed, and date everything — but always confirm anything consequential with your ward office, the Immigration Services Agency, or a qualified professional.

We don't estimate your eligibility for anything. A wrong number on a permanent residency application isn't our risk to take with your life.

Free guides

Essential guides to Japanese paperwork

Plain English, dated, and specific about what is required by law versus what is only proposed. No account needed.

Arriving

Daruma is out

On the App Store for iPhone, iOS 15.1 or later.

The guides are free and need no account.