Working Holiday Japan Experience

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Intro

What kinds of jobs can you expect during your Working Holiday in Japan?

You’re thinking about doing a Working Holiday in Japan and want to know what kinds of jobs and salaries you can realistically expect? As a former Working Holiday traveler in Japan, I can share my own job-hunting experience, and from the perspective of a business owner and employer in Japan, I can also explain what type of work you can realistically count on.

First, let’s take a look at the conditions of the Working Holiday visa in Japan, which define what type of work is permitted under which circumstances.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan states:

Participants in Working Holiday Programs are allowed to engage in temporary employment as an incidental activity in order to supplement their travel funds.

Participants are strictly prohibited from working at bars, cabarets, nightclubs, gambling establishments, and other venues that may affect public morals in Japan. If a participant works at such a place, they are in violation of the Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Act and may face deportation, unless they are recognized as a victim of human trafficking.

Additionally, the Embassy of Japan in Germany clarifies:

This program is not intended for individuals who primarily wish to work. The main purpose of the stay should be “holiday” in Japan. Accordingly, applicants whose primary intention is to work in Japan are not eligible to apply for this visa.

In simplified terms: Unlike tourists, you are allowed to take on part-time work under the legally regulated conditions, provided it is outside of restricted industries such as nightclubs, bars, gambling, and similar establishments. However, the focus of your stay must not be on employment. In practice, this means you should dedicate less than 50% of your Working Holiday year in Japan to work. Striking this balance between travel and work is precisely what makes the Working Holiday Japan experience so unique for many people.

Finally, a word about working conditions in Japan:

Contrary to the common stereotype that Japanese people work endlessly long hours and drive themselves into exhaustion, the legal framework is actually different. The law stipulates a 40-hour work week, with 8 working hours per day and a one-hour break. Overtime regulations must be contractually defined and are compensated with extra pay.

Of course, there are employers in Japan who do not comply with labor laws (the so-called black companies), and social norms around maintaining group cohesion (such as nomikai—drinking gatherings with colleagues after work, typically in a bar or izakaya) mean that employees sometimes spend nearly the entire day tied to work-related activities. This is more common in metropolitan areas, whereas in rural regions of Japan, the majority of people tend to work a typical “9-to-5” schedule.

Experience

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As a Working Holiday traveler, I actually focused more on traveling through Japan and seeing as much of the country as possible. I wanted to meet people, discover the culture, and develop a “feel” for the country. This approach shaped my very own Working Holiday Japan experience.

Originally, I thought my Japanese skills (around N4 level at the time) would certainly be enough to occasionally take on a part-time job. However, during the year, I attended various language schools to further improve my language skills because I knew that the chances of finding a job during my Working Holiday in Japan were directly related to my language proficiency.

After some time, I began searching for part-time jobs on platforms like Yolo Japan or GaijinPot. At that time, I was living in the center of Tokyo and applied to many hospitality jobs (mainly sushi restaurants and chains, as I personally found it interesting to see what goes on behind the scenes) and jobs where I could use my German language skills (like localization testing for translations already done). What all these listings had in common: minimum wage or extremely close to minimum wage. That was fine with me, as I didn’t have any special qualifications for these jobs and truly considered them as part-time work.

The result: The platforms themselves require an extraordinary amount of (sometimes personal) information to create a profile and get in touch with potential employers. The application processes were then typically Japanese. That means: Enormous effort in creating very detailed application documents with rigid deadlines for submission. Despite the fact that I had help from a native Japanese speaker to prepare these documents and that they double-checked everything before submission, I received only one response out of about 10 applications. This experience is definitely one of the more sobering parts of my Working Holiday Japan experience.

For the localization job application, I received a response after about 2 months stating that my application couldn’t be considered due to a form error.

Mind you, by this time, I had already spent over 3 months in Tokyo, balancing job searching with attending language school. It was during this time that I truly understood how important patience and a certain level of frustration tolerance are for a realistic Working Holiday Japan experience. It’s not enough to just be motivated – you also have to handle long waiting times, cultural differences, and bureaucratic hurdles.

In the meantime, I had learned about the opportunity to connect with people through platforms like Workaway Japan. The focus here is on cultural exchange. In exchange for work, the host provides accommodation and meals. Since I was planning to travel further west to Kansai, I selected some relevant hosts and sent them a message. The offers on Workaway Japan seem to be quite crowded, so I didn’t receive any notable responses here either. Still, this attempt showed me that during a Working Holiday in Japan, one can consider not only traditional jobs but also alternative paths like work exchange – even if the chances of success may vary.

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In the meantime, while staying at a small sharehouse in the Osaka port area, I simply used my social skills and presented the owner with the idea that I could clean the guest and communal areas if he would provide me with a free bed in the shared room in return. This small experiment became an important part of my personal Working Holiday Japan experience because it showed me that direct communication, with a bit of luck, can often lead to creative solutions.

The next day, we agreed to my proposal, and he quickly showed me his cleaning routine. Since he was very satisfied with my work and I could explore Osaka in peace after my morning tasks, I ended up staying for an entire month and saved a lot on accommodation costs. After a short time, a very friendly relationship developed, and the owner of the sharehouse, together with his friends, invited me to a Hanshin Tigers baseball game, a yakiniku BBQ, and several izakaya visits. This openness and warmth were a defining element of my Working Holiday Japan experience, because the hospitality in Osaka is simply fantastic!

Since I wanted to continue traveling, I once again searched online for jobs focused on cultural exchange without pay – and quickly found an opportunity in the rural part of Kyoto. On an organic farm, I was to work for two weeks in exchange for accommodation and meals, working six hours a day. Looking back, it was exactly this mix of spontaneous solutions, cultural exchange, and work experiences that made my Working Holiday in Japan so unforgettable.

After the initial settling-in period, it quickly became clear to me that the rural surroundings and the purposeful work on the farm were extremely fulfilling. At my request, the host spoke Japanese with me and gave presentations about Japanese culture and life to us travelers (there were usually two travelers staying in a separate building). This combination of physical work, cultural exchange, and language practice made this stay one of the most valuable parts of my working holiday experience in Japan.

The initial two weeks turned into two and a half months, during which I had virtually no expenses and, in return, learned a lot about Japan, but also about agriculture and livestock farming. It was precisely these insights into rural life away from the big cities that helped me develop a much deeper understanding of the “other Japan” that many tourists never get to know.

Ultimately, during my working holiday year in Japan, I was much better off volunteering or participating in cultural exchanges than taking a traditional part-time job in one of the big cities. On the one hand, direct contact with hosts and small business owners often leads to long-lasting friendships, which in turn can open up opportunities if you are interested in living in Japan long term. On the other hand, food and accommodation are the most expensive items in your travel budget during a working holiday. If you can save on these, you can travel throughout Japan extremely cheaply while learning about local differences and peculiarities from your hosts and getting to know “real” life in Japan. And it is precisely this balance of working, learning, and experiencing that makes my working holiday in Japan so special and memorable to this day.

Change of perspective

From the employer's point of view:
What kind of working holiday jobs in Japan can you expect?

I am now an entrepreneur and employer in Japan myself, and can better classify my experiences from a contrasting perspective. It is precisely this change of perspective that helps me to classify my own working holiday experience in Japan even more realistically.

Starting with Japanese language skills:
Customer service in Japan is very high, often geared towards regular customers, and strives to build and maintain long-term business relationships. In an island nation like Japan, this makes learning the language all the more important. Even in positions where there is no customer contact, work instructions are naturally given in Japanese. Therefore, employers are concerned about their public image and their relationship with their regular customers if they hire someone who jeopardizes the high quality standards due to a lack of language skills.

This leads to the next point, competition:
Despite declining birth rates and an aging society, there is often still enough competition for part-time jobs in metropolitan areas such as Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka in the form of young Japanese people who need extra income. If an employer has the choice between two equally qualified applicants, with the only difference being that one speaks fluent Japanese and the other may only have N4 or N3 level, they will always prefer the native speaker for a job that does not require any special knowledge (e.g., catering or retail) for reasons of barrier-free communication.

But there is also fierce competition for specialized jobs. As in the example of localization testing mentioned above, whether it be German, French, Spanish, and especially English, there are many applicants in a city like Tokyo who have the required skills. The employer can now conveniently select the “best” candidate based on numbers and possible interview rounds. This leads to absurd situations in which even temporary jobs require bachelor’s degrees or many years of teaching experience to teach preschool English.

The final point: training period and administrative effort
Employers generally want a certain degree of predictability when filling a position. However, most travelers expect their Working Holiday Japan job to involve finding something in city A for two weeks at short notice and then traveling on to city B to find a new job for the next three to four weeks. In my experience of Working Holiday Japan, this rarely works. Even a stay of six months is not a long period of time for an employer if they first have to train you for a certain period of time. Added to this is the administrative effort involved in employment contracts and documentation that the employer has to submit to the authorities on your behalf. It is therefore extremely unattractive for employers to hire travelers who are likely to stay for only a few weeks or months.

So, what is realistic?

The reality is that it will be difficult to find work. If you do find a part-time job, be prepared to work for the minimum wage of around 1000–1100 yen per hour. The minimum wage varies from prefecture to prefecture and is roughly equivalent to €5.80–€6.40. Wage levels and the cost of living in Japan are lower than in Germany, so you should not expect to earn the same hourly wage as you would in Germany. Instead, you can reduce your travel costs to a minimum by volunteering or working on organic farms.

In my opinion, you should never start a working holiday in Japan with the sole intention of earning money. Instead, save up enough beforehand so that you can travel around Japan for a whole year without any income. This will give you the time and peace of mind you need to fully concentrate on getting to know the country, its culture, and its people in all their facets. If a job opportunity arises during your trip, your visa will allow you to take it. If not, see it as an opportunity to grow as a person in a challenging new environment, make new friends, and network with interesting contacts for the future.

Ultimately, the experiences and impressions you gain during your working holiday are worth more than the money you can realistically earn. A working holiday in Japan is an outstanding opportunity to shape your personality, broaden your horizons, and set the course for the future—but it is definitely not the ideal way to get rich while traveling.

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