After Additional Documents, How Long Until PR Approval? About 150 Days for Mar–Apr 2026

For a permanent residency application in Tokyo, when the final additional documents were mailed in March–April 2026, the median time from mailing to approval was about 150 days (about five months), a large increase from the 70 days summarized in this blog's June 2026 article. Waits also became more spread out: some people were approved after just over 60 days, while one was still waiting after 205 days.

The June article counted only people approved before it was published. Since then, more cases have been collected and many comments have come in, including from people who were still waiting when they commented. Grouped by the month the final additional documents were mailed, the results are shown below.

Days from final additional documents by mailing month: about 70 days for February or earlier, about 150 days for March–April

Mailed in February 2026 or earlier, 19 people: the median is still about 70 days, but several people waited more than four months; their results had not come in when the June article was written.
Mailed in March–April 2026, 17 people: the median is about 150 days, and half waited 150 days or more.
Mailed in May–June 2026, 4 people: only two have results, both approved in just over a month; the other two were still waiting in mid-September 2026. As of early October 2026, only the faster results can be seen, so it is too early to tell how long this group will wait.

Each case mailed in March or later is shown below, so you can look for one similar to yours. For people still waiting, the chart shows how long they had waited when they commented or when the case was collected; the actual wait will be longer.

Each case with final additional documents mailed in March 2026 or later: days from mailing to approval, or days waited so far

A few notes:

"About 150 days" includes people still waiting. Counting the days they had waited as a lower bound gives a median of 153 days; treating them as waiting much longer gives 159 days.
Where the mailing date is known only to the month, approved cases are estimated at mid-month and marked "~" in the chart; cases still waiting are counted from the end of the month, which errs on the short side.
The new cases were found on rednote over time, not by collecting every approval post from a given period. Each group is also small, so the numbers may change as new cases come in.
Most cases are HSP (incl. deemed HSP).

Source: rednote public posts and comments.

Data through October 2026.

This research was first published on rednote (@ad_astra).

Whether you are still waiting after submitting additional documents or have already been approved, please share your timeline: [email protected]. The numbers here will be updated as new cases accumulate.