Japan's shrinking birthrate, aging population and foreign workers.
Kawasaki's four-legged Home LEO prototype is meant to live with older people and notice falls, not do chores. What it says about Japan's stalled care workforce of 2.126 million, and what is still missing.
Tochigi police drop scent discrimination from their police dog exam after zero call-outs in 2025, as searches for missing people doubled from 61 to 120. Who do police dogs look for where you live?
Japan's children hit a record low while its toy market hit a record. Toys R Us Japan, dubbed a "black ship" in 1991, filed for court rehabilitation owing about ¥13.2 billion; Don Quijote's parent is set to take over.
Tokyo's resident registry shows the city added 75,018 people during 2025, and 62,478 of them were foreign residents: 83 percent of the growth. Count only Japanese residents and Tokyo is down 3,238 over five years.
A Japanese team pinned down when CD4 killer T cells start to expand: right around age 100. The study needed blood from ten donors over 110, and the cohort that could supply them took thirty years to build.
Sushi shop bankruptcies in Japan rose 45.5% in the first half of 2026, yet only 18.8% were losing money, the lowest in Teikoku Databank's 20 years. They are not failing. They close because nobody takes over.
Japan recorded 86,473 IVF births in 2024, about 1 in 8 of its 686,173 births. Treatments fell to 550,265 while the multiple-birth rate rose to 4.15 percent, and the 2022 insurance reform helps explain both.
Japan's Children and Families Agency asked 100,000 young people about marriage. 35.1% of unmarried respondents said they have no intention of marrying, but only 53.1% of that group said they do not want to.
Japan cremated 99.98% of its dead in fiscal 2024. But the rate was 36.2% in 1915, and the Meiji government banned cremation in 1873 before reversing itself. Land, cholera policy and local ordinances built that number.
Toyota, NTT and Tokyu are among roughly 1,600 Japanese employers paying for an AI dating app for single staff. The workplace is trying to buy back a matchmaking role it lost over fifty years.
Japan's 2026 population estimate shows foreign residents up 9.64% to 3.73 million while the total falls. How Japan is quietly becoming an immigration society, compared with Germany and Canada.