Highly Skilled Professional

What the Highly Skilled Professional visa is

A points-based work visa, and the fastest route to permanent residence of any destination we assess. Seventy points opens the visa. Eighty points opens permanent residence after one year. Between 70 and 79 it takes three.

The three categories

Academic research, advanced specialised and technical activities, and business management. Most engineers, developers and technical professionals fall into the second, and it is the one our calculator models.

The grid

Education carries 30 points for a doctorate, 20 for a master's and 10 for a bachelor's, with 5 more where degrees span two distinct fields. Career experience adds up to 20. Age adds up to 15, with the full amount below 30 — Japan is unusually generous to younger applicants and unusually harsh above 40.

Salary is worth up to 40 points and is scored on your Japanese salary, tapering by age band. It is the single largest component and the one a calculator cannot know from an Indian income figure, which is why the score we show you is a floor rather than a total.

The bonuses that decide close cases

JLPT N1 is worth 15 points. That is more than the difference between a bachelor's degree and a master's. N2 is worth 10, a degree from a Japanese institution another 10.

For anyone in the high 60s, Japanese is usually the cheapest available route over the line — and the one nobody budgets years for.

The rule people miss

Points must be held both now and one or three years earlier. Crossing 80 today does not mean permanent residence in a year; it means the clock runs from when the evidence shows you were already there. Planning backwards from that is the difference between a one-year route and a four-year one.

J-Skip

A separate track that skips the points test entirely: a master's plus ¥20 million a year, or ten years' experience plus ¥20 million. Permanent residence after one year. If your salary is in that range, ignore the grid.

Where it goes wrong

Assuming salary points can come from an Indian salary. Assuming the clock starts on arrival. And treating Japanese as optional — at N1 it outscores a postgraduate degree, and it cannot be acquired quickly.

Who this suits

A professional in their twenties or early thirties with a master's degree, several years of experience, and a salary that would land in the upper Japanese bands. On that profile the arithmetic is unusually kind. Below it Japan is a slow country to migrate to, and there are easier answers we would point you towards instead.