This article is a translation of the Japanese original. Where the two differ, the Japanese version prevails. Read the Japanese original（日本語版を読む）
A 家族滞在 renewal looks at 3 points: whether 資格外活動 stays within up to 28 hours per week, whether you are really being supported, and whether the person supporting you has enough income to keep the household going. For each of them, it matters that you can explain your situation with documents. We recommend keeping records of your working hours, filing your notifications of place of residence, and keeping the taxes and social insurance contributions of the person supporting you paid up, in ordinary times rather than at the last minute.
A family would like to know, before the extension of their 在留期間 on 家族滞在, what the screening looks at.
Under blanket permission for 資格外活動, the rule is up to 28 hours per week. If you have more than one job, the hours are added together.
To work part-time on the 家族滞在 status of residence, you need to obtain 資格外活動許可 in advance. Under blanket permission, what is allowed is, as a rule, up to 28 hours per week.
If you are paid by more than one workplace, you have to add up all those hours and keep the total to up to 28 hours per week. Even if each workplace on its own is 28 hours or less, if the total goes over, the activity is outside what your permission allows.
So that you can explain your work situation at the renewal, we recommend keeping your payslips and shift tables, and writing down your own record of your weekly working hours.
If your 住民票 address is different from that of the person supporting you, you need to explain the reason with objective material.
「家族滞在」 is a status of residence granted to the spouse or the child who is supported by a person living in Japan. For that reason, whether you really live while being supported by that person is part of what is examined.
If the person supporting you and the family have their 住民票 registered at different addresses, it is important to be ready to explain a reasonable reason with objective material, such as a 単身赴任証明書 (proof of a work posting away from the family) or a 通学証明書 (certificate of school attendance). Living apart without any explanation of the reason can become a factor that raises doubts about whether the support is real.
Also, when you move house or change jobs, please make the various notifications, starting with the notification of a change of place of residence, within the set period. Failing to make a notification works against you when your situation in Japan is explained.
No clear standard has been published. As a rough guide in practice, the income should match the number of people supported.
The basic premise of 家族滞在 is that the person supporting you can support the family financially in Japan. In practice, the tendency is that the more family members are supported, the higher the level of income expected.
For example, take a case where the person supporting the family has an annual income in the 3 million yen (300万円) range and supports 3 people in total — a spouse, and 2 people who are their children. As a rough guide in practice, it is said that in a case like this, whether the household can keep going may be examined carefully. The figure itself has not been published as a requirement, so there is no need to think that anything short of a particular amount means denial.
It helps to attach a certificate of savings balance, together with the certificate of employment and the tax assessment certificate of the person supporting you, and to explain concretely that the household can support itself.
Your 在留カード and your マイナンバーカード become 1 card, and you no longer need to renew it at your city or ward office. Applying is optional.
A change in the law has created a system that merges the 在留カード and the マイナンバーカード. A mid- to long-term resident or a special permanent resident recorded in the Basic Resident Register may file an application asking for a 特定在留カード or a 特定特別永住者証明書 to be issued. Issuance began on 14 June, 令和8年（2026年）.
In substance, the system brings the 在留カード (or the 特別永住者証明書) and the マイナンバーカード together into 1 card. When 2 cards become 1, you no longer need to go through the renewal procedure for the マイナンバーカード at the city or ward office. Procedures relating to the 在留カード and the マイナンバーカード can now be handled in one place, which is intended to make life easier for foreign residents and to make administration more efficient.
On the 特定在留カード, the period of stay, the type of permission, the date of permission and the date of issue are removed from the face of the card, and this information is recorded only on the IC chip. The items recorded on the IC chip can be checked with the reader application for 在留カード and similar cards, but this is no more than an optional way of checking, and to use it you must obtain the person's consent and have them show you the card.
Whether to apply is up to you. Merging the cards does not in itself change what the renewal screening looks at. Nor can we find, in the published material, any system under which a late notification is automatically recorded and held against you, under which reading the IC chip becomes compulsory when someone is hired, or under which going over the hours allowed for 資格外活動 is displayed as a warning.
Keep 3 things in order in ordinary times: managing your working hours, meeting the public obligations of the person supporting you, and keeping your notifications consistent.
The hours at all of your workplaces are added together. The total has to stay within up to 28 hours per week; you cannot work 28 hours at each workplace.
It is not settled that it cannot. However, if your 住民票 addresses are different, you need to be ready to explain a reasonable reason, with a 単身赴任証明書 or a 通学証明書 for example.
No clear standard has been published. As a rough guide in practice, the income should match the number of people supported, and you explain the household's ability to keep going with savings, a certificate of employment and so on.
Applying is optional. It is something that mid- to long-term residents and similar residents may apply for, and issuance began on 14 June, 令和8年（2026年）. It is a system for bringing the 在留カード and the マイナンバーカード together into 1 card, so that the renewal procedure at the city or ward office is no longer needed.
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This page is a translation of the Japanese original. Where the two differ, the Japanese version prevails.