Total Fertility Rate by Prefecture in JapanThe Latest Ranking, With Okinawa Highest at 1.52, Tokyo Lowest at 0.96 and the Nation at a Record-Low 1.14

Japan's total fertility rate usually makes the news as "a record low for the country". But how much does it differ between prefectures? Has the gap between the highest and lowest prefectures widened or narrowed over time? And why is Tokyo the lowest year after year?

This article uses the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare's vital statistics to rank all 47 prefectures by total fertility rate^[1][9]. The prefectural figures for 2025 are provisional, published in June 2026; final figures are not out yet (the reason is explained below). It then looks at changes from the previous year, the national trend since 1947, how regional gaps have shifted, the number of births, and what the figures can and cannot tell us. Whether to have children, and how many, is each person's own decision; the subject here is simply statistics that summarise births in a given year.

1. The short answer: Okinawa is highest at 1.52 and Tokyo lowest at 0.96

• Japan's total fertility rate in 2025 was 1.14, down 0.01 from 1.15 the year before and the lowest since records began in 1947. It has fallen for ten years in a row^[7].
• By prefecture, Okinawa is highest (1.52), followed by Miyazaki (1.46) and Fukui (1.45). Tokyo is lowest (0.96), followed by Hokkaido and Miyagi (1.00)^[2].
• High rates are common in western Japan, especially Kyushu, Chugoku and Shikoku; low rates in Greater Tokyo, Hokkaido and Tohoku. Thirty-three prefectures are above the national figure (1.14), two are equal to it and 12 are below.
• The rate rose in 13 prefectures, fell in 28 and was unchanged in six. Most moves are small, between 0.01 and 0.07, so trends over several years matter more than a single year's change.
• Prefectural figures for 2025 are provisional. Final figures will be recalculated using population from the 2025 census and are due in November 2026, so they may change^[6].

What the total fertility rate measures: age-specific birth rates for ages 15 to 49, added up

The total fertility rate is the sum of the birth rates for women at each age from 15 to 49 in a given year. It corresponds to the number of children a woman would have over her lifetime if she gave birth at that year's age-specific rates^[5].

Because it adds up rates for each age rather than counting people, it removes differences in the age structure of the female population, so years and regions can be compared. The ministry describes it as an indicator used for comparisons over time, between countries and between regions^[5]. Prefectural figures are calculated by multiplying the birth rate for each five-year age group of mothers by five and adding them up (for 2015 and 2020, by adding single-year rates)^[9].

The figures cover births to Japanese nationals in Japan, and prefectures are assigned by the child's address^[8].

Prefectural figures for 2025 are still provisional

Japan's vital statistics come in two stages: provisional figures around June and final figures around September. The final figures for 2025 were published on 30 September 2026, but rates that use population as the denominator were withheld, apart from the national totals. They are being recalculated with population from the census held in 2025, and prefectural total fertility rates and other rates are due in November 2026^[6].

This article therefore uses the provisional figures published on 3 June for prefectures in 2025^[2]. The population used as the denominator in the provisional figures was estimated by the ministry from Statistics Bureau data, so the final figures may differ^[1]. Figures for 2024 and earlier are final^[9]. The national figure of 1.14 is the same in both the provisional figures and the summary of final figures^[7].

The latest national figures: 1.14, with 671,270 births

There were 671,270 births (to Japanese nationals in Japan) in 2025, 14,903 fewer (2.2%) than the year before^[7]. That is the fewest since records began in 1899 and the tenth consecutive fall, though the decline was smaller than the drops of around 5% in recent years^[6].

2. The full ranking: Kyushu, Chugoku, Shikoku and Hokuriku near the top; Greater Tokyo, Hokkaido and Tohoku near the bottom

Sources: for 2025, the ministry's provisional annual vital statistics, Table 9^[2]; for 2024, final vital statistics, volume 1, births, Table 4.5^[9]. Ranks run from highest to lowest, with equal values sharing a rank. The 2024 ranks are calculated the same way.

The top: six prefectures in Kyushu and Okinawa, plus Chugoku, Shikoku and Hokuriku

The top ten are Okinawa (1.52), Miyazaki (1.46), Fukui (1.45), Nagasaki (1.42), Shimane (1.41), Kagawa and Kumamoto (1.40), and Tottori, Saga and Kagoshima (1.38). Six of the eight prefectures in Kyushu and Okinawa are in the top ten, the exceptions being Fukuoka and Oita. Only Okinawa is at 1.5 or above, and 16 prefectures are at 1.3 or above.

The bottom: Greater Tokyo, Hokkaido, Tohoku and Kyoto

The lowest are Tokyo (0.96), Hokkaido and Miyagi (1.00), Kyoto (1.03), Akita and Kanagawa (1.05), Saitama (1.06), Chiba (1.07) and Aomori (1.10). Eight prefectures are below 1.1, including all four in Greater Tokyo. Osaka (1.13) and Aichi (1.20) are not as low as Tokyo.

By region, the further west, the higher

This article took a simple average of the prefectures in each region (not weighted by population; a reference calculation, with Mie counted in Kinki).

• Kyushu and Okinawa: 1.39
• Chugoku: 1.32; Shikoku: 1.32
• Chubu: 1.26
• Kinki: 1.20
• Kanto: 1.09
• Hokkaido and Tohoku: 1.08

Broadly, rates rise towards the west and are low in eastern Japan and the big metropolitan areas. Within regions there are differences, though: Shiga is 11th despite being in Kinki, and all three Hokuriku prefectures in Chubu (Toyama, Ishikawa and Fukui) are in the top 16.

3. Changes from the previous year: up in 13 prefectures, with bigger swings where births are few

From 2024 (final) to 2025 (provisional), the total fertility rate rose in 13 prefectures^[4].

• Up (13): Ishikawa (1.23 to 1.30); Kagawa and Kochi (up 0.04); Iwate, Nagasaki and Miyazaki (up 0.03); Toyama, Shizuoka, Mie and Shiga (up 0.02); Akita, Tokushima and Kumamoto (up 0.01)
• Unchanged (6): Miyagi, Tokyo, Hyogo, Wakayama, Ehime and Kagoshima
• Down (28): the largest falls were in Nagano and Tottori (down 0.05) and Aomori, Gifu, Okayama and Yamaguchi (down 0.04)

Ishikawa fell to 1.23 in 2024 and returned to 1.30 in 2025. The figure dipped in the year of the Noto Peninsula earthquake of January 2024 and recovered the next year, but the statistics cannot show whether the two are connected. Tottori, third in 2024, fell from 1.43 to 1.38 and dropped to eighth.

Where births are few, the yearly figure swings more

The total fertility rate is a rate, so it is calculated separately from how many births there are. But when the underlying number of births is small, chance rises and falls move the figure more easily. In 2025 there were 85,090 births in Tokyo, against 2,973 in Tottori, the fewest, 3,079 in Kochi, 3,148 in Akita and 3,339 in Shimane^[11].

Averaging the size of year-on-year changes from 2007 to 2025, when figures are published every year, the largest are in Kochi (0.053), Tottori and Shimane (0.052) and Okinawa (0.047), and the smallest in Niigata (0.024), Ehime (0.026), Osaka and Hokkaido (0.027) and Hyogo (0.028). Prefectures with fewer births tend to swing more, but that is not the only factor.

Averaging three years leaves the top and bottom much the same

To smooth out single-year swings, this article took a simple average of the figures for 2023 to 2025 (2023 and 2024 final, 2025 provisional; a reference calculation).

• Highest: Okinawa (1.55), Miyazaki and Fukui (1.46), Shimane and Nagasaki (1.43), Kumamoto (1.42)
• Lowest: Tokyo (0.97), Hokkaido and Miyagi (1.02), Akita and Kyoto (1.06), Kanagawa (1.09)

Okinawa in first place and Tokyo in 47th did not change in any of the three years, and the top and bottom are much the same as in the single-year ranking. Differences of a few places in the middle, on the other hand, mean little.

4. Tokyo has the lowest rate, yet about one in eight children born in Japan is born in Tokyo

Tokyo's total fertility rate is 0.96, the lowest in almost every year on record. Yet 85,090 children were born in Tokyo in 2025, 12.7% of the national total, or about one in eight^[11]. That is far more than second-placed Osaka (52,598) and third-placed Kanagawa (50,209).

Moreover, births rose from the previous year in only four prefectures in 2025: Tokyo (up 883), Ishikawa (up 164), Toyama (up 47) and Kagawa (up 44). They fell in the other 43. Compared with 2005, twenty years earlier, births nationally fell to 63.2% of their earlier level, but Tokyo kept 88.1%, the smallest decline of any prefecture. The largest decline was in Akita, at 40.9%.

By births per head of population, Tokyo is fourth

Separate from the total fertility rate, there is a "crude birth rate": births per 1,000 people. In the 2025 provisional figures, the national rate is 5.6, and the highest are Okinawa (8.0), Shiga and Fukuoka (6.4) and then Tokyo (6.3) in fourth place^[2]. The lowest is Akita (3.6), which is 42nd for total fertility rate (1.05).

So Tokyo is fourth on one indicator and 47th on the other. The crude birth rate depends heavily on how many people of childbearing age live in an area. Tokyo, which draws many young people for study and work, has a large share of people in their 20s and 30s, which pushes its crude birth rate up. The total fertility rate adds up rates for each age, so it removes these differences in age structure^[5].

What remains after removing age structure: differences in the share of people who are married

The total fertility rate removes only differences in age structure, though. Differences in how many women of each age are married remain in the figure.

In Japan, 97.3% of children born in 2025 had parents who were married to each other^[12]. As a result, the total fertility rate tends to be lower where a smaller share of people in their 20s and 30s are married. As our article on average age at first marriage by prefecture showed, Tokyo has the highest average age at first marriage in Japan for both sexes (32.0 for husbands and 30.6 for wives)^[14], and the highest average age of mothers at the birth of their first child, at 32.5 (31.0 nationally)^[13].

In addition, if people work in Tokyo and then move to Kanagawa, Saitama, Chiba or elsewhere when they marry or have children, Tokyo's figures capture only the young single years and the neighbouring prefectures only the child-rearing years. How much moves like these matter cannot be confirmed from vital statistics alone. Tokyo's 0.96 does not necessarily equal "the number of children a woman living in Tokyo will have in her lifetime".

5. The trend since 1947: from 4.54 to 1.14, and down for ten straight years since 2016

Japan's total fertility rate was 4.54 in 1947, just after the war^[10]. It fell quickly in the 1950s and stayed around 2 from the 1960s to the early 1970s, apart from 1966. After dropping below 2 in 1975 it kept falling, reaching 1.26 in 2005. It then rose a little to 1.45 in 2015, but has fallen again every year since 2016, ten years in a row, to 1.14 in 2025^[7].

Source: final vital statistics, volume 1, births, Table 4.1^[10]. The 2025 total fertility rate is from the summary of final figures^[7]. Figures for 1947 to 1972 exclude Okinawa.

1966 was a Hinoeuma ("fire horse") year in the traditional calendar, and births were about 460,000 fewer than the year before. The total fertility rate also fell to 1.58, but the years either side were above 2. The 1.57 of 1989 was below that 1966 figure. Births peaked at 2,696,638 in 1949, with a second postwar peak of 2,091,983 in 1973. They fell below one million in 2016, and the 2025 figure is 32.1% of 1973's.

The peak age for births has moved from the late 20s to the early 30s

Broken down by age, births have shifted steadily to older ages. In 1985, the birth rate for ages 25 to 29 (0.89) was the highest, about twice that for ages 30 to 34 (0.44). In 2025, ages 30 to 34 (0.44) were the highest, above ages 25 to 29 (0.30)^[3]. The 30 to 34 group was the only one whose rate rose from the previous year in 2025, and births to mothers in this group rose by 2,221.

The average age of mothers at the birth of their first child rose from 25.7 in 1975 to 31.0 in 2025, and has been 31.0 for three years in a row since 2023^[3].

6. How regional gaps have changed: Okinawa first every time since 1975, Tokyo last almost every time

Prefectural figures are published every five years from 1960 to 2005 and every year from 2007 (Okinawa from 1975)^[9]. The table shows the highest and lowest prefectures in selected years.

2025 figures are provisional; the others are final^[9][2].

Okinawa has been first in every published year from 1975, when it joined the statistics, to 2025. Tokyo has been lowest in every year since 1960 except 1965 (when Toyama was lowest) and 1970 (Akita). The highest in 1970 was Saitama (2.35); at that time the Tokyo suburbs were on the high side.

The gap between top and bottom has narrowed, but overall spread has changed little

The gap between the highest and lowest prefectures went from 1.25 in 1975 to around 0.7 to 0.8 from 1990 to 2020, and to 0.56 in 2025, the smallest since Okinawa was added in 1975. This is mainly because first-placed Okinawa's figure has fallen, however. The spread across all 47 prefectures (the standard deviation) has stayed between 0.12 and 0.15 since 1985, without much change.

Over the past ten years, every prefecture has fallen

Compared with 2015, when the national figure was 1.45, every prefecture was lower in 2025 (the national figure fell 0.31). The largest falls were in Fukushima and Okinawa (down 0.44), Iwate, Aichi and Shimane (down 0.37) and Miyagi (down 0.36). The smallest were in Fukui (down 0.18), Tokushima and Toyama (down 0.20), Nara (down 0.21) and Kochi (down 0.22).

In terms of rank, those that rose over the decade include Toyama (27th to 15th), Tokushima (24th to 12th), Kochi (27th to 17th), Nara (41st to 31st) and Hyogo (33rd to 23rd). Those that fell include Fukushima (15th to 34th), Aichi (17th to 29th), Iwate (30th to 38th) and Hiroshima (12th to 19th).

Going back twenty years to 2005, the national figure fell 0.12, from 1.26 to 1.14, and only Tokushima rose (1.26 to 1.33). The largest falls were in Fukushima (down 0.35), Yamagata (down 0.30), and Iwate and Akita (down 0.29), all in Tohoku.

7. Links with ages at marriage and childbirth: where people first marry later, the rate is lower

Set alongside the average age at first marriage by prefecture, the prefectural patterns look very similar. Using the 47 prefectures' 2025 figures, the correlation coefficient with wives' average age at first marriage is minus 0.71, and with mothers' average age at the birth of their first child also minus 0.71 (calculated for this article)^[14][13]. Prefectures where people first marry or have a first child later tend to have lower total fertility rates.

For example, the average age of mothers at the birth of their first child is highest in Tokyo (32.5) and lowest in Miyazaki (29.5). Okinawa is 30.2 and Fukui 30.4, both younger than the national 31.0^[13].

A correlation does not show that one thing causes the other, though. Ages at marriage and childbirth and the total fertility rate may both be shaped by shared circumstances such as housing, work, commuting, study and people moving in and out of an area. These statistics alone cannot show which factors matter, or by how much.

8. Reading the numbers: what the total fertility rate can and cannot tell us

It is not the actual number of children a woman has

The total fertility rate in everyday use is the "period total fertility rate": it adds up one year's age-specific birth rates, which come from different generations. The number of children women of the same generation actually have over their lifetimes (the cohort total fertility rate) is not known until that generation reaches 50^[5].

When ages at marriage and childbirth are rising, the two diverge. In the ministry's very rough calculation, the generation born from 1986 to 1990 (aged 35 to 39 in 2025) had already reached 1.36 by 2025, above the 2025 period rate of 1.14^[5].

Prefectural figures for 2025 may change in November

The prefectural figures for 2025 in this article are provisional. Final figures will be recalculated using population from the 2025 census as the denominator and are due in November 2026^[6]. Because many prefectures share the same value, a change of just 0.01 from a new denominator could be enough to swap places.

Prefectures follow the child's address, and only Japanese nationals are counted

Births are assigned to prefectures by the child's address. A child born in a hospital in another prefecture, for example when a mother returns to her parents' home to give birth, is counted in the prefecture of the child's address. The figures cover Japanese nationals in Japan and do not include births of children who are not Japanese nationals^[8].

These statistics cannot explain why prefectures differ

Many circumstances may lie behind differences between prefectures, such as ages at marriage and childbirth, the size and cost of housing, work and commuting, distance from relatives, and moves for study or work. But vital statistics show the number of registered births and the rates calculated from population; they do not show the reasons. No single factor explains the differences.

The figures are not a yardstick

The total fertility rate is a statistic for understanding births across regions and periods. Whether to have children, when, and how many depends on each person's circumstances and choices. There is no need to compare yourself or the people around you with your prefecture's figure.

Our articles on average age at first marriage by prefecture and life expectancy by prefecture also use official statistics to look at regional differences.

This article introduces published statistics and does not recommend any particular choice about marriage, childbirth or family. Figures are from the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare's vital statistics as published in October 2026. Prefectural total fertility rates and crude birth rates for 2025 are provisional, with final figures due in November 2026. Regional averages, three-year averages, average year-on-year changes and correlation coefficients were calculated for this article from the published figures.

References

1. [1]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Summary of the 2025 Annual Vital Statistics (provisional data), published 3 June 2026 (Japanese). MHLW ↩
2. [2]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Summary of the 2025 Annual Vital Statistics (provisional data), statistical table 9: vital statistics rates by prefecture (crude birth rate, total fertility rate) (Japanese). MHLW (PDF) ↩
3. [3]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Summary of the 2025 Annual Vital Statistics (provisional data), overview of results (Figure 2-2, births by mother's age; Figure 2-3, mother's average age at first birth; Figure 2-4, total fertility rate by mother's age) (Japanese). MHLW (PDF) ↩
4. [4]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, press release on the 2025 Annual Vital Statistics (provisional data), 3 June 2026, noting that the total fertility rate rose in 13 prefectures (Japanese). MHLW (PDF) ↩
5. [5]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Summary of the 2025 Annual Vital Statistics (provisional data), reference 1: on the total fertility rate (period and cohort total fertility rates) (Japanese). MHLW (PDF) ↩
6. [6]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, press release on the 2025 Vital Statistics (final data), 30 September 2026, stating that population-based rates were published only as national totals, with details due in November 2026 (Japanese). MHLW (PDF) ↩
7. [7]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Summary of the 2025 Vital Statistics (final data), overview of results (671,270 births; total fertility rate 1.14) (Japanese). MHLW (PDF) ↩
8. [8]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Summary of the 2025 Vital Statistics (final data): outline of the survey (coverage; births are assigned to prefectures by the child's address) (Japanese). MHLW (PDF) ↩
9. [9]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Vital Statistics (final data) 2024, volume 1, births, Table 4.5: total fertility rate by prefecture and year, on e-Stat (Japanese). e-Stat (CSV) ↩
10. [10]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Vital Statistics (final data) 2025, volume 1, births, Table 4.1: births, crude birth rate, sex ratio at birth and total fertility rate by year, released on e-Stat on 30 September 2026 (Japanese). e-Stat (CSV) ↩
11. [11]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Vital Statistics (final data) 2025, volume 1, births, Table 4.3: births by prefecture and year, released on e-Stat on 30 September 2026 (Japanese). e-Stat (CSV) ↩
12. [12]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Vital Statistics (final data) 2025, volume 1, births, Table 4.29: births and percentages by legitimacy and year, released on e-Stat on 30 September 2026 (Japanese). e-Stat (CSV) ↩
13. [13]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Vital Statistics (final data) 2025, volume 1, births, Table 4.21: average age of fathers and mothers by birth order and prefecture, released on e-Stat on 30 September 2026 (Japanese). e-Stat (CSV) ↩
14. [14]Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Vital Statistics (final data) 2025, volume 1, marriage, Table 9.12-2: average age at first marriage by prefecture and year, wives (husbands in Table 9.12-1), released on e-Stat on 30 September 2026 (Japanese). e-Stat (CSV) ↩