your documents
Japan works back to front compared with everywhere else: your school applies for a Certificate of Eligibility in Japan first, and only then do you apply for a visa in Kathmandu. A new TB screening step now sits in front of both.
The set below is what a Nepali applicant to Japan is normally asked for. Your institution or your circumstances can add to it — treat this as the floor, and the official checklist as the ceiling.
Certificate of Eligibility (CoE)
Applied for in Japan by your school, on your behalf, before the visa.
TB clearance certificate
From a designated panel clinic in Nepal, now required in the CoE and visa process.
Letter of acceptance
From the Japanese school, university or language institution.
Passport
Valid, presented at the embassy with the visa application.
Academic documents
Transcripts, certificates and graduation evidence, translated as required.
Japanese or English proficiency
Depending on the programme — JLPT level for Japanese-medium courses.
Financial evidence
Sponsor documents, bank certificates and income evidence, often examined closely.
Application forms & photographs
To the embassy's specification.
Your school applies to a regional immigration bureau in Japan for the Certificate of Eligibility. Once issued, it is sent to you, and you apply for the visa at the Embassy of Japan in Kathmandu. The CoE is the hard part; the visa that follows it is comparatively procedural.
Embassy of Japan in Nepal
IOM Migration Health Assessment Centre — Kathmandu
Book screening at a designated panel clinic
Japan operates its own pre-entry tuberculosis screening for applicants from several countries including Nepal, and only designated clinics can issue the certificate.
Do it before the CoE application
The clearance certificate is required in support of the Certificate of Eligibility, so it sits at the front of your timeline, not the end.
Watch the 180-day validity
The certificate is valid for a limited period from the date of screening — time it against when your school will file, not when you hope to fly.
Send your school a complete financial file
Japanese immigration examines the sponsor's finances at the CoE stage. Weak evidence fails there, before you have applied for anything.
Who applies for the Certificate of Eligibility: your school in Japan, not you
Japan pre-entry TB screening for Nepali applicants: required, at a designated panel clinic
Validity of the TB clearance certificate: 180 days from screening
The TB screening requirement is recent, and a lot of guidance written for Japanese study from Nepal predates it entirely. If a checklist you are reading does not mention it, that checklist is out of date.
Where this page shows a blank rather than a number, it is because we could not verify it against a source we would stand behind. A shown gap is more useful than a confident guess.
Most of your file is issued in Nepal and is identical whichever destination you choose. Each of these has its own guide with the office address, the fee and the steps.
The NOC is a Nepal-side requirement, not Japan's — but without it a Nepali bank will not send your tuition, so it blocks everything downstream regardless of where you are going.