By Hoang Vu  September 14, 2025 | 11:28 pm PT
Passports of Singapore, Japan and South Korea. Photo courtesy of Henley & Partners
The Japanese passport has dropped to the third spot in the latest Henley Passport Index, trailing behind Singapore and South Korea.
Japanese passport holders now can travel to 189 destinations without a visa, down one compared to the previous ranking released in July, according to the update of the index, created by the London-based global citizenship and residence advisory firm Henley & Partners.
In the previous ranking, Japan secured the world’s second most powerful passport along with South Korea.
Last year, Japan was named one of six countries with the world’s most powerful passports, sharing the No.1 spot with Singapore, Germany, France, Italy and Spain.
As of December 2024, there were 21.6 million valid Japanese passports in circulation, accounting for around 17.5% of the country’s total population, according to Japan’s Foreign Ministry.
Japan has traditionally had a low passport ownership rate compared to other countries, consistently hovering around 22% to 24% throughout the 2010s, according to the Japan Times. However, the percentage dropped further during the Covid-19 pandemic and has remained low since.
Experts have called on the Japanese government to introduce initiatives that encourage more young people to gain international experience, including offering free passports to first-time travelers going abroad.
The Henley Passport Index tracks global travel freedoms in 227 countries and territories using exclusive data from the International Air Transport Association.
It ranks 199 passports based on the number of destinations their holders can enter without a prior visa. Continuously updated throughout the year to reflect changes in visa policies, the index is widely recognized as a key measure of global mobility.
AloJapan.com