Compulsory Automobile Liability Insurance (CALI / Jibaiseki) Calculator
Choose a vehicle category (passenger car, kei car, motorcycle, or moped) and a contract term to estimate Japan's mandatory CALI insurance premium required for vehicle inspection and registration.
What Is the CALI (Jibaiseki) Premium Calculator?
The CALI premium calculator lets you estimate the cost of Japan's mandatory Compulsory Automobile Liability Insurance — required for every vehicle inspection and new registration — simply by choosing a vehicle category (passenger car, kei car, motorcycle, or moped) and a contract term. It's based on the base rates published by the General Insurance Rating Organization of Japan, so you can instantly compare the premium across different contract lengths.
Because CALI applies the same nationwide base rate regardless of insurer, the premium never changes depending on which agent you sign up with. Okinawa Prefecture and some remote islands use different rates, and this calculator estimates the mainland rate only. Check with your insurer or agent for the exact premium.
Sources used in this calculation
Statutory figures such as tax and insurance rates come from the public bodies listed below. They change when the law is revised, so please also check the primary source before relying on the result for an important decision.
- Standard compulsory motor liability insurance premiums by vehicle class and contract term (mainland Japan) — General Insurance Rating Organization of Japan (損害保険料率算出機構) Effective from 2026-11 ／ Last checked 2026-09-21
How to Use This Calculator
- Choose a vehicle category Select passenger car, kei car, motorcycle, or moped as the category of vehicle you're insuring.
- Choose a contract term Pick the length of the policy in months, based on how long your vehicle inspection is valid for.
- Check the estimated premium See the total premium for the chosen vehicle category and term, plus its monthly equivalent.
- Compare different contract terms Recalculate with a different term to see how much the monthly cost drops for a longer contract.
Tips for getting more out of it
- It's common to choose a term one month longer than the vehicle inspection period (such as 25 or 37 months) to avoid a coverage gap before the next inspection.
- Light motorcycles (over 125cc, up to 250cc) and mopeds (up to 125cc) have no vehicle inspection requirement, so you can freely choose any term from 12 to 60 months.
- CALI only covers bodily injury and death to other people, not property damage or your own injuries. Consider adding voluntary insurance for broader coverage.
- Longer contract terms lower the effective monthly cost, so paying for a longer term upfront usually reduces your total spending.
Use Cases
Budgeting before an inspection quote
Get a sense of the CALI premium on its own before requesting a full vehicle inspection quote.
Deciding between similar contract terms
Compare a term slightly longer than the inspection period, such as 24 versus 25 months, before choosing one.
Signing up a moped or light motorcycle
Since mopeds and light motorcycles have no inspection requirement, compare terms from 12 to 60 months to find the best value.
Estimating a refund before scrapping or selling
Use the per-term premium as a reference when weighing the timing of a sale or scrapping against a shorter contract.
Glossary
- CALI (Jibaiseki)
- Compulsory Automobile Liability Insurance, required by Japan's Automobile Liability Security Act for every car and motorcycle. It covers only bodily injury to others, up to a fixed limit.
- Base rate
- The CALI premium rate calculated by the General Insurance Rating Organization of Japan and applied uniformly by every insurer. The premium never varies by company.
- Vehicle category
- The classification used in the rate table — passenger car, kei car, motorcycle, or moped — each of which carries a different premium.
- Contract term
- The length of the CALI policy in months. Inspected vehicles typically choose 12, 13, 24, 25, 36, or 37 months, while mopeds and light motorcycles can choose anywhere from 12 to 60 months.
- Voluntary insurance
- Optional insurance that covers what CALI does not, such as property damage, damage to your own vehicle, and your own injuries.
Frequently asked questions
Side Note — Why CALI insurance is mandatory
CALI insurance is required by law so that accident victims can receive a minimum level of compensation regardless of the at-fault driver's financial situation. Relying on voluntary insurance alone would leave victims uncompensated whenever the at-fault driver happened to be uninsured. Insurers are not allowed to refuse a CALI contract, and the scheme is run on a non-profit basis, which sets it apart from voluntary insurance.
CALI premiums are calculated from base rates set by the General Insurance Rating Organization of Japan, a third-party body whose rates every insurer must follow. Unlike voluntary insurance, where premiums vary by company, CALI costs the same no matter which insurer or agent you use, as long as the vehicle type and term match.
Rates are reviewed every few years based on accident frequency and claims data. In April 2023, rates were cut by an average of 11.4% reflecting a decline in traffic accidents. More recently, rising claim payouts per accident have prompted discussion of future rate revisions, so it is worth checking the rates in effect at the time you actually take out a policy.