Japan Income Percentile & Deviation Score Calculator
Enter your annual income to see what percentile and deviation score ("hensachi") it corresponds to among salaried workers in Japan, based on the National Tax Agency's salary distribution survey.
Salaried workers by income band and share (2024/Reiwa 6)
Number of workers employed the full year (both sexes) and their share, by annual income band, from the National Tax Agency survey.
| Income band | Workers | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Up to ¥1,000,000 | 3,934k | 7.7% |
| Over ¥1,000,000 – ¥2,000,000 | 5,707k | 11.1% |
| Over ¥2,000,000 – ¥3,000,000 | 6,767k | 13.2% |
| Over ¥3,000,000 – ¥4,000,000 | 8,258k | 16.1% |
| Over ¥4,000,000 – ¥5,000,000 | 7,870k | 15.3% |
| Over ¥5,000,000 – ¥6,000,000 | 6,059k | 11.8% |
| Over ¥6,000,000 – ¥7,000,000 | 3,907k | 7.6% |
| Over ¥7,000,000 – ¥8,000,000 | 2,710k | 5.3% |
| Over ¥8,000,000 – ¥9,000,000 | 1,741k | 3.4% |
| Over ¥9,000,000 – ¥10,000,000 | 1,208k | 2.4% |
| Over ¥10,000,000 – ¥15,000,000 | 2,306k | 4.5% |
| Over ¥15,000,000 – ¥20,000,000 | 576k | 1.1% |
| Over ¥20,000,000 – ¥25,000,000 | 147k | 0.3% |
| Over ¥25,000,000 | 174k | 0.3% |
Source: Japan National Tax Agency, "Survey on Private Sector Salaries" (2024), Table 21
What the income percentile tells you
Knowing that you earn a certain salary says little on its own. What people usually want to know is where that figure sits relative to everyone else. This calculator takes your annual income and places it within the actual distribution of salaried workers in Japan, reporting both the percentile you fall into and the equivalent deviation score, a scale where the average is set at 50.
The two figures answer the same question in different ways. The percentile comes straight from the real distribution, so it reflects the fact that incomes cluster at the lower end with a long tail of high earners. The deviation score instead assumes a bell-shaped curve, which makes it easy to compare with other statistics but less precise at the extremes. Both are drawn from the National Tax Agency survey and cover only workers employed for the full year.
How to check your income percentile
- Enter your annual income Use your personal pre-tax income in units of 10,000 yen. Household totals will overstate your position, since the underlying data is per worker.
- Read your percentile The result shows the share of workers earning less than you, along with the top percentage your income falls into.
- Compare with the deviation score A score of 50 is the average, 60 is roughly the top 16%, and 70 is roughly the top 2.3%. Use it when you want a single number to compare across statistics.
- Check your position on the chart The distribution chart marks where your income falls, making it easy to see how many workers sit on either side of you.
Tips for getting more out of it
- The survey only covers workers employed for the full year, so mid-year job changers, retirees, and the self-employed are not represented in this distribution.
- A deviation score of 50 corresponds to the average income of ¥4.78 million; a score of 60 is roughly the top 16%, and 70 is roughly the top 2.3%.
- Income varies a lot by age and tenure, so for comparisons within your own generation or industry, check more specific statistics.
- The percentile figure uses the actual distribution via interpolation, so it tracks reality more closely than the deviation score, which assumes a normal distribution.
When this calculator is useful
Evaluating a job offer in Japan
A salary figure quoted in yen is hard to judge without local context. Seeing the percentile tells you how the offer compares with the wider workforce rather than with your own expectations.
Planning a move to Japan
If you are relocating, the distribution shows what a given income means in practice and how far it sits from the national average of ¥4.78 million.
Setting a salary target
Working backwards from a percentile you want to reach gives you a concrete income figure to aim for in negotiations or career planning.
Understanding a skewed distribution
Comparing the percentile with the deviation score shows how a long upper tail pulls the average above what most people actually earn.
Terms used on this page
- Percentile
- The share of workers earning less than a given income. Being in the top 10% means 90% of workers earn less than you do.
- Deviation score
- Known in Japan as "hensachi", a scale that sets the average at 50 and one standard deviation at 10. Widely used for exam results and other comparisons.
- Standard deviation
- A measure of how widely values are spread around the average. Here it is approximately ¥3.26 million, estimated from income band midpoints.
- Linear interpolation
- Estimating a value between two known points by assuming an even spread. Used here to place an income within its reported band.
- Skewed distribution
- A distribution that is not symmetrical. Incomes have a long upper tail, so the average sits above what a typical worker earns.
- Full-year worker
- Someone employed by the same company for an entire year. The survey excludes mid-year joiners, leavers, and the self-employed.
Frequently Asked Questions
Side Note — Why "deviation scores" are used for income, not just exams
In Japan, "hensachi" (deviation score) is best known from university entrance exams, but it is really just a general statistical way of expressing how far a value sits from the average of a data set. Converting the mean to 50 and one standard deviation to 10 works for test scores, but equally for height, weight, or income — anything roughly bell-shaped. Knowing your income deviation score turns a vague sense of "doing okay" into a concrete number relative to the whole working population.
The survey behind this tool, Japan's "Survey on Private Sector Salaries," has been run by the National Tax Agency every year since 1949, drawing on real payroll withholding data rather than self-reported surveys — which tends to make it more reliable than opinion polling. In the 2024 edition, the average annual income for full-year workers was ¥4.78 million, up 3.9% year over year, one of the larger increases in recent years.
That average, though, hides a lopsided shape: most workers actually cluster in the ¥3–4 million band, and a relatively small number of very high earners pull the average upward. As a result, more than half of all workers earn less than the ¥4.78 million average. The percentile view captures this skew directly, showing you more intuitively what share of workers actually earn less than you — something a deviation score alone can obscure.