Japan Visa Appointment in the UK: London and Edinburgh

TL;DR

Japan visa applications in the UK are lodged in person, by appointment, at the Embassy of Japan in London or the Consulate-General in Edinburgh. There is no visa centre and no centre fee. London books up to 4 weeks ahead, Edinburgh up to 2, first come first served. The counter accepts the file, most decisions take 5 working days, and the passport comes back from the same office. Our £99 prepares the file and books the appointment.

No centre, no courier: it is the embassy itself

Anyone who has queued at a Schengen visa centre expects Japan to work the same way. It does not. The embassy's General Information page says: "Please submit all the required documents for your visa category at the Consular Section in person. An appointment must be booked in advance." The Consulate-General in Edinburgh says the same. Nobody checks your file at a counter run by a contractor, nobody charges a service fee, and nobody sends your passport on by courier. You deal with the visa section directly, which is why the official cost of applying yourself is the visa fee and nothing more.

The embassy does publish a list of registered visa agents, sixteen companies as of July 2025, who may lodge applications for most visa categories, with the note that they "are not affiliated to the Embassy". Using one is optional. We are not on that list, we do not lodge, and we do not need to: our job is the file and the booking, and you attend.

If you have not yet checked whether you need a visa at all, start with Japan visa from the UK.

London or Edinburgh: the jurisdiction rule

Where you live decides the office. The Edinburgh consulate accepts applications from residents of Scotland and these council areas in the north east of England: County Durham, Cumbria (the consulate lists it as Cumberland, and Westmorland and Furness), Darlington, Gateshead, Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, Newcastle upon Tyne, North Tyneside, Northumberland, Redcar and Cleveland, South Tyneside, Stockton-on-Tees and Sunderland. Everyone else in England, and all of Wales and Northern Ireland, applies at the embassy in London.

The rule is enforced from both ends. Edinburgh "will in principle not accept visa applications from residents of the Embassy's jurisdiction", and the embassy's appointments page tells residents of Scotland and the north east to "ensure you use the Consulate General of Japan in Edinburgh booking site". The desk note is simple: the address on your share code page is the one the visa section sees, so book where that address says.

Both offices refuse applications from people who are only visiting the UK. Long-term status, such as work, study, family or settlement, is what makes you a resident for this purpose.

How the London booking works

The embassy's Consular Appointments page sets the rules, and you accept them before the system sends you to a third-party booking site. Bookings "can only be made for Embassy working days up to 4 weeks in advance", with no same-day bookings. Slots are "limited and offered on a first-come, first-served basis", and "availability may be limited during holiday periods (Easter, Christmas, Half term etc)". You book the visa application service specifically; a passport or certificate appointment will not do, and visa and non-visa services "can not be provided at the same appointment".

Families and groups applying together book "only one appointment slot". The embassy forbids booking multiple appointments for the same application and forbids transferring or selling a booking: "Any appointment slots transferred to a third party will be invalidated." That is why we book in your own name, with your details, and never hold slots.

Changes and cancellations go through the link in the confirmation email, at least a day ahead; same-day cancellations for illness are by email to the consular section. On the day, "You will only be able to enter the Embassy 10 minutes before your appointment time", with the confirmation email or a printout shown at security, and "If you are significantly late for your appointment, entry to the Embassy may be denied." The embassy also says it cannot promise to serve you at the exact minute booked. The consular section is open 09:30 to 16:30, Monday to Friday, closed on British bank holidays, the year-end period and some Japanese holidays.

How the Edinburgh booking works

The consulate's online booking page is separate from London's. Bookings "can be made 1 day to 2 weeks in advance", with no same-day visits. For visas it is "One slot for one visa application only", and "If there are more than two applications to make at the same time (e.g. family, friends, etc.), please contact us by telephone or email." The booking is not complete until the Register button is pressed and the confirmation email arrives. Holders of a Certificate of Eligibility are pointed to a separate page before booking, which does not concern visitor visas.

What happens at the counter

The visa section checks the file against its checklist for your purpose and either accepts it as a valid application or hands it back. The timing that matters is on both offices' pages: "Once a visa application submitted in person has been accepted as valid, in most cases it will take 5 working days." Acceptance is the moment the clock starts, not the booking, not the appointment itself if the file is sent back. Everything other than the passport stays with the embassy, so take copies.

Two timing rules bracket the appointment. The embassy "cannot accept a visa application submitted more than 3 months before the date of arrival in Japan", so the earliest useful appointment is three months before you land. And a single-entry visa is valid for three months from issue, so applying far ahead and then postponing means applying again.

What goes in the file is a separate subject, covered in Japan visa documents for UK residents. The one thing to repeat here is the embassy's note that the passport, form and photo must be originals, with the photo already glued to the form.

Timing: what the embassy does and does not say

The 5 working days is the embassy's figure for a straightforward file. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs' processing time page adds that if there is any problem with the content, the file goes to Tokyo "and issuance of a visa may take more than a month", and that a request for additional documents or an interview stops the clock. Edinburgh says plainly that it "cannot accept requests for fast processing time (especially temporary visitor visa for tourism)".

Neither office publishes how far out the next free slot usually is, and neither do we as a fixed figure. Our desk logs the earliest date it sees at each office when it books, and the plan step shows that reading with its date. Slots are released four weeks ahead in London and two in Edinburgh, so the practical answer is to be ready to book the moment your travel date falls inside the three-month window and to keep flights refundable until the passport is back.

Collecting your passport

London's appointments page lists "Visa collections (except 11:30-14:00)" among the services that do not need an appointment, so you return during opening hours outside that lunchtime gap. Edinburgh is stricter: "You must make a collection appointment ONLINE after your application is accepted. Passports must be collected in person", and anyone who cannot attend "must arrange for someone to come on their behalf" with photo ID and a signed authorisation letter.

The visa fee is paid at collection and only if the visa is issued: £77 for most nationalities, £4 for Indian nationals, nothing for Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Filipino nationals. Edinburgh takes cash only. A refused application costs nothing, though the embassy will not say why it refused.

Doing it yourself, or with us

You can do all of this yourself. The booking systems are free, the embassy publishes the checklist and the form, and applying yourself costs only the official visa fee. Scan everything before you hand it over with the Bundler, and use the Compressor if a file is too big to keep.

Our prepared-for-you Japan visa service does the parts people get wrong: the form for you to sign, the Schedule of Stay, the pack built to the embassy's checklist, and the London or Edinburgh appointment booked in your own name from the official system, within 3 working days of your complete file subject to availability, or your service fee back. The file itself is ready within 24 hours of your complete documents. £99 for the first traveller and £69 for each extra traveller on the same trip, up to five. You attend, you pay the official fee if the visa is issued, and the visa section decides. Full refund if you cancel before we start work. WayaNerd Ltd, company 16269713. Start at the plan step.