List of regions of Japan

is often divided into regions, each containing one or more of the country's 47 prefectures at large. Sometimes, they are referred to as "blocs", or "regional blocs" as opposed to more granular regional divisions. They are not official administrative units, though they have been used by government officials for statistical and other purposes since 1905. They are widely used in, for example, maps, geography textbooks, and weather reports, and many businesses and institutions use their home regions in their names as well, for example Kyushu National Museum, Kinki Nippon Railway, Chūgoku Bank, and Tōhoku University.
One common division groups the prefectures into eight regions. In this arrangement, three of the four main islands of Japan, namely Hokkaidō, Shikoku, and Kyūshū, each form their own region, while the largest island, Honshū, is split into five regions. Minor islands are grouped with the larger ones, for example with the Satsunan Islands being included under Kyūshū and the Tokyo Islands under Kantō. Okinawa Prefecture is usually considered part of Kyūshū, but is sometimes treated as its own ninth region.
Japan has eight High Courts, but their jurisdictions do not match the typical eight-region geographical division.

Table

Region	Population	Area in km²	Prefectures contained
Hokkaidō	5.1 million	83,000	Hokkaidō
Tōhoku	8.9 million	67,000	Akita, Aomori, Fukushima, Iwate, Miyagi, Yamagata
Kantō	43.3 million	32,000	Chiba, Gunma, Ibaraki, Kanagawa, Saitama, Tochigi, Tōkyō
Chūbu	21.4 million	67,000	Aichi, Fukui, Gifu, Ishikawa, Nagano, Niigata, Shizuoka, Toyama, Yamanashi
Kansai	22.5 million	33,000	Hyōgo, Kyōto, Mie, Nara, Ōsaka, Shiga, Wakayama
Chūgoku	7.3 million	32,000	Hiroshima, Okayama, Shimane, Tottori, Yamaguchi
Shikoku	3.8 million	19,000	Ehime, Kagawa, Kōchi, Tokushima
Kyūshū & Okinawa	14.3 million	44,000	Fukuoka, Kagoshima, Kumamoto, Miyazaki, Nagasaki, Ōita, Okinawa, Saga

Regions and islands

This is a list of Japan's major islands, traditional regions, and subregions, going from northeast to southwest. The eight traditional regions are marked in bold.

Hokkaidō
Honshū
* Tōhoku region
* Kantō region
** Nanpō Islands
* Chūbu region
** Hokuriku region
** Kōshin'etsu region
** Tōkai region
* Kansai region
* Chūgoku region
** San'in region
** San'yō region
Shikoku
Kyūshū
* Northern Kyūshū
* Southern Kyūshū
* Ryukyu Islands
** Satsunan Islands
** Okinawa
Other regional divisions

In many contexts in Japan, regional groupings are used that digress from the above-mentioned common 8-region geographical division. The 8-region model is frequently regarded as a standard on the English Wikipedia and some other English-language publications. Examples of regional divisions used by other particular institutions include:

Region	Prefectures
–	Hokkaidō
Tōhoku	Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Akita, Yamagata, Fukushima
–	Tokyo
Kantō	Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Saitama, Chiba, Kanagawa, Niigata, Nagano, Yamanashi, Shizuoka
Chūbu	Toyama, Ishikawa, Fukui, Gifu, Aichi, Mie
Kinki	Shiga, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo, Nara, Wakayama
Chūgoku	Tottori, Shimane, Okayama, Hiroshima, Yamaguchi
Shikoku	Tokushima, Kagawa, Ehime, Kōchi
Kyūshū	Fukuoka, Saga, Nagasaki, Kumamoto, Ōita, Miyazaki, Kagoshima, Okinawa

Region	Prefectures
Hokkaidō	Hokkaidō
Tōhoku	Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Akita, Yamagata, Fukushima
Kantō-Kōshin'etsu	Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Saitama, Chiba, Tokyo, Kanagawa, Nagano, Niigata, Yamanashi
Tōkai-Hokuriku	Toyama, Ishikawa, Fukui, Shizuoka, Gifu, Aichi, Mie
Kinki	Shiga, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo, Nara, Wakayama
Chūgoku	Tottori, Shimane, Okayama, Hiroshima, Yamaguchi
Shikoku	Tokushima, Kagawa, Ehime, Kōchi
Kyūshū	Fukuoka, Saga, Nagasaki, Kumamoto, Ōita, Miyazaki, Kagoshima, Okinawa

Region	Prefectures
–	Hokkaidō
Tōhoku	Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Akita, Yamagata, Fukushima
Kantō	Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Saitama, Chiba, Tokyo, Kanagawa, Yamanashi, Nagano
Hokuriku	Niigata, Toyama, Ishikawa
Chūbu	Nagano, Gifu, Shizuoka, Aichi, Mie
Kinki	Shiga, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo, Nara, Wakayama, Fukui
Chūgoku	Tottori, Shimane, Okayama, Hiroshima, Yamaguchi
Shikoku	Tokushima, Kagawa, Ehime, Kōchi
Kyūshū	Fukuoka, Saga, Nagasaki, Kumamoto, Ōita, Miyazaki, Kagoshima
–	Okinawa

Region	Prefectures
Hokkaidō	Hokkaidō
Tōhoku	Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Akita, Yamagata, Fukushima
Kantō-Kōshin	Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Saitama, Chiba, Tokyo, Kanagawa, Yamanashi, Nagano
Hokuriku	Niigata, Toyama, Ishikawa, Fukui
Tōkai	Gifu, Shizuoka, Aichi, Mie
Kinki	Shiga, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo, Nara, Wakayama
Chūgoku	Tottori, Shimane, Okayama, Hiroshima
Shikoku	Tokushima, Kagawa, Ehime, Kōchi
Northern Kyūshū	Yamaguchi, Fukuoka, Saga, Nagasaki, Kumamoto, Ōita
Southern Kyūshū-Amami	Miyazaki, Kagoshima
Okinawa	Okinawa

Constituency	Prefectures
Hokkaidō	Hokkaidō
Tōhoku	Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Akita, Yamagata, Fukushima
Northern Kantō	Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Saitama
Tokyo	Tokyo
Southern Kantō	Chiba, Kanagawa, Yamanashi
Hokuriku-Shin'etsu	Niigata, Nagano, Toyama, Ishikawa, Fukui
Tōkai	Gifu, Shizuoka, Aichi, Mie
Kinki	Shiga, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo, Nara, Wakayama
Chūgoku	Tottori, Shimane, Okayama, Hiroshima, Yamaguchi
Shikoku	Tokushima, Kagawa, Ehime, Kōchi
Kyūshū	Fukuoka, Saga, Nagasaki, Kumamoto, Ōita, Miyazaki, Kagoshima, Okinawa

High court	Prefectures
Sapporo	Hokkaidō
Sendai	Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Akita, Yamagata, Fukushima
Tokyo	Tokyo, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Saitama, Chiba, Kanagawa, Niigata, Yamanashi, Nagano, Shizuoka
Nagoya	Aichi, Mie, Gifu, Ishikawa, Fukui, Toyama
Osaka	Shiga, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo, Nara, Wakayama
Hiroshima	Tottori, Shimane, Okayama, Hiroshima, Yamaguchi
Takamatsu	Tokushima, Kagawa, Ehime, Kōchi
Fukuoka	Fukuoka, Saga, Nagasaki, Kumamoto, Ōita, Miyazaki, Kagoshima, Okinawa

Region	Prefectures
Hokkaidō	Hokkaidō
Tōhoku	Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Akita, Yamagata, Fukushima
Kantō	Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Saitama, Chiba, Kanagawa, Yamanashi
Tokyo	Tokyo
Tōkai	Gifu, Shizuoka, Aichi, Mie
Hoku-Shin'etsu	Niigata, Nagano, Toyama, Ishikawa, Fukui
Kinki	Shiga, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo, Nara, Wakayama
Chūgoku	Tottori, Shimane, Okayama, Hiroshima, Yamaguchi
Shikoku	Tokushima, Kagawa, Ehime, Kōchi
Kyūshū	Fukuoka, Saga, Nagasaki, Kumamoto, Ōita, Miyazaki, Kagoshima, Okinawa

Region	Prefectures
Hokkaidō	Hokkaidō
Tōhoku	North: Aomori, Iwate, Akita South: Miyagi, Yamagata, Fukushima
Kantō	Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Saitama, Chiba, Tokyo, Kanagawa, Yamanashi
Tōkai	Gifu, Shizuoka, Aichi, Mie
Hoku-Shin'etsu	Niigata, Toyama, Ishikawa, Fukui, Nagano
Kansai	Shiga, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo, Nara, Wakayama
Chūgoku	Tottori, Shimane, Okayama, Hiroshima, Yamaguchi
Shikoku	Tokushima, Kagawa, Ehime, Kōchi
Kyūshū	Fukuoka, Saga, Nagasaki, Kumamoto, Ōita, Miyazaki, Kagoshima, Okinawa

Region	Prefectures
Hokkaidō	Hokkaidō
Tōhoku	Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Akita, Yamagata, Fukushima
Hokuriku	Toyama, Ishikawa, Fukui
Kantō-Kōshin'etsu	Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Saitama, Chiba, Tokyo, Kanagawa, Niigata, Yamanashi, Nagano
Tōkai	Gifu, Shizuoka, Aichi, Mie
Kinki	Shiga, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo, Nara, Wakayama
Chūgoku	Tottori, Shimane, Okayama, Hiroshima, Yamaguchi
Shikoku	Tokushima, Kagawa, Ehime, Kōchi
Kyūshū-Okinawa	Fukuoka, Saga, Nagasaki, Kumamoto, Ōita, Miyazaki, Kagoshima, Okinawa

List of regions of Japan

Table

Regions and islands

Other regional divisions