How does Japan mark Exam season?
大学入学共通テスト
- Local date
- January 16, 2027–January 17, 2027
- When is it?
- The first Saturday and Sunday on or after January 13, a two-day period.
Japan's Common Test for University Admissions is run by the National Center for University Entrance Examinations, on a rule rather than a fixed date: the first Saturday and Sunday on or after January 13. For the 2027 cycle that falls on January 16–17, with make-up sittings on January 23–24. The Common Test is followed by each university's own examination; national and public universities split these into early and late schedules. So Japan is two-stage like Taiwan, but arranged differently: the second stage is held by individual universities in February and March, and candidates for national and public universities file their choices after their Common Test scores are known — scores first, then choose, the reverse of Taiwan's apply-then-interview order.
What is this topic?
Every country here runs a national test that decides university places, but how tightly that decision is compressed varies enormously. China squeezes it into two days, June 7 and 8. Brazil does the opposite, spreading it across two Sundays a week apart in November. India goes further still, dispersing subject papers across nearly two months. Japan and Taiwan run a two-stage system: one national test, then each university's own. The United States is the only place with no national entrance exam at all. The same question — how an eighteen-year-old should be measured — gets seven different answers.
Sources and dates
Dates follow local time zones, calendars, and official notices. Check the source when a date is estimated or locally variable.