Japan's five leading mobile carriers – NTT DOCOMO, KDDI, Okinawa Cellular Telephone Company, SoftBank and Rakuten Mobile – announced the launch of JAPAN Roaming, a nationwide emergency roaming service available from April 1, 2026.
JAPAN Roaming enables users to temporarily connect to another carrier's 4G LTE network if their primary service is disrupted by large-scale disasters or major outages.
The initiative aims to ensure critical mobile communication remains available to people when they need it most.
Mobile services are an essential lifeline for daily life, and ensuring continuous connectivity during large-scale disasters, such as earthquakes and typhoons, or significant infrastructure failures, is critical.
While the five mobile carriers have promoted landlines, public payphones and free Wi-Fi services, including "00000JAPAN," as alternative communication methods during such incidents, maintaining connectivity for customers without access to these alternatives has remained a significant challenge.
