.jp trustee and local-presence services compared

The pick is JP-Domains.com, and the argument is jurisdictional rather than commercial. Article 8 of the JPRS rules turns on an address in Japan that can receive the registry's notices, and article 11-2 ends the registration when the post comes back, so the counterparty you want is one that keeps an office in Japan and answers Japanese registered mail. This is the only service here that does. It is a JPRS designated registrar, AGNT-1643, trading since 2003 from Nishi-Shinjuku in Tokyo, it publishes a full Specified Commercial Transactions Act disclosure naming the legal entity behind it, and it prices .jp at $49 a year, $35 for a first year, with the local-presence requirement met at no extra charge.

Openprovider is the pick if you want the mechanism in writing before you pay. It bundles the service free, states that it supplies a proxy address on the owner record for non-Japanese registrants, and publishes the exit: set your own Japanese address on the owner contact, or the domain cannot transfer away. The trade-offs are that it is a wholesale platform reached through a reseller, and that a Dutch company is the wrong sort of counterparty for the risk described below. The cheapest option is not the pick because five services here supply the address for nothing; price is not what separates them.

The ten services compared

Ratings weigh a described model, a published exit and a counterparty that can act inside Japan ahead of how low the fee is. Four of the ten do not say which model they run, which is why not stated is marked in red rather than left blank. None of these services are affiliated with JPRS, and JPRS does not licence, approve or supervise trustee arrangements: it appoints designated registrars, which is a different thing and only one company here holds that appointment. Each service links to its full profile in the provider directory, and the methodology explains where the figures come from.

The address is the whole rule

Article 8 of the rules for general-use JP domain names sets the test in one sentence: the registrant must be an individual with an address in Japan at which the notices JPRS gives under these rules are to be received, or an organisation, incorporated or not, with a head office, principal office, branch, sales office or comparable permanent place in Japan for the same purpose. Article 8, paragraph 1-2 then requires that address to be filed as the registrant's registered address. There is no residence test, no citizenship test and no company requirement. Article 10 sets no limit on how many general .jp domains one registrant may hold.

Read the purpose clause carefully, because it is doing the work. The address is not decoration on a form. It is defined as the place where JPRS's notices are received, and article 11-2 says what happens when they are not.

Article 11-2 terminates a registration automatically where both of two things are true: the filed eligibility details cannot be confirmed from a certificate of registered matters or other documents JPRS specifies, and a notice sent by content-certified registered post to the registered address is returned because the retention period expired, receipt was refused, or the addressee is unknown or has moved. JPRS then emails a deletion date to the managing registrar and the registration contact and deletes the record on that date. Producing the documents before that date stops it, and so does notice of a dispute or court proceeding.

That is the frame for the two products sold here. Under address substitution your name stays on the registrant record and the provider's Japanese address goes underneath it: CentralNic Reseller describes it as a local address in Japan provided automatically where the owner contact does not contain one, Openprovider as a proxy address for non-Japanese registrants, INWX as registering the domain in your name with its own data or a local partner's. Under agent as registrant the provider or an agent it appoints becomes the registrant outright, which is what Netim, Web Solutions and EuropeID describe. Both put the same letterbox at the centre of the arrangement. Only the first leaves your name on it.

Why .co.jp cannot be rented

.co.jp runs under a different rulebook, and two of its articles kill the trustee model outright. The list of eligible organisations covers kabushiki-kaisha, godo-kaisha, yugen-kaisha, partnerships, mutual and special companies, credit unions, limited liability partnerships, investment corporations, and foreign companies, on one further condition: a foreign company must have completed foreign-company registration in Japan. Article 9 then limits an organisation to one attribute-type JP domain name, full stop. The published relaxation of that limit reaches only name changes, mergers and business transfers.

The .co.jp products that exist are therefore reservations rather than registrations. Web Solutions states that its local agent is the legal holder, that Japanese law makes the agent liable for what the domain and its email are used for, and that the agent will not release control of the DNS under any circumstances, so only a 302 redirect is available. It advises treating the arrangement as temporary and incorporating. JP-Domains.com allows domain forwarding only, no name servers and no DNS records. Changing the registrant of a .co.jp later also needs the representative's seal registration certificate, which is not something a foreign buyer can produce for a company they do not own.

What you are buying

Article 19 puts the domain, the registrant's name, the registrant's address, and the registration or public contact into the registry record and publishes it, so the JPRS lookup tells you which product you bought. Under address substitution you will see your own name against a Japanese address you have never visited. Under the agent model you will see the agent in both fields.

• You keep the rights, and the exposure. If your name is on the record you are the registrant JPRS deals with, and article 21 makes you responsible for notifying changes to the recorded details. The address you are responsible for keeping accurate belongs to somebody else.
• Leaving means replacing the address, not just the registrar. Both Openprovider and CentralNic Reseller state that where the owner contact has no Japanese address, a new owner contact with one must be set before the domain can transfer away, because the proxy address has to be replaced first.
• The auth code is treated as your intention. Article 25 requires agreement between registrant and transferee, the current authorisation code obtained through the managing registrar, and release of the transfer lock if one is set. Paragraph 2-6 says that once JPRS confirms the code, the application is treated as genuinely made on the registrant's will. A registry-set 60-day lock follows a completed transfer, and CentralNic Reseller adds that no transfer is possible within 30 days of expiry and that the registrant cannot be changed during one.

The services in detail

JP-Domains.com ★★★★★★★★★★

A Tokyo registrar established in 2003, JPRS accredited as AGNT-1643 and ICANN accredited, operating under Taka Enterprise Ltd. It publishes what Japanese law obliges a trader to publish and what almost nobody else on this page volunteers: the legal entity, its registered office at Nishi-Shinjuku in Shinjuku-ku, a Tokyo telephone and fax number, its payment methods, and a formal personal-data request procedure under the Act on the Protection of Personal Information. .jp is $49 a year, $35 for a first year, with local presence at no additional charge, and transfers out are free.

It is also the only provider that gets .co.jp right in public, setting out the one-domain-per-company rule, the three routes open to a foreign buyer, and the fact that converting several reserved names into real registrations needs a separate Japanese company for each. Weakness: it never says whose name or address goes on the registrant record under the general .jp local-presence arrangement, publishes no exit terms for that service, and its terms of service exclude cancellations and refunds once a registration is complete. Ask the first question before you buy; the phone number works. Full profile.

Openprovider ★★★★★★★★★★

The Dutch platform includes .jp in its local presence list at no charge, excludes .co.jp from it, and repeats the one-per-registrant .co.jp limit in its own documentation. Its .jp page is specific where others are vague: the service is a proxy address used where the owner contact does not contain a Japanese one, an outgoing transfer needs manual approval from support, and if the owner contact has no Japanese address you must set a new owner contact with one first, because the proxy address has to be replaced before the domain can leave.

It also publishes the industry-wide truth that where a trustee service is used an external transfer code commonly cannot be requested until the service is disabled or moved. Weakness: the Japanese party behind the address is never named, the domain price appears only inside an order, and retail buyers reach the company through a reseller rather than dealing with it directly. Full profile.

CentralNic Reseller ★★★★★★★★★★

The Key-Systems and RRPproxy platform, with .jp connections both through GMO and directly. Its knowledge base is the most technically complete .jp documentation published anywhere: a local Japanese address is supplied automatically where the owner contact lacks one, the auth code is retrieved by an explicit request to the registry, an outbound transfer not approved within five days times out and fails, a 60-day lock follows a completed transfer, and the owner address has to be replaced with your own before you can leave.

Weakness: none of it is retail. No price is published, no exit fee is quoted, the Japanese address provider is unnamed, and the contract you sign is a reseller's rather than theirs. Sound plumbing sold two steps from the buyer. Full profile.

INWX ★★★★★★★★★★

The German registrar we pick for .de, running a local presence list of around sixty extensions with .jp among the ones marked free. Its single description across the whole list, that the domain is registered in your name but with INWX's data or a local partner's, is the right shape for .jp: article 8 tests the registrant's address, and address substitution answers it while leaving your name in place.

Weakness: that one sentence is all there is. INWX does not say whether the .jp arrangement uses a Japanese partner or which one, publishes no exit process, and its .jp page reduces the whole rule to a note that a local owner is required. It scores lower here than on .de, where the product and the registry sit in the same country. Full profile.

Netim ★★★★★★★★★★

Our pick on .fr, where it scores 4, and a weaker fit here. It does the two things that earned it that rating: it publishes the trustee fee for .jp, €250 a year, on a list that prices more than forty extensions individually, and it publishes the mechanism and the exit. Netim or one of its partners is listed as the registrant on your behalf while you keep beneficial ownership; you cancel by updating the restricted contact or changing the holder to someone eligible, and an outgoing transfer requires that change of holder first.

Weakness: €250 is five times what a Japanese registrar charges for the domain with the requirement met, the partner that holds the Japanese address is never named, and on this registry a French counterparty cannot itself receive the letter that article 11-2 turns on. Full profile.

Gandi ★★★★★★★★★★

Gandi covers .jp under Auto Trustee, free and added automatically at purchase, and publishes the domain at £93.60 to register and £153.58 to renew. Its .jp page says the extension is open to persons with a local presence in Japan, as local owner or administrative contact, and that Gandi will provide a local administrative contact automatically and free of charge where needed.

Weakness: that description does not match article 8, which tests the registrant's address and offers no administrative contact alternative in the general-use rules. Either Gandi's local contact is being written into the registrant record, in which case the page describes the wrong field, or it is not, in which case the eligibility question is unanswered. The renewal is also the highest on this page by a distance, and no exit is documented. Full profile.

Web Solutions ★★★★★★★★★★

Danish, .jp at $300 a year with the service included, and .co.jp at $300 plus a $299 agent fee. It earns half a star back purely on candour about the .co.jp product, which it describes better than anyone except JP-Domains: the local agent is the legal holder, Japanese law makes that agent liable for the use of the domain and its email, the agent will not give up control of the DNS under any circumstances, only a redirect is possible, and the client should treat the whole thing as temporary and incorporate in Japan, at which point the agent will release the domain for a fee.

Weakness: its published local presence terms. It must remain the maintaining registrar, prepaid fees are not returned, it may at its sole discretion and without informing you update address data or move ownership between its local presence agents, it has no obligation to defend a complaint and may demand proof of your right within seven days, and it disclaims responsibility for the acts of the local agent it chose. Full profile.

Oryon ★★★★★★★★★★

A Singapore hosting company, included because it is one of the few retailers anywhere to publish a single all-in figure: .jp at $60 excluding GST to register, renew and transfer, with a domain proxy service offered alongside it. For a small buyer already in the region that is a clear, comparable price on a page where most of the field will not quote one.

Weakness: proxy is the only word said about it. There is no description of whose address is used, no named Japanese party, no terms and no exit, and the same price table marks the proxy as unavailable on its own domestic .sg, which suggests the service is bought in wholesale rather than run. Full profile.

101domain ★★★★★★★★★★

A large ccTLD specialist, .jp at $55.49 the first year and $64.49 on renewal, with trustee and proxy service marked as available. Its general trustee page says the designated local contact acts as the registrant or agent, that you keep control through your account, and that the service is removed by raising a support ticket with a contact update request.

Weakness: its .jp page, marked as updated in June 2026, reduces the entire rule to the line that a Japanese contact address and phone are required. It does not mention article 8, the registrant, .co.jp or the trustee fee, which appears only once you begin an order. Registrant or agent is a difference this registry cares about a great deal, and the page does not resolve it. Full profile.

EuropeID ★★★★★★★★★★

The same operation as Web Solutions on a second site: €265 a year for .jp, registration and renewal alike, with the proxy service at no charge. Its page says a local contact address is necessary, and then its proxy section says EuropeID itself, its local branch office or a local representative it designates will become the legal holder and administrative contact of the .jp domains concerned.

Weakness: a Danish company cannot be the registrant of a general .jp under article 8, so the first two of those three options are not available and the work necessarily falls to an unnamed local representative. The same discretionary terms apply as at Web Solutions, prepaid fees are not refunded, and the price is more than five times a Tokyo registrar's. Full profile.

Who will not sell you one

Domgate publishes local presence for Hong Kong, Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, Nepal and Singapore, and not for Japan. Marcaria covers the restricted European domains and not .jp. Gandi's corporate trustee list, the paid tier, covers .co.kr, .co.id and .com.hk but stops at Japan's border, with .jp handled by the free automatic service instead. GMO Internet's English-facing Japan Registry site is now little more than a contact form.

How to choose

1. Ask whose name goes on the registrant record, and whose address. Article 8 tests that one field. Four of these ten services do not tell you what they put in it.
2. Ask who signs for registered post at that address. Not who owns the building, who opens the envelope. Article 11-2 turns on a returned letter and article 11-3 freezes the domain while the clock runs.
3. Ask what documents they hold, and how fast they can produce them. Article 11-2 does not cancel where the eligibility details can be confirmed from a certificate of registered matters or other documents JPRS accepts. That is the escape hatch and it is paper-based.
4. Check the record yourself in the JPRS lookup. Article 19 publishes the registrant name and address, so the whois answers the model question whatever the sales page said.
5. Do not buy a .co.jp trustee expecting a website. One .co.jp per company under article 9, the agent keeps the DNS, and forwarding is all you get. Treat it as a reservation while you incorporate.
6. Price the exit. On address substitution it means entering your own Japanese address and then transferring. On the agent model it means a change of registrant that the agent has to sign and may charge for. Get the figure in writing first.
7. Plan around the locks. A registry lock of 60 days follows a completed transfer, no transfer runs within 30 days of expiry, and the registrant cannot be changed during a transfer. Order the steps before you start rather than mid-migration.
8. Run your own DNS. Point the domain at name servers you control, so a billing dispute is never an outage. This is impossible on a .co.jp held by an agent, which is the clearest sign of what that product is.

Alternatives

Use a Japanese address you already have. Article 8 accepts a branch, sales office or comparable permanent place, not only a head office, and no company registration is required for a general .jp. An office, a subsidiary or a serviced address that genuinely receives your post is enough, and it costs nothing extra. A post box is not, because it cannot receive content-certified registered mail addressed to you.

Register a Japanese entity, or a branch. Heavier, and it settles the question permanently. It is also the only route to .co.jp: a godo-kaisha or kabushiki-kaisha, or a foreign company that completes foreign-company registration in Japan, which the .co.jp rules accept explicitly. See the .jp eligibility rules.

Use one of the open Japanese second levels. .ne.jp and .gr.jp have their own eligibility rules and several providers here supply local presence for them at the same price as .jp, which can be a better fit than renting a .co.jp you cannot point anywhere.

Use .tokyo or a generic. .tokyo carries no local test at all and is a fraction of the price, and a name you hold outright is worth more than a name someone in Shinjuku holds for you.

Frequently asked questions

Notes

Prices checked September 2026 as published by each provider. JP-Domains.com lists .jp at $49, $35 for a first year, and .co.jp at $79, $59 for a first year, with a separate .co.jp protection service at $299. Netim lists the .jp trustee at €250 a year excluding VAT on top of the domain. Gandi lists £93.60 and £153.58 with the service free. 101domain lists $55.49 and $64.49 with the trustee fee unpublished. EuropeID lists €265 and Web Solutions $300, in both cases with the service included and for what appears to be one operation behind two sites, plus $299 for the Web Solutions .co.jp agent. Oryon lists $60 excluding GST, and prices its proxy service nowhere. Openprovider and INWX include the service at no charge, and CentralNic Reseller publishes no retail figure.

Rules and article numbers are from the JPRS rules for general-use JP domain names and the rules for attribute-type and regional JP domain names, both published in Japanese by JPRS; translations here are ours and the Japanese text governs. Provider terms are quoted or summarised from each company's published pages. Where a provider does not describe its model or its exit, the table says so rather than guessing. This page describes how .jp registration works and how these services present themselves. It is not legal advice, and if the domain matters to your business the agreement is worth putting in front of a lawyer.

Last updated September 2026. Prices and terms change, and several of these providers publish out-of-date pages. If you spot something wrong, email info@trusteeindex.com.