Fire and Ambulance: Call 119. Crime: Call 110. When Unsure, #7119 Covers Only 41 Areas

Japan’s emergency telephone numbers are 119 for a fire or an ambulance, and 110 for a crime or accident. You can call from a public phone without coins or a phone card. Separately, there is “#7119,” which you can consult when you are unsure whether to call an ambulance, and “#9110,” for a non-urgent consultation with the police. However, #7119 does not connect everywhere in the country.

The following is based on the Immigration Services Agency’s 生活・就労ガイドブック (“Guidebook on Living and Working,” Japanese 8th edition, February 2026), and materials published by the Fire and Disaster Management Agency, the National Police Agency, and the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department, confirmed in September 2026. This article does not judge the severity of an illness or injury. If you think it could be life-threatening, call 119 before reading further.

How to use the four numbers

For an accident or incident at sea, there is 118 (the Japan Coast Guard). The same Guidebook explains that you can call 110, 118, and 119 from a public phone without coins or a phone card. On a phone with a red emergency call button, lift the receiver, press the button, and then dial the number; on a phone without a button, lift the receiver and dial directly.

What you are asked when you call 110

According to the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department, when you call 110 you are asked, “This is 110, Tokyo Metropolitan Police. Is this a crime? An accident?” The operator asks questions such as the following.

• What happened
• How many minutes ago it happened
• The location (an address, a nearby landmark such as a shop or building, the floor, and so on)
• The extent of the damage or what you witnessed, and whether anyone is injured
• Whether you remember anything about the offender (sex, number of people, age, clothing, direction they fled, and so on)

The Immigration Services Agency’s 生活・就労ガイドブック also advises answering, calmly and as accurately as you can, when, where, and what happened, your own name and contact information, and whether anyone is injured. If you cannot make the call yourself, ask someone nearby for help.

The Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department states that it receives around 2.11 million 110 calls a year, of which around 330,000 are non-urgent reports such as inquiries, consultations, or prank calls. It advises using #9110 when you want to consult about a worry or concern, and notes that you can also consult directly at your nearest police station.

What to tell them when you call 119

When you call 119, you are asked, “Is this a fire? An ambulance?” For a fire, answer “There’s a fire” and give the location and your own name and contact information. What to say for an ambulance, and how to prepare before going to the hospital, are covered in the article on before you visit a hospital in Japan.

Can you speak Ukrainian?

The Fire and Disaster Management Agency is advancing “three-way simultaneous interpreting,” in which a fire department that receives a 119 call connects to a telephone interpreting center so that the caller, the fire department, and the interpreter can all speak together. According to the agency’s survey, as of January 1, 2025, 673 of the 720 fire departments nationwide had introduced it. Every department that has introduced it supports English, Chinese, and Korean; beyond that, each fire department chooses its own languages. The number of languages supported by a department that has introduced the service ranges from 4 to 32.

The agency’s materials do not show which departments support Ukrainian. Whether you can get interpreting for a 119 call in Ukrainian depends on the fire department in your area. We were unable to confirm published police materials showing the nationwide availability of foreign languages for 110 calls.

If you can speak English, you are likely to connect to an interpreter more easily by using English. Keep a note of your address written in Japanese, along with a nearby landmark, next to your phone.

#7119, for when you are unsure, differs by area

#7119 (the Emergency Medical Telephone Consultation Service) is a system that lets you consult by phone with a doctor, nurse, or emergency life-saving technician when you are unsure, in the case of a sudden illness or injury, whether you should call an ambulance or go straight to a hospital. According to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency, if the situation is judged highly urgent, you are connected to 119; if not, you are told which medical institutions you can see and when.

According to the agency’s page, #7119 is operated in 41 areas nationwide (confirmed September 2026). Most cover an entire prefecture, but in Hokkaido it covers only Sapporo and its surrounding area, in Aichi Prefecture only Nagoya, and in Wakayama Prefecture only Tanabe and the towns around it. Akita, Mie, Shimane, Saga, Miyazaki, and Kagoshima Prefectures are not on the #7119 list. The agency notes that some areas offer emergency telephone consultation under a different number instead of #7119.

The hours it operates and the age it covers also differ by area. Many areas operate 24 hours, while some operate only at night. Most areas cover roughly age 15 and older, with many advising that a child under 15 should call #8000 instead. Check the number and hours for your area on the agency’s list before you become unwell.

When it is hard to speak by voice

The National Police Agency’s “110 App System” lets a person who has trouble making a voice call to 110 — for example, someone hard of hearing — report by text (chat) and photo from a smartphone. Advance registration is required, and it notifies your location by GPS. You need a contract on a Japanese mobile carrier’s line that supports SMS and data communication, and it can only be used within Japan. The National Police Agency asks that anyone who can make a voice call use voice to call 110.

For 119, the Fire and Disaster Management Agency is promoting the introduction, by fire departments, of the “NET119 Emergency Reporting System” for people with a hearing or speech disability. Check with the fire department in your area about whether it is available and how to register.

The National Police Agency also operates the “110 Video Reporting System,” in which the police send a dedicated URL by text message to the smartphone of a person who has called 110, so that they can send video or photos of the scene. Sending them is optional for the caller, and any communication charges are the caller’s own responsibility.

When you cannot get through on 110

For times when 110 cannot be reached because of a disaster, a power outage, or a mobile phone network failure, the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department suggests asking people nearby for help and calling from a different carrier’s mobile phone, a landline, or a public phone, or telling a nearby police station, police box, or patrolling officer directly. It advises checking in advance where the nearest police box is to your home or workplace.

The Immigration Services Agency’s 生活・就労ガイドブック also has a Ukrainian-language edition, and its chapter on emergencies and disasters lets you read how to dial 119 and 110 (though it is a different edition from the Japanese one; see preparing for earthquakes and typhoons, and what you can read in Ukrainian).