🇯🇵 Asia · Japan

Japan PSE Certification Guide (Diamond / Circle)

Japan's electrical safety regime is not a single certification but two distinct routes, divided by the risk the item carries: Diamond PSE goes through third-party certification, while Circle PSE goes through self-declaration. Choose the wrong route and the documents, timelines and labels all have to be redone.

Short answer: For consumer electronics (Bluetooth earphones, speakers, cameras, small appliances and so on) the usual category is Circle PSE, under which the law allows the manufacturer to self-declare, although in practice importers and e-commerce platforms ask for a third-party test report. Safety-critical components such as power cords, plugs, adapters, fuses and current limiters fall under Diamond PSE (Specified Electrical Appliances), which must be certified by a third-party conformity assessment body accredited by METI; self-declaration is not valid for these. Both routes are supervised by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) under the Electrical Appliances and Materials Safety Act (電気用品安全法, commonly called the PSE Act).

Certification Overview

Both are PSE, but Diamond and Circle differ widely in who issues the certificate, how thorough the documentation has to be and how long the process takes. Classify the item first, then talk about process

Item	Diamond PSE (Specified Electrical Appliances)	Circle PSE (Non-Specified Electrical Appliances)
Regulator	Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI)	Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI)
Legal basis	Electrical Appliances and Materials Safety Act (per the Ministerial Ordinance currently in force)	Electrical Appliances and Materials Safety Act (per the Ministerial Ordinance currently in force)
Applicable products	Safety-critical components: power cords, plugs, adapters, fuses, fuse holders, current limiters, etc.	Finished consumer electronics and appliances: Bluetooth earphones, speakers, cameras, smart watches, etc.
Third party required	Yes — certified by a third-party conformity assessment body accredited by METI	No — self-declaration is allowed (in practice a third-party test report is usually attached)
Factory inspection	Required, with follow-up routine inspections	Not required
Reference timeline	6-10 weeks	3-5 weeks
Mark	Diamond PSE mark	Circle PSE mark
Japan responsible party	Required	Required
Technical standards	Item 1 / Item 2 of the Ministerial Ordinance, referencing JIS standards (such as JIS C 6950, JIS C 6065; now trending toward IEC 62368-1)	Same as above

The timelines in the table are reference values measured from the moment the sample arrives at the laboratory in Japan; they exclude shipping (about 3-5 days), and laboratory queues in peak season can add another 3-4 weeks. Actual timelines depend on product complexity, document completeness and whether rework is needed, and they are not a delivery commitment.

How Diamond PSE and Circle PSE Are Split

The dividing line is not "whether the product sells well" but "whether a failure of the item could directly cause electric shock or fire". Japan lists the higher-risk items with a relatively standardised construction as "Specified Electrical Appliances" and controls them with a diamond mark plus third-party certification; everything else is a "Non-Specified Electrical Appliance", controlled with a circle mark, self-declaration and post-market supervision.

◆ Diamond PSE (Specified Electrical Appliances)

Typical items are power cords, plugs, adapters, fuses, fuse holders and current limiters. These products have a relatively fixed construction, are made in large volumes and connect directly to the mains; a fault in the insulation or the materials has serious consequences.

Certification route: a third-party conformity assessment body accredited by METI carries out the conformity assessment and issues the certificate; the company cannot self-declare compliance. Factory inspection is part of the process, and routine inspections continue after certification.

Reference timeline 6-10 weeks. The documentation leans toward engineering detail: construction drawings, material lists, specifications and evidence for key components, and factory quality control records all have to line up with one another.

● Circle PSE (Non-Specified Electrical Appliances)

Typical finished consumer electronics land here: Bluetooth earphones, speakers, cameras, smart watches and other small appliances. The company confirms compliance with the technical standards itself, affixes the Circle PSE mark and takes responsibility for that compliance.

Certification route: self-declaration. But "self-declaration" does not mean "anything goes" — Japanese importers, distributors and e-commerce platforms generally require a test report from a third-party laboratory as the technical basis on which the declaration stands.

Reference timeline 3-5 weeks, with no factory inspection.

The easy mistake: a finished product being Circle does not mean its bundled power adapter is also Circle. The adapter is judged on its own item category and is usually Diamond. Prepare only for Circle when planning a finished-product project and the power section will stall.

Which Products Are In Scope

A sensible order of judgement is "does it connect to the mains → which item category is it → Diamond or Circle", rather than starting from the name of the product. The item list follows the Ministerial Ordinance in force and its appended tables; the common situations are set out below:

Product situation	Typical examples	PSE classification
Safety-critical components	Power cords, plugs, adapters, fuses, fuse holders, current limiters	Diamond PSE (Specified Electrical Appliances)
Mains-powered finished consumer electronics	Bluetooth earphones, speakers, cameras, smart watches, common small appliances	Circle PSE (Non-Specified Electrical Appliances)
Pure DC / built-in battery powered, with no AC adapter	Battery-powered handheld devices; USB-powered where the adapter is sold separately	Usually outside PSE control; a construction analysis statement can be issued for platform review
Mains-powered and containing a wireless transmitter	Wi-Fi cameras, Bluetooth speakers, wireless charging products	PSE (safety) + MIC technical conformity certification (wireless), run in parallel

Category mistakes usually involve two kinds of product: treating a finished product supplied with an AC adapter as a "pure DC product", and treating the adapter as an accessory that can be ignored. Both tend to draw questions at customs clearance and at platform listing.

Documents to Prepare

Diamond and Circle differ in document depth, but the foundation is the same one: proving that the product's construction, materials and component selection meet the technical standards. Subject to the Ministerial Ordinance in force and the requirements of the body receiving the application, the list usually includes:

Product and construction documents

Datasheet, construction drawings for the finished product and the power section, circuit schematic, BOM, and nameplate / label artwork (including rated voltage, current and power).

Component evidence

Datasheets and existing certification evidence for key safety components (cable, plug, fuse, transformer, capacitor, optocoupler and so on), which helps avoid duplicate testing.

Technical standards compliance documents

Clause-by-clause mapping against the technical standards corresponding to Item 1 / Item 2 of the Ministerial Ordinance, referencing JIS standards (such as JIS C 6950, JIS C 6065; now trending toward IEC 62368-1).

Japanese-language documents

A Japanese manual and Japanese safety warnings. The manual must include Japanese, and the safety warnings must be worded in Japanese; English can only be supplementary.

Samples

Testable samples as required by the body receiving the application, shipped with the full nameplate and manual, to avoid a "sample does not match mass production" finding.

Japan responsible party

Details of a local Japanese company that carries the import and compliance responsibility and handles enquiries from the regulator.

Diamond PSE additionally requires factory-related quality control documents to support the factory inspection; for Circle PSE the evidence chain rests on a third-party test report, the self-declaration document and retention of the technical file.

Japan Responsible Party and Notifying Supplier (届出事業者)

This is where PSE differs sharply from CE in practice. Under the CE system an overseas manufacturer can issue its own declaration of conformity; Japan requires a responsible party inside Japan to answer for the product's PSE compliance — normally a local Japanese company acting as the importing business operator. This is a legal requirement, not an option.

Practical point: the role of the responsible party is not "lending an address and a name". When a product is sampled, complained about, recalled or reworked, regulators and channels come to this Japanese entity first. The responsible party therefore needs a basic understanding of the actual product and should hold a full copy of the technical file and test reports.

Which notification and record-keeping duties the responsible party carries, and under what name it files them, depend on the product attributes and the Ministerial Ordinance in force. It is worth fixing the responsible party at project kick-off rather than looking for one after testing is finished — a great deal of lost time comes from exactly this step.

Mark and Label Requirements

Compliance of the PSE mark is often underestimated. It is not just a matter of printing a circle or a diamond, but of a set of information that has to hold true at the same time:

Must be marked on the product itself

The Circle or Diamond PSE mark has to be placed on the product itself, together with the manufacturer name, rated voltage, rated current and rated power. Marking only on the packaging or in the manual does not meet the requirement.

Diamond and Circle cannot be mixed

The shape of the mark reflects the item classification, not customer preference. Putting a Circle mark on a Diamond item turns a product that needs third-party certification into a self-declaration — in effect, improper marking.

Japanese manual and warnings

The manual must include Japanese, and the safety warnings must be in Japanese. English may appear alongside but cannot replace the Japanese wording.

Wireless products add the technical conformity mark

Products with a wireless transmitter also need the technical conformity mark (技適マーク / 技術基準適合証明) plus the certification number, displayed on the product together with the PSE mark; the two cannot substitute for each other.

Technical details such as the size, proportions, colour and placement of the mark follow the Ministerial Ordinance in force and the relevant public notices. When designing the nameplate, it is worth laying out the PSE mark, the technical conformity mark and the manufacturer / responsible party information in a single pass, to avoid reworking the tooling later.

How PSE Relates to MIC Wireless Certification

This relationship comes up a lot when exporting to Japan. Put simply: PSE governs "electrical safety", MIC governs "radio waves" — two sets of regulations, two regulators, two independent processes; a product that both connects to the mains and transmits wirelessly needs both.

Dimension	PSE (Electrical Appliances and Materials Safety Act)	MIC technical conformity certification (formerly TELEC)
Regulator	Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI)	Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC)
What it covers	Electrical safety: insulation, temperature rise, construction, materials	Radio transmission: frequency tolerance, occupied bandwidth, transmit power, spurious emissions, antenna gain and directivity
Applicable standards	Ministerial Ordinance technical standards, referencing JIS	MIC public notices No. 88 (2.4GHz), No. 157 (5GHz), etc.
Third party required	Diamond: mandatory third party; Circle: self-declaration allowed	Certification required, obtaining the technical conformity mark and certification number
Factory inspection	Required for Diamond	Not required
Reference timeline	Circle 3-5 weeks / Diamond 6-10 weeks	3-6 weeks
Mark	Circle or Diamond PSE mark	Technical conformity mark + certification number (Japanese format)
Japan representative	Japan responsible party required	Japan representative required

The two projects can run in parallel, but their test content does not overlap and neither replaces the other. For a mains-powered product with wireless, it is worth scheduling "PSE + MIC" as two parallel tracks from the start and preparing samples and documents once. Details of the wireless side are in the Japan MIC / PSE knowledge base entry, and the overall service is on the Japan MIC / PSE certification service page.

Can CE / UL Reports Be Reused

The short answer: they can be referenced, but they cannot simply be converted into a certificate.

On technical standards, Japan's PSE technical standards reference JIS standards and now trend toward IEC 62368-1. That means a CE (LVD) report or a UL report based on IEC 62368-1 overlaps to a fair degree with PSE in terms of test items and judging logic, and the engineering data can be used as part of the technical file to reduce duplicate testing and shorten the back-and-forth.

Procedurally, however, they cannot substitute for one another: Diamond PSE must be certified by a third-party conformity assessment body accredited by METI, and reports from EU notified bodies or US NRTLs sit outside that certification system; Circle PSE can be self-declared, but the technical standards the declaration rests on are still the Japanese Ministerial Ordinance, so assessment records against the Japanese requirements are needed.

Practical advice: treat existing reports as "input", not as "the conclusion". Run a gap analysis first to see whether the test items, limits, key component list and nameplate information line up with the Japanese requirements, then decide the scope of additional testing. The exact acceptability is determined by the Ministerial Ordinance in force and by the body receiving the application. For the EU route see the CE / RED knowledge base entry, and for the Korean counterpart see the KC knowledge base entry.

Common Pitfalls

Judging PSE by voltage

Japan runs on 100V / 50-60Hz, close to the 110V North American situation, with NEMA 1-15 plugs (two flat pins, no earth), so it is easy to assume "the US approach works here". Whether a product is controlled depends on the item category, not on the voltage.

The adapter gets missed

The finished product is cleared as Circle, and only then does it turn out that the in-box adapter is a Diamond item. The adapter either needs its own certification or has to be an already-compliant existing model.

Marking only on the packaging

The PSE mark has to be on the product itself, together with the manufacturer name and rated parameters. Designing the packaging first and changing the product later is a frequent rework point.

Shipping without a Japan responsible party

The responsible party is a legal requirement, not a channel preference. Without one, a shipment can be stopped at customs clearance or at platform listing.

An all-English manual

The manual must include Japanese, and safety warnings must be worded in Japanese. English support is fine; replacing Japanese is not.

Nameplate inconsistent with the filing

Manufacturer name, trademark, model and ratings must match across the nameplate, the report and the responsible party's documents; any mismatch can trigger a request for further explanation.

Doing PSE and forgetting MIC

Products with a wireless transmitter also need the technical conformity mark and certification number; the two run in parallel and do not cover each other.

Scheduling as if it were "just issuing a certificate"

Document review on the Japanese side is detailed and questions are frequent. Allowing time for rework and supplementary documents is more realistic than compressing the test period. To check the category first, use the certification quick lookup.

Key Facts

Item	Details
Name of the law	Electrical Appliances and Materials Safety Act (電気用品安全法), commonly called the PSE Act
Regulator	Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI)
Two kinds of mark	Diamond PSE = Specified Electrical Appliances; Circle PSE = Non-Specified Electrical Appliances
Third-party requirement	Diamond must be certified by a third-party conformity assessment body accredited by METI; Circle may be self-declared
Factory inspection	Required for Diamond, with routine inspections; not required for Circle
Reference timeline	Circle 3-5 weeks, Diamond 6-10 weeks (from sample arrival at the laboratory, excluding shipping and queuing)
Japan responsible party	Required, normally a local Japanese company acting as the importing business operator and carrying the compliance responsibility
Mark location	On the product itself, together with the manufacturer name and the rated voltage / current / power; not on packaging alone
Language requirement	Manual includes Japanese; safety warnings in Japanese
Technical standards	Item 1 / Item 2 of the Ministerial Ordinance, referencing JIS C 6950, JIS C 6065, trending toward IEC 62368-1 (subject to the Ministerial Ordinance in force)
Relation to wireless certification	PSE and MIC technical conformity certification are independent and parallel; neither replaces the other

FAQs

Circle PSE allows self-declaration, so does that mean no testing is needed?

At the legal level the manufacturer is indeed allowed to self-declare, but the declaration still needs a technical basis. In practice Japanese importers, distributors and e-commerce platforms generally require a test report from a third-party laboratory; without one they will not accept the listing or the purchase. Self-declaration is a way of allocating responsibility, not a route to skipping testing.

Does a purely battery-powered product with no adapter need PSE?

PSE mainly targets mains (AC) powered products. A purely DC battery-powered product supplied without an AC adapter is usually outside PSE control, and a construction analysis statement can be issued for platform review. But if the product ships with an adapter in the box, the adapter itself is still judged on its own item category, which is usually Diamond.

Does Diamond PSE always require a factory inspection?

Yes. The Diamond PSE process includes factory-related inspection, and routine inspections continue after certification; Circle PSE does not require one. This is one of the reasons Diamond takes longer and needs more detailed documents.

I already have CE or UL reports — do I still need retesting for Japan?

Usually a gap analysis against the Japanese technical standards comes first, and the scope of additional testing is decided afterwards. The Japanese technical standards reference JIS and trend toward IEC 62368-1, which overlaps with CE / UL test items, so existing data can cut duplicate work; but Diamond PSE must be certified by a third-party body accredited by METI, and reports from other systems cannot simply be converted. The exact acceptability is determined by the Ministerial Ordinance in force and by the body receiving the application.

Exporting products to Japan?

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