35.6855° N, 139.7239° E
TOKYO
Most Famous People Born in Tokyo, Japan
- Notable people
- 5,034
- Peak decade
- 1980s
- Median birth year
- 1957
- Most distinctive
- Seiyū 131.4×
An ecosystem of fame that barely exists outside Japan. Tokyo's two most distinctive professions — seiyū (voice actor) at more than 130 times the global rate and manga artist at over 60 times — are job titles that simply don't have English equivalents, and they sit alongside one of the world's biggest novelist, photographer, and model benches. The list also runs from Tokugawa shoguns through the woodblock masters of Edo to the directors and animators who exported postwar Japanese cinema to the world.
One face per decade — the most globally famous figure born in Tokyo during each.
Notable Births by Decade
Click a decade to filter the list below. Peak: 1980s with 644 notable births.
What Tokyo Is Known For
Click any row to filter the list of people below.
Actor is Tokyo's biggest profession — 17% of all notables (840).
Tokyo over-indexes on seiyū — 131.4× the global rate.
Tokyo under-produces politician — only 0.3× the global rate.
Profession Mix Over Time
Each band shows a profession family's share of Tokyo's notable births by decade. Hover the chart for the breakdown at any decade.
- Film & TV
- Sports
- Music
- Art & Design
- Writing
- Science
- Other
- Field: Photographer Clear ×
Nobuyoshi Araki
Born 1940
Hiroshi Sugimoto
Born 1948
Mika Ninagawa
Born 1972
Kōshirō Onchi
1891 - 1955
Ihei Kimura
1901 - 1974
Hiroshi Hamaya
1915 - 1999
Kishin Shinoyama
Born 1940
Miyuki Matsuda
Born 1961
Yutaka Takanashi
Born 1935
Yurie Nagashima
Born 1973
Hideki Fujii
1934 - 2010
Yōnosuke Natori
1910 - 1962
Mitsuaki Iwagō
Born 1950
Yoshino Ōishi
Born 1944
Akihiko Okamura
1929 - 1985
Hiromix
Born 1976
Shinzo Maeda
1922 - 1998
Shinzō Fukuhara
1883 - 1948
Toshio Shibata
Born 1949
Hajime Sawatari
Born 1940
Ryūji Miyamoto
Born 1947
Takeyoshi Tanuma
Born 1929
Issei Suda
1940 - 2019
Shōtarō Akiyama
1920 - 2003
Yūtokutaishi Akiyama
1935 - 2020
Tsuneko Sasamoto
Born 1914
Masatoshi Naitō
Born 1938
T. Enami
1859 - 1929
Akira Satō (photographer)
1930 - 2002
Hiroji Kubota
Born 1939
Yuki Onodera
Born 1962
Hisae Imai
1931 - 2009
Taku Aramasa
Born 1936
Kiyoji Ōtsuji
1923 - 2001
Seiichi Motohashi
Born 1940
Ryōji Akiyama
Born 1942
Chōtoku Tanaka
Born 1947
Rosō Fukuhara
1892 - 1946
Toshio Sakai
1940 - 1999
Masao Horino
1907 - 1998
Tadayuki Naitoh
Born 1941
Banri Namikawa
1931 - 2006
Takashi Okamura (photographer)
Born 1927
Rika Noguchi
Born 1971
Akira Gomi
Born 1953
Hiroshi Yamazaki
1946 - 2017
Akira Tanno
1925 - 2015
Ken Ohara
Born 1942
Asako Narahashi
Born 1959
Mitsugu Ōnishi
Born 1952
Shin Yanagisawa
1936 - 2008
Haruo Tomiyama
1935 - 2016
Naoki Ishikawa (photographe)
Born 1977
Kanendo Watanabe
Born 1947
Seiji Kurata
1945 - 2020
Tadasuke Akiyama
Born 1941
Akira Komoto
Born 1935
Kōichi Saitō (photographer)
Born 1935
Takamasa Inamura
1923 - 1989
Kiyoshi Nishiyama
1893 - 1983
Yoshiko Shimada
Born 1959
Mayu Kanamori
Born 1963
Senzō Yoshioka
1916 - 2005
Akihide Tamura
Born 1947
Taiji Matsue
Born 1963
Masataka Takayama (photographer)
1895 - 1981
Gen Ōtsuka
1912 - 1992
Shunji Ōkura
1937 - 2015
Seike Tomio
Born 1943
Kiyoshi Sonobe
1921 - 1996
Susumu Matsushima
1913 - 2009
Kensuke Hijikata
Born 1922
Kōnosuke Ishii
1916 - 1997
Takuya Tsukahara
Born 1937
Kimiko Yoshida
Born 1963
Keisuke Kumakiri
1934 - 2020
Hisaji Hara
Born 1964
Hitomi Watanabe
Born 1939
Kosuke Okahara
Born 1980
Akira Toriyama (ophthalmologist)
1898 - 1994
Tetsugo Hyakutake
Born 1975
Toshiki Ozawa
Born 1932
Mieko Tadokoro
Born 1952
Takayuki Ogawa
1938 - 2008
Tamotsu Nakamura
Born 1934
Shizuka Yokomizo
Born 1966
Ryūkichi Shibuya
1907 - 1995
Ao Gunji
Born 1970
Shinichiro Kobayashi
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