Same-Name Couples Find Love at Japan's Unique Dating Events

Tokyo — A dating agency in Japan has launched a matchmaking series designed to work around the country’s rule that married couples must share a single surname, organizers said. The concept pairs people who already have the same family name, allowing them to marry without either partner changing their legal surname under the current system.

The first gathering took place on a Friday evening in Tokyo and brought together three men and three women, all with the surname Suzuki. Organizers said the event was intended both to create matches and to draw attention to a legal requirement that many people view as a barrier to marriage.

Japan’s civil code requires spouses to adopt one surname after marriage. The practice has a highly uneven impact by gender: about 95% of women change their names, according to the figures cited in the source material. Japan is described as the only country globally that enforces this rule, a point that has made the issue a recurring focus in debates about gender equality and social norms.

Critics say the single-surname requirement reflects a male-dominated society. The government has introduced limited administrative steps to reduce friction, including allowing birth names to appear alongside married names on official documents such as passports and driving licenses, but the underlying civil code requirement remains unchanged.

International bodies and domestic stakeholders have also pressed for reform. The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women has urged Japan to revise the law to allow a selective dual-surname system. In the corporate sector, the business community has backed legal changes, arguing that the current rule creates practical problems for Japanese companies operating internationally when female employees’ work identification does not match their legal surname.

Keidanren, a powerful business lobby, has supported reform, and an internal Keidanren survey found that 82% of female executives favor allowing separate surnames. Organizers involved in the dating initiative, including Yuka Maruyama of Asuniwa, said the project is meant to raise awareness and pointed to concerns that some people hesitate to marry because of the surname-change requirement.

Despite growing calls to amend the civil code, successive Liberal Democratic governments have resisted changes. Conservative members have argued that allowing separate surnames would weaken the traditional family unit, leaving the policy debate unresolved even as workarounds like same-surname matchmaking draw attention to the issue.