[Like for everything else] It always boils down to how strong your motivation is in learning the language. If it isn’t strong enough you will only go that far, even if you are in Japan. I was going through some topics on Reddit and I have been amazed by how many people (currently leaving in Japan apparently) say that they have just given up at the idea of getting better at Japanese. They are happy with their current level (which could be any) and just get by speaking the least possible. That’s just to say that everybody is driven by different goals and only over time you will discover what your potential is given how much you care about Japanese. That said, it is 100% true that studying any language in the place where it’s used / spoken will always speed up your learning process and boost your chances of learning better / quicker. Luckily there are many tools you can use as a self learner.
If you use a language you will learn it. It’s like with everything.
For example, my japanese Zen teacher recently told me she could use a brush up on her Kanji. In times of the computer, she types and the Kanji pops up, so she started to forget them. I want to highlight she was raised in Japan and she came here in her late twenties.
I have learned english at school, but it didn’t use it, so my english was crap. Then I needed it for work and made some friends. Now my english might not be brilliant, but I am so fluent that I express myself almost freely and even give presentations without any issues.
I was told that I would never be able to learn computer programming, since I was bad at math. Now guess what? Still sucking at math, but coding software since 1998.
What others said: as long as you use your japanese it will get better. If you stop, it won’t. Probably it will take a few years, but who cares?
As others have said, if you immerse yourself as much as possible, by doing the hard work of reading, and listening to Japanese, along with grammar and kanji study, you’ll get a lot of the way there, though for most people it takes quite a while (though that depends on your inborn facility as well as your self-discipline).
And the other equally important part if you want to achieve verbal fluency is actually learning how to speak. This part is more difficult (but certainly not impossible) outside Japan. First step is probably doing a lot of shadowing (where you listen and repeat audio by a native speaker).
Second step is to find a native speaker to converse with, and that could be a person on the internet or preferably a real live person, preferably a real live language teacher.
Even with all your immersion and language shadowing, it can still be daunting to compose sentences on the fly. That’s why you need to talk with someone who can get you to converse and correct your mistakes. Good luck!
(As for myself, I’m fluent in a very minimal way, in that I can say a lot of very basic sentences quite easily, but I also easily reach the limits of my ability. I hope to expand those limits over the next couple of years. I’ve been learning Japanese long enough not to expect miracles, but I’m trying.)
If this is your goal, then it’s very attainable. I know people who live have lived in Japan 10+ years and couldn’t pass JLPT N5 if their life depended on it because they only speak their native language all day.
Fluency is more of a scale anyway. I’m no where near native level fluency but I can hold conversations on a variety of topics quite easily because I’m good with the little I know. If you become good in even basic Japanese you would have reached a level of fluency.
I would say that if you’re motivated, self-study can be more efficient. For instance you can:
- Spend as much time you want, not be limited to a certain amount each week.
- Study using any method you like
- Focus on whatever you find most interesting/helpful/motivating
And of course you don’t need to live in or even go to Japan. I practice conversation with community tutors on italki, and if your goal is to be able to construct everyday sentences, then I would certainly say that I was able to achieve this before I visited Japan for the first time this spring.
In general, don’t believe people who for whatever reason claim that Japanese is in any way impossible to learn, it most certainly is not! It merely requires more time than a language more closely related to the one(s) you already know (but you knew this already! 
)
Only you can decide on that. if you want to get fluent in Japanese, no one can stop you.
I’m completely self-taught but live in Japan, I see it and listen to it everyday, sometimes I use it lol. In my experience, the vast majority of people I’ve met who are good at Japanese have at some point paid to learn it and lived in Japan. That doesn’t mean you can’t reach a high level without living here or studying here, but its going to be a big hindrance to understanding natural Japanese in formal and informal settings if you can’t experience how Japanese is actually used in reality. Then again there are people who lived here 10 years + and cant read hiragana. It’s entirely down to how much hard work you put it in.
I would say if you have the time, like spending 1-2 years learning Japanese before you go to Japan, getting to N1 level will be much more straightforward than getting to N1 while working here or something. Weird as that might sound, but N1 is just testing how much you memorised more than anything.
Right…
I’ve never had a proper lesson in my life and whilst I’m still a beginner, certain aspects of my Japanese are “better” than people I know who take lessons. One of the best things I ever did was get some language exchange friends to message, exchange voice messages and, when you’re ready, actually have telephone conversations with. It will help your listening, pronunciation and teach you how to speak more naturally and be aware of colloquialisms (which you can then use to impress your other exchange friends 
).
It’s also helped me bed in things like grammar and which word from a group of synonyms is more appropriate in a given situation. I’d say try to get quite a few people because 1. life gets in the way and you won’t always be able to chat to one person, 2. different people speak differently (different levels of formality, accents, dialect etc) and 3. it’s nice to have different perspectives on Japanese language and culture.
There are a few great (free) sites out there so get looking! I’ve met some amazing friends through language.exchange and conversationexchange.com
I don’t know anything about the OP. If they are some 18 year old with bags of free time, they have a ton opportunity to study Japanese. People living in Japan who aren’t studying are more than like dealing with the pressure of living here, like working and trying to make social connections rather than spending all their time inside memorising vocab lists and reading NHK all day and night for N1. Someone without any pressure to actually come and live and work in Japan can study at their leisure. That’s my point.
i completely agree with you.
A bit off the topic, but how did you begin with italki tutor-conversations? Just curious to hear a little about your experience, since I want to get a casual conversation tutor on italki as well, but I keep procrastinating (shyness). At the moment I consume a nice portion of Japanese media daily, but it’s all passive. I want to pay a tutor to not worry about the give-and-take of language exchange between friends.
Depending on your native tongue japanese is just incredibly difficult lol so it costs a lot more effort to get to ‘fluent’ than when learning german or something when your native tongue is english
I think I was kinda in the same boat, but the mindset that made it easier for me to start was to just book the lesson(s) and then let future-me suffer the consequences! Just pretend you’re booking them for someone else or something 
I looked for community tutors since they were cheaper and I knew I just wanted free conversation anyway. Then I looked at their presentation videos to find people I thought looked like they might be nice to talk to. Really nothing more to it than that…
It was pretty scary the first few times, I won’t lie But after a while you get more used to expressing yourself (and more used to the fact that it’s not gonna be perfect!).
Also, the tutors are generally pretty good at giving you a topic if you both just fall quiet, so you shouldn’t have to fear awkward silences too much.
Thank you for your reply. 
Yeah, I’m also looking for conversation practice, so I’ll look for a community tutor.
How long were your first lessons? I’m pretty sure my brain will be cooked and boiled if I start out with 60-minute lessons. 
And is skype used for lessons, or some other service?
Many tutors offer varying lengths (30,45,60 I’ve even seen up to 90 minutes), and when you sign up you get three trial lessons that are shorter but cheaper, so you’ll likely be able to use those for half-hour lessons to begin with.
I’ve always used Skype, but depending on the person they might also have other means available (such as hangouts or similar)
EDIT: I used my three trial lessons on three different people in order to shop around a bit before committing to a full hour with someone.
aaaaaaaah so many helpful replies ;;
i feel a little insecure tagging everyone here, so i’m just answering in the void and maybe someone sees it!
first of all: i’m so thankful and relieved so many people made good experiences with self learning and probably even consider themselves as fluent. it’s giving much motivation! as for me i’m absolutely happy when i ever reach a level where i can have simple conversations and be able building own sentences when i learn new words. i also want to be able to understand people out of context. f.e. when i read a book in english i often don’t know every word, but reading the whole sentence and scene i still understand what’s going on.
i absolutely understand it’s unrealistic to hope for being super fluent and understanding everything without putting a lot of time and effort in learning. since i don’t have this time i learn a little everyday (30 to 60 minutes) and do little steps forward each a week. so i’m very slow and need to repeat a very lot, because for now i can’t use my knowledge much.
thank you for your advices! totally will start watching japanese dramas again so i stay immersed. as a reading training i read out japanese tweets out loud. same goes for every japanese text that catches my eye. i already noticed i can read hiragana a little faster now! and very very rarely i even understand some words! that’s already a lot for me!
since i still remember how hard it was for me to understand english people talking when i was younger, i know it will take a long time and a lot of training to be able to undertstand fast spoken japanese. but for now i’m looking forward to it! thank you so much for your motivating words! let’s all do our best to get better!!
If you look around, there are some posts from people living in Japan (I’d link one if I could remember which it was) who say that living in Japan definitely does not make you fluent on its own. I’m sure it helps to be surrounded by casual conversation and colloquialisms all day every day, but you can still get that online. Everything from watching Japanese Twitch streams to joining a language exchange will aid in that, and there are places with voice chats for practicing Japanese verbally.
Yes, if you go to Japan one day and have only practiced online, I’m sure there will be some kind of shock and nervousness, and you may fail to understand many things, but you would definitely be better prepared than someone who just dove straight in to Japan hoping to become fluent over time merely through exposure because they heard “you only become fluent if you’re in Japan.”
That site looks awesome! Signing up now 
Millions of fluent non-native english speakers all around the world would like to have a word with your friend.