Abstract: Research on semiotics started at almost the same time in China and Japan and has gone through similar stages of development. In both countries, research has gone through the primary stage centred on Saussurean semiology, the stage of entanglement with structuralism and the stage of interdisciplinary integration. China and Japan – in the cultural circle of Chinese characters – are deeply related to each other both academically and theoretically, and exchanges on semiotics between them will certainly be conducive to disciplinary construction and development in both countries. This paper discusses the development of Japanese semiotics to deepen understanding in this field.