Which choice?～Compareing Shadan with NPO

When you want to establish some kind of entity to do social goods in Japan, you have another option other than NPO.
That is a non-profit legal entity called Shadan Houjin (Incorporated Association), which has 2 types.
One is Ippan Shadan Houjin (General Incorporated Association) and the other is Koueki Shadan Houjin (Public Interest Incorporated Association).
Similar to NPOs, they are allowed to conduct profit-making businesses but are not allowed to share the profit with members.

Koueki Shadan Houjin is the certified Shadan Houjin and can obtain tax exemption, but you can not establish Koueki Shadan Houjin immediately.
Everyone has to start by establishing Ippan Shadan Houjin and reorganize it into Koueki Shadan Houjin by obtaining the governmental certification.

So "Shadan" means Ippan Shadan Houjin in the following part. I prefer to use the abbriviation because it is a too long name to describe every time for me and it might be annoying for readers.

Comparing Shadan with NPO, Shadan is much easier to establish, free from governmental control, less support from the government, has less credibility,and requires a bit more money.

Regarding the process of establishment, Shadan is much easier compared to NPO.
You need only 2 persons as founders compared to 10 for NPO. 
One governor is enough for Shadan compared to 3 for NPO.
The duration of the process for establishing Shadan is much shorter than establishing NPO. 
You do not need the governmental certification which sometimes takes 3-6 months to obtain for establishing Shadan.
Therefore, you can complete the procedure in 1-2 weeks if you hurry.

Regarding governmental control, Shadan is free from the restriction of activity areas that are applied for NPO, and no need to file the annual action plan and budget to local governments every fiscal year.

Regarding governmental support, there is a few governmental subsidies for Shadan.
For NPO, there are many public or non-profit organizations to support NPO in terms of establishment, organizational operation and financing but there is no such support centers for Shadan. 

Regarding credibility, since every NPO has to obtain the certification of establishment from the local government, NPO is considered to be more credible than Shadan. 

Regarding the cost, it will be roughly 120,000 yen for establishing Shadan, which is almost 0 yen for establishing NPO. 
The breakdown of the amount is, 60,000 yen for the notarization of the articles of incorporation and about 60,000 yen as the registration fee. 

Please note that running Shadan costs more than NPO.
Shadan has to pay corporate income tax if they do profitable business and corporate inhabitant tax.
A few local governments offer tax exemption of corporate inhabitant tax for Shadan which is totally non-profit. But many do not.
For example, Tokyo Metropolitan Government takes 17.3% of corporate income tax for the profit and 70,000 yen of corporate inhabitant tax per year for all Shadan. There is no corporate inhabitant tax exemption in Tokyo.

So which choice is a very difficult question, as you see.
Then you may ask, which is more polular?

Let's see the number of newly established organizations.
From the research of TOKYO SHOKO RESEARCH, LTD., in 2021, the number of newly established NPO was 1,504.
In 2019, the number of newly established Ippan Shadan was 6,083. 
So you can see that Shadan is more popular than NPO in terms of numbers.

However, since you cannot change NPO to Shadan, and vice cersa, you have to consider carefully before getting too far. Or please ask specialists.