Osaka Bay (大阪湾 ''Ōsaka-wan'' ) is a bay in western Japan. As an eastern part of the

Seto Inland Sea The , sometimes shortened to the Inland Sea, is the body of water separating Honshū, Shikoku, and Kyūshū, three of the four main islands of Japan. It serves as a waterway connecting the Pacific Ocean to the Sea of Japan. It connects to Osa ...

, it is separated from the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contine ...

by the Kii Channel and from the neighbor western part of the Inland Sea by the Akashi Strait. Its western shore is formed by Awaji Island, and its northern and eastern shores are part of the Kansai metropolitan area. Major ports on Osaka Bay include

Osaka is a designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the third most populous city in Japan, following Special wards of Tokyo and Yokohama. With a population of ...

Kobe Kobe ( , ; officially , ) is the capital city of Hyōgo Prefecture Japan. With a population around 1.5 million, Kobe is Japan's seventh-largest city and the third-largest port city after Tokyo and Yokohama. It is located in Kansai region, w ...

, Nishinomiya, Sakai,

Amagasaki 270px, Amagasaki Castle 270px, Aerial view of Amagasaki city center 270px, Amagasaki Station is an industrial city located in Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 455,555 in 223812 households, and a population de ...

, and Hannan. A number of

artificial island An artificial island is an island that has been constructed by people rather than formed by natural means. Artificial islands may vary in size from small islets reclaimed solely to support a single pillar of a building or structure to those tha ...

s have been created in Osaka Bay in past decades, including Kansai International Airport, Kobe Airport, Port Island, and Rokkō Island. In antiquity, Osaka Bay stretched almost to Kyoto, Naniwa, Osaka's oldest settlement, itself a peninsula in the bay. Several islands at the south end of Osaka Bay are part of the

Seto Inland Sea National Park is a Japanese national park, comprising areas of Japan's Seto Inland Sea, and of ten bordering prefectures. Designated a national park in 1934, it has since been expanded several times. It contains about 3,000 islands, known as the Setouchi Isl ...

. Industries locate around Osaka Bay because there is a skilled and plentiful workforce, many port facilities, efficient linkages (from small to medium to large firms). There are good transport links (including the

Shinkansen The , colloquially known in English as the bullet train, is a network of high-speed railway lines in Japan. Initially, it was built to connect distant Japanese regions with Tokyo, the capital, to aid economic growth and development. Beyond ...

), room for expansion (land reclaimed from the sea), and a large local market (9 million). In a recent economic change in Osaka Bay, older 'heavy' industries such as Nippon Steel have declined, and 'new tech' companies such as ICT have expanded. There has been a growth in the quaternary industries — research, development, and information. There has also been a development in the science parks and the building of new motorways; this has meant the loss of the countryside. The Tempozan Ferris Wheel and Osaka Aquarium Kaiyukan are both located in the Tempozan Harbor Village area of Osaka.

Major ports

* Port of Kobe * Port of Osaka

Airports

* Kansai International Airport * Kobe Airport

Major ports

Airports

See also