Who owns LINE?
LINE is owned by LY Corporation (Japan, TSE: 4689).[1]
This ownership is reported in official statements but has not yet been matched to a regulatory filing.
Evidence: LY Corporation Integrated Report FY2024, 19 November 2025. Last checked .
Key facts
- Current owner
- LY Corporation reported
- Owner HQ
- 🇯🇵 Japan
- Origin
- 🇯🇵 Japan
- Founded
- 2011
- Category
- Internet & digital › Digital services › Email & messaging
- Parent ticker
- TSE: 4689
- Last verified
- · 1 sources
About LINE
LINE is the messaging app that LY Corporation's integrated report dates to 2011, when it lists the launch of the LINE messenger app as a milestone. The company says the service is provided in about 230 countries and regions, and around it sit LINE Official Account advertising, LINE STICKERS, LINE GAME and LINE MUSIC. LINE Corporation merged with Z Holdings in 2021, and LY Corporation was launched in 2023.
Ownership timeline of LINE
- Current owner LY Corporation [1] reported
Where LINE sits in LY Corporation
Controlling ownership as of . Brands grouped under the entity that owns them; large groups are collapsed.
- Ikyu.com
- LINE
- Yahoo! JAPAN
- ZOZOTOWN (51.4%)
Open the full LY Corporation ownership tree →
See the full LY Corporation brand portfolio (4) →
Other brands owned by LY Corporation
LY Corporation controls 4 brands on Brandtree, 4 of them in internet & digital.
Also in internet & digital
- Ikyu.com
- Yahoo! JAPAN (1996)
- ZOZOTOWN
Other brands in email & messaging, and who owns them
The 18 brands in email & messaging on Brandtree belong to 14 owners. The largest is Snap, with 2.
About the owner: LY Corporation
LY Corporation is a publicly listed company headquartered in Japan, founded in 2023. Brandtree records 4 brands under its control, and it is listed as TSE: 4689.
LY Corporation is the Tokyo-listed company, code 4689 on the TSE Prime market, formed in October 2023 by an intra-group reorganisation that brought together Yahoo Japan Corporation and LINE Corporation. It is itself controlled: its integrated report names A Holdings Corporation as its parent, held 50.0% each by SoftBank Corp. and NAVER Corporation, with A Holdings owning 62.4% of LY and general shareholders 37.6%. It runs the Yahoo! JAPAN portal and the LINE messaging app and holds stakes in PayPay, ZOZO and ASKUL.
LY Corporation: full profile, brands and acquisition history →
🇯🇵 LINE and other Japanese brands
Brandtree records a controlling owner for 437 brands that began in Japan. 21 of them (5%) are now controlled by a company headquartered in another country; LINE is not one of them.
- ABEMA — CyberAgent 🇯🇵
- Acquire — Kadokawa 🇯🇵
- Animal Crossing — Nintendo 🇯🇵
- Dragon Quest — Square Enix 🇯🇵
- Elden Ring — Bandai Namco 🇯🇵
- Jikkyou Pawafuru Puroyakyu — Konami 🇯🇵
Frequently asked questions
Who is the parent company of LINE?
The parent company of LINE is LY Corporation, a publicly listed company headquartered in Japan.
Is LINE owned by NAVER?
No. LINE is owned by LY Corporation, not NAVER.
Is LINE Japanese?
Yes. LINE originated in Japan in 2011 and its owner, LY Corporation, is also headquartered in Japan.
Is LINE still owned by LY Corporation?
Yes. As of 4 October 2026, LINE is still owned by LY Corporation. The ownership record was last checked against primary sources on that date.
Sources (1) & corrections
Last verified . Every ownership fact above is backed by one of these primary documents. Numbers in brackets in the text refer to this list.
- [1] LY Corporation Integrated Report FY2024 — LY Corporation, Annual report, published 19 November 2025; retrieved 4 October 2026.
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