Most of the surrenders were after (a) Japan had accepted the Potsdam terms, and a ceasefire had been ordered (on the evening of 14th August) and (b) the Kwantung Army surrendered (18th August). The ceasefire did not stop the fighting - not all units received the order, and many units that received the order kept fighting, including aggressively counter-attacking. The Kwantung Army as a whole officially surrendered on 18th August, but again this didn't stop the fighting. Most of the fighting stopped in the next few days, but in some places, it took a week after the surrender to crush major resistance. One division (the 107th) fought until 30th August, when the surviving 1/3 of the division surrendered.

The large surrenders that occurred were typically after the units had been involved in hard fighting and, on average, had suffered about 50% casualties (mostly killed). The orders to surrender came from the division or regiment commander. Where no such order to surrender came from above, Japanese units typically fought until destroyed (even after the ceasefire order). Basically, when the local commander ordered a surrender, the Japanese soldiers obeyed. When orders to surrender came from elsewhere, they were often ignored.

In total, about 100,000 Japanese soldiers surrendered after combat, which is about the same number as the total killed and wounded suffered by the Japanese. Another 500,000 Japanese soldiers (who hadn't fought the Soviets) were taken into custody at the end of the war by the Soviets - the Soviets considered them POWs, but Japan did not, since they were not captured before the end of the war. The Japanese position was that these 500,000 soldiers were internees rather than POWs, and that taking them to camps in the Soviet Union and exploiting them for labour was illegal (not that the Japanese government could do much about it, other than to complain).