Sora Aoi

As a student, she worked at various part-time jobs in the food-service industry, such as pizza parlors, pubs and sushi bars with the intent of becoming a pre-school teacher. While in her third year in high school, Aoi was scouted in Shibuya by a talent agency for gravure modelling. She decided to enter the adult entertainment industry with the aim of eventually working on TV and in other parts of the entertainment industry, stating that "If there was only the AV industry, I couldn’t do it."

When asked how her stage name was chosen, Aoi explained: "My agency asked what color I liked. I said blue. He also asked what I like in general. I said sky. So, he chose Aoi Sora."

Aoi appeared as a gravure idol in the June 2002 issue of Bejean and then made her debut in adult videos at age eighteen in July 2002, with Happy Go Lucky! for the Alice Japan studio, part of the Kuki Inc. group which was one of Japan's largest producers of pornography at the time. The next month, she appeared in the AV The Blue Sky on the Samansa label for the Max-A studio, also part of the Kuki group. For her video appearances in 2002, Aoi was awarded the Second Place Award as Best New Actress in the 2002 X City Grand Prix Awards. Aoi continued making videos for both Alice Japan and Max-A for almost two-and-a-half years until late 2004.

While continuing to perform in hardcore AVs, Aoi also appeared in the first video release of the Shuffle company's new label Believe. Entitled The Naked Body, this June 2003 release was an "image video", which has nude modeling but features no sex.

During this period, Aoi also started making appearances in mainstream media. In May 2003, she had a role in the theatrical release Gun Crazy 4: Requiem for a Bodyguard and from July to December 2003, Aoi had a role in the TV Asahi J-dorama Tokumei Kakarichō Tadano Hitoshi. For her starring role in the pink film, Tsumugi, released to theaters in July 2004, Aoi was given a Best Actress Award at the 2004 Pink Grand Prix ceremony. The film was ranked the fourth-best pink film release of the year.

Aoi also starred in the October 2004 release of the manga-based theatrical thriller Stop the Bitch Campaign: Hell Version. According to one reviewer of the June 2007 DVD release of the film: "The acting proves that Sora Aoi is no Dame Judi Dench but she is winsome enough to make you believe and care for her."

In November 2004, Aoi left Alice Japan and Max-A to move to the newly formed studio, S1 No. 1 Style, part of the large Hokuto Corporation. Her first video for S1, Sell Debut, was directed by Hideto Aki and released on November 11, 2004. Aoi continued making about one video a month for S1 until mid-2006. By this time, Aoi had become one of the most popular AV idols in Japan. Her name was the second most popular internet search on a female celebrity in Japan for 2005.