Kuroshio was the third vessel to be commissioned in the 19-vessel Kagerō-class destroyers built for the Imperial Japanese Navy in the late-1930s under the Circle Three Supplementary Naval Expansion Program.

The Kagerō-class destroyers were a class of nineteen 1st Class destroyers built for the Imperial Japanese Navy during the 1930s, and operated by them during the Pacific War, when all but one were lost. It also called Shiranui-class destroyers because the second ship, Shiranui was launched before first ship, Kagerō