Born in the central Tochigi Prefecture's Nogi Sakai, Wakana started her career as a gravure idol in 1995 and began transitioning to film acting in 2000. The move was complete by 2002. She did have to leave her birth name Sakai Miyuki behind as around the same time another actress had started in the industry with the same name. Sakai paused her career in 2005 to deal with an autoimmune illness, but with her fortunately overcoming the disease was back playing a geisha in Maiko Haaaan!!!! and next the attractive stockinged cousin in My Rainy Days. Sakai clearly likes to write as evidenced by her blog and cites basketball and dancing as favourite pastimes. She has done commercials for Softbank, Asahi Brewery and others. She graduated from Koyama Minami High School and is signed to the A-Team Agency.