On July 18, 2025, USCIS announced that it had reached the annual quota of H‑1B visas for FY 2026.
The congressionally‑mandated allotment consists of 65,000 standard slots plus 20,000 reserved for holders of US master’s or higher degrees. Because these limits have been reached, no additional cap‑subject H‑1B petitions will be accepted for positions starting October 1, 2025.
USCIS emphasized that it will still receive and adjudicate H‑1B petitions that do not fall under the cap. These include requests to extend an existing H‑1B worker’s stay, change the terms of current employment, transfer an H‑1B worker to a new employer or file for concurrent H‑1B employment. These are all cases where the individual has already been counted against the cap in a prior year.
The 2026 quota was met following the FY 2026 registration window from March 7 to March 24, 2025. Roughly 336,000 foreign nationals were registered, and the agency randomly selected approximately 118,660 registrants to meet the statutory cap of 85,000 visas, yielding a selection rate of a little over one‑third.
USCIS has confirmed that it will not run a supplemental draw.
This was the second year in which the lottery operated on a beneficiary‑centric basis, meaning each registrant could only be entered once regardless of how many employers filed on their behalf. The shift has greatly curtailed duplicate submissions. Compared with the prior year, total eligible registrations fell by more than a quarter, the pool of unique beneficiaries dropped from 423,028 to 336,153, and the average number of registrations per person declined from 1.06 to 1.01. As a result, odds of selection improved and opportunities for ‘gaming the system’ have diminished.
Companies whose candidates were not chosen will need to wait for the FY 2027 process or pursue alternative visa categories. Cap‑exempt H‑1B categories, such as positions at universities and non‑profit research institutions, remain available, and other visa classifications may also be viable.
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Author
Founder & Principal Attorney Nita Nicole Upadhye is a recognized leader in the field of US business immigration law, (The Legal 500, Chambers & Partners, Who's Who Legal and AILA) and an experienced and trusted advisor to large multinational corporates through to SMEs. She provides strategic immigration advice and specialist application support to corporations and professionals, entrepreneurs, investors, artists, actors and athletes from across the globe to meet their US-bound talent mobility needs.
Nita is an active public speaker, thought leader, immigration commentator, and immigration policy contributor and regularly hosts training sessions for employers and HR professionals.