United States | USCIS reaches H-1B visa cap for FY 2026

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced it has received enough registrations to meet the fiscal year (FY) 2026 H-1B cap, including the advanced degree exemption.

Key Points:

• All prospective petitioners with selected beneficiaries have been notified that they are eligible to file H-1B cap-subject petitions for their beneficiaries starting April 1, 2025.
• Only petitioners with registrations for selected beneficiaries may file H-1B cap-subject petitions for FY 2026.
• Petitioners must include a copy of the selection notice and evidence of the beneficiary’s valid passport.
• The filing period for H-1B cap-subject petitions will be at least 90 days.

Additional Information: USCIS randomly selected enough beneficiaries to reach the H-1B cap. An H-1B cap-subject petition must be properly filed at the correct filing location or online at my.uscis.gov and within the filing period indicated on the relevant selection notice. Petitioners filing for selected beneficiaries based on their valid registration must still submit evidence or otherwise establish eligibility for petition approval, as registration and selection only pertains to eligibility to file the H-1B cap-subject petition.

More details on the H-1B electronic registration process can be found here.

This alert has been provided by the BAL U.S. Practice Group.

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