United States | Data shows continued increase in nonimmigrant visas issued

Nonimmigrant visa issuance continued to climb in fiscal year 2023, surpassing pre-pandemic totals, according to recently published State Department statistics.

According to the Report of the Visa Office 2023, the State Department issued a total of 10,438,327 nonimmigrant visas, up more than 34% from last year’s total of 6,815,120. Visa issuance plummeted during the COVID-19 pandemic but has rebounded in each of the last two fiscal years.

Additional Information: The Visa Office changed its methodology for calculating visa data beginning with fiscal year 2019 to reflect the greater access to application-level data. Its previous methodology was based on a count of workload actions, which were not linked by application. The new methodology more accurately reflects final outcomes from the visa application process during a specified reporting period but does not mean the prior methodology was flawed or erroneous.

BAL Analysis: Recently, BAL Senior Counsel Tiffany Derentz held a BAL Community event with Julie Stufft, the State Department’s deputy assistant secretary for visa services, where they provided insights on administrative processing, the domestic visa renewal pilot program and additional information about what’s ahead for the Visa Office this year. BAL Community members can watch the event on demand.

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

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