How long is the wait?
Processing time of H-1B visa by occupation
About the project
The H-1B visa is a non-immigrant visa in the U.S. that allows foreign workers to work temporarily in specialty occupations. It is also the visa foreign students get after they get their first job out of American colleges.
This interactive tool displays the H-1B visa proceessing time for all occupational categories listed by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services in the past five years. The average proceessing time calculation is based on applications received between Oct 1, 2007 and Sep. 30, 2013. The processing time for 2013 is mostly inaccurate as most cases were still under review by Sep. 30.
The current law limits to 65,000 foreign nationals who may be issued a H-1B visa each fiscal year. Laws also exempt up to 20,000 foreign nationals holding a master's or higher degree from U.S. universities from the cap on H-1b visas.A lottery system was used in 2008 (FY2009 quota) and 2013 (FY2013 quota).