USCIS Reached the Fiscal Year 2027 H-1B Cap

United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has reached the Fiscal Year (FY) 2027 H-1B cap. On July 17, 2026, USCIS announced that it received enough petitions to reach the mandated 65,000 H-1B visa regular cap and the 20,000 visas for advanced degree holders.

WHAT EMPLOYERS CAN EXPECT

With this development, USCIS will not conduct a second round of the H-1B cap lottery.  Employers may expect that over the next few days, USCIS will update non-selected registrants’ online accounts to change the status of pending FY 2027 registrations from “Submitted” to “Not Selected.”

PETITIONS NOT SUBJECT TO THE H-1B CAP

USCIS will continue to accept and process H-1B petitions that are not subject to the cap. These include filings for extensions of status, amended petitions, changes of employer, concurrent employment for existing H-1B workers, and petitions filed by organizations that are cap-exempt.

If you have any questions about this alert, please contact your Gibney representative or email info@gibney.com.

Houman Afshar