United States: FY 2026 H-1B Cap Registration Period Closes March 24

If your organization will be working with immigration counsel to draft and submit H-1B cap registrations, the company must do the following:

• Maintain an organizational account in the USCIS online system. Sponsoring employers must have an organizational account at USCIS.gov; these accounts have replaced the “registrant” account used in the FY 2021 to FY 2024 cap seasons. There is still time to create an account or upgrade a registrant account from a prior year, if you have not already done so. However, coordinate with your Fragomen attorney before taking any steps in the USCIS account system.
• Finish identifying prospective H-1B beneficiaries as soon as possible. If your organization has not finished identifying your H-1B cap needs, it must do so as soon as possible so that registrations can be submitted by the March 24 deadline.
• Ensure that prospective H-1B beneficiaries are aware of the registration rules related to passports and travel documents. Remind prospective H-1B beneficiaries that they must use the same valid passport or travel document for every FY 2026 registration that is filed on their behalf, or risk invalidation of all FY 2026 registrations filed for them. The passport or travel document that is used for the H-1B registration(s) should also be the same as the one that would be later used to support the foreign national’s H-1B petition filing, H-1B visa application, and H-1B entry to the United States, if the foreign national is selected in the cap lottery (with exceptions for renewed or replacement passports, legal name changes, and similar circumstances).
• Promptly review each registration drafted by immigration counsel. When your Fragomen attorney finishes drafting an H-1B cap registration for your organization, the company’s designated signatory (called an “Administrator”) will be notified to log into the USCIS system to review, approve, and e-sign the registration. This is the time to determine whether any changes need to be made to the company’s registrations. The registration period is brief, so the signatory should review registrations as soon as requested to do so by the Fragomen attorney.
• Prepare for possible technology issues. The H-1B cap registration platform can experience slowdowns and technical glitches, especially at times of high-volume use. Notify your Fragomen team and USCIS if your organization encounters any problems. The risk of potential glitches increases as the registration deadline approaches and log-ins and submissions increase. Prompt completion and submission of cap registrations can help to minimize last-minute problems.

After the registration period closes, USCIS will run two cap lotteries to select the beneficiaries on whose behalf H-1B cap petitions can be filed. The first lottery will contain all registered H-1B beneficiaries. USCIS will use this lottery to select enough beneficiaries to meet the regular H-1B cap of 65,000. The second lottery will contain all registered master’s cap beneficiaries who were not selected in the first lottery. USCIS will use this lottery to select enough beneficiaries to meet the H-1B cap exemption of 20,000 for holders of U.S. advanced degrees. Subsequent lotteries are possible if the number of H-1B petitions received for unique beneficiaries from the initial lotteries is insufficient to meet the FY 2026 quota.

USCIS plans to notify employers and immigration counsel of the lottery results by March 31. For winning beneficiaries, USCIS will notify each employer that filed a registration on their behalf of the foreign national’s selection in the lottery. Each employer will be permitted to file an H-1B petition on behalf of that foreign national. To learn the lottery results, your Fragomen attorney and your company’s authorized signatory will need to access their myUSCIS.gov account and review the status of each beneficiary. Make a record of your selected beneficiaries through screenshots or other means, to guard against any irregularities in the USCIS system.

USCIS will begin to accept H-1B cap petitions on behalf of lottery selectees on April 1, 2025. The petition filing period will end no earlier than June 30, 2025. USCIS will specify the exact end date of the petition filing period in cap selection notices. All FY 2026 H-1B cap petitions for beneficiaries selected in the initial lottery must be submitted during the designated filing period. 

Fragomen is closely monitoring H-1B cap registration and will continue to provide updates.