United States: USCIS Runs Third Lottery to Select More FY 2022 H-1B Cap Cases

The third cap lottery is being conducted because the FY 2022 H-1B quota of 85,000 has not been reached. USCIS did not receive enough H-1B cap petitions to meet the quota during the initial filing period, which ran from April 1 to June 30, 2021 and the second filing period, which ran from August 2, 2021 to November 3, 2021. 

In the initial FY 2022 lottery in March 2021, USCIS drew just 87,500 of 308,613 registrations to meet the 85,000 quota, or 28% of the total number of registrations.  During the second drawing, USCIS drew an additional 27,717 registrations for a total at that time of 115,217 selected registrations – 37% of the total number. Combined, the two FY 2022 drawings were still lower than the prior year, when 124,415 registrations – or 45% – were selected from 274,237 FY 2021 H-1B cap registrations received.  This third selection period, in which an additional 16,753 registrations have been selected—resulting in a total of 131,970 selected registrations, brings USCIS closer to last year’s selection rate, at almost 43% for FY 2022.

Employers are not required to take any action to be included in the third lottery. USCIS has selected from among the thousands of H-1B registrations that were filed during the March 2021 registration period but not chosen in the initial lottery drawing.

An employer whose registration is newly selected should receive a USCIS email indicating that action has been taken on its case. The employer or its immigration counsel must log into the H-1B cap registration system and print out a selection notice for the case. The notice will inform the employer of the filing deadline and the specific USCIS filing location. The notice must be included when the employer files a complete H-1B cap petition for the registration.

Fragomen is closely monitoring the third FY 2022 cap selection and will provide updates as more information becomes available.