USCIS Releases Breakdown of FY 2019 H-1B Cap Filings

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At a glance

USCIS received 95,885 advanced-degree H-1B cap submissions and 94,213 standard H-1B cap submissions during the FY 2019 filing period.

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A closer look

USCIS has released the numbers of advanced and standard H-1B cap petitions it received during the FY 2019 H-1B cap filing season. Of the 190,098 H-1B cap petitions filed:

• 95,885 were submitted towards the cap exemption of 20,000 for holders of U.S. advanced degrees, and
• 94,213 were submitted towards the standard quota of 65,000.

As announced yesterday, the agency ran two lotteries on April 11 to select which cases will be processed to completion. The first lottery selected enough cases to meet the 20,000 advanced degree exemption, and the second lottery chose from the remaining 170,098 cases, including those not selected in the advanced-degree lottery, to fill the standard quota of 65,000.

Based on the statistics provided, advanced-degree filings had a 21% chance of selection in the advanced-degree lottery. All remaining cases had a 38% chance of selection in the standard lottery. Overall, the odds for advanced-degree cases were somewhat higher because these filings had a second chance for selection if they were not chosen in the initial lottery.

What’s next

Receipting of cases selected in the lottery is expected to begin in the coming days. Employers will not know how many of their cases were selected in the lottery until USCIS completes receipting, which could take weeks. Cases that were not chosen in the lotteries will be rejected and returned with their filing fees.

Once receipting is completed, contact your Fragomen team for assistance in identifying alternatives for foreign nationals whose H-1B petitions were not selected in the cap lotteries.

This alert is for informational purposes only. If you have any questions, please contact the immigration professional with whom you work at Fragomen.