Time to get lucky: USCIS announces second round of H-1B lottery

The US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has announced that it will conduct a second round of H-1B lottery selections for the fiscal year 2025 under its regular annual 65,000 visa limit. The USCIS determined that it would need to select additional registrations for unique beneficiaries to reach the FY 2025 regular cap numerical allocation.

However, the USCIS confirmed that there would be no second selection for the advanced degree exemption, also known as the master’s cap. The first round had already met the required numbers for this category.

The H-1B visa cap for FY2025 is set at 65,000 for the regular cap and an additional 20,000 under the master’s cap.

"Soon, we will select additional registrations for unique beneficiaries from previously submitted electronic registrations using a random selection process," stated the USCIS.

"We will notify prospective petitioners with selected registrations from this second round of selection that they are eligible to file an H-1B cap-subject petition for the beneficiary named in the applicable selected registration. We will announce when we have completed this second process of selections and notifications, the agency added.

The H-1B visa, favoured by Indian professionals, is the main pathway for Indian IT companies to send their software engineers to the United States, with Indians consistently being the largest group of H-1B recipients.

In March, USCIS held a random lottery for the fiscal year 2025 H-1B visas, including those eligible for the advanced degree exemption. Only petitioners with selected registrations can file H-1B cap-subject petitions during the specified filing period noted in their registration selection notice.

The initial filing period for these selected registrations was from April 1 to June 30, 2024.

This second selection process is essential to meet the FY2025 regular cap numerical allocation.

However, USCIS confirmed that there would not be a second selection for the advanced degree exemption, also known as the master’s cap, because the first round already met the required numbers for this category.

"We will not be conducting a second selection for the advanced degree exemption (the master’s cap), as enough master’s cap registrations were already selected and sufficient petitions were received based on those registrations as projected to meet the FY 2025 masters cap numerical allocation," said the immigration authority in the US.

"Registrations that indicated eligibility for the master’s cap will be included in the second round for the regular cap," added USCIS.

The H-1B visa is highly sought after by US companies, particularly in the technology sector, for hiring skilled foreign workers.

Those with selected registrations will be notified on the myUSCIS online account.