Live Tools and Visa Timeline
Visa Timeline Explorer
Pick your visa or path and see where the current timelines actually stand. For a green-card category, read the live Visa Bulletin (paste it or drop the PDF) to find your cutoff dates; for a work visa, see the status, extension, and lottery timeline that applies to it. You can also estimate a consular stamping wait or an immigrant-visa interview wait below. Everything runs in your browser and nothing is saved. For your full personalized queue position, try Check My Status.
Every category in the Visa Bulletin has two charts, and knowing which one you're reading (and which one applies to you this month) is the thing people get wrong most often.
When a green card can actually be approved and issued. If your priority date is on or before this date, your case can be finalized: your I-485 can be approved, or your immigrant visa issued.
When you're allowed to submit your I-485 (adjustment of status), which is often earlier. Filing can unlock a work permit (EAD) and travel document (Advance Parole). It is not approval.
Which chart applies to you this month? If you're adjusting status inside the U.S., USCIS decides each month whether applicants may use Dates for Filing or must use Final Action Dates. Check the current month's USCIS Adjustment of Status Filing Charts alongside the State Department Visa Bulletin. This is a general explainer, not legal advice.
H-1B Process Checklist
A plain-English walk through the whole H-1B journey, from your employer's registration and petition to getting the visa and entering the U.S. The single most important choice is the fork: if the petition is a change of status you gain H-1B status without a visa stamp, while consular processing means you get the stamp abroad. Pick your path and the checklist shows only the steps that apply to you. Tick steps as you go: your progress is saved locally in this browser, so you can close the tab and pick up where you left off over a process that can take months. It stays on this device and is never sent anywhere, and you can wipe it anytime with the Clear my saved progress button at the bottom. (Your Check My Status answers, which are more personal, stay ephemeral and are never saved.) This is educational, not legal advice.
Phase 1: Employer and petition side
These steps are driven by your employer and their immigration counsel. You usually do not act on them yourself.
- Registration and lottery. For cap-subject roles your employer registers you in the annual H-1B registration (typically opens in March); if registrations exceed the cap, USCIS runs a random lottery. Cap-exempt employers skip the lottery. See USCIS H-1B electronic registration and the H-1B overview. Window, fee, and odds change yearly; confirm on the official page.
- Labor Condition Application (LCA). Before the petition, the employer files Form ETA-9035 / ETA-9035E with the U.S. Department of Labor through the FLAG system, attesting to the wage and worksite. The LCA is not your H-1B petition; it is a separate DOL step that comes first. See the DOL H-1B program page.
- Employer files Form I-129. If selected or cap-exempt, your employer files Form I-129 (with the certified LCA), asking for either change of status or consular notification, which sets your path.
- Optional premium processing. Your employer may pay for Form I-907 for a faster decision. Fee and timeframe change; confirm on the official page.
- Receive the I-797 approval notice. USCIS issues Form I-797 on approval; keep a copy. Track the receipt with USCIS case status.
Phase 2: Choose your path
Change of Status (already in the U.S.): you gain H-1B status on the approval's effective date (typically October 1 for cap-subject cases). No DS-160, visa fee, appointment, or interview is needed to start working; you only need a stamp later if you travel and re-enter. Consular Processing / Visa Stamping (outside the U.S., or you choose the stamp): you complete the full sequence in Phase 3 to get a visa stamped in your passport.
Phase 3: Consular stamping (only if you need a visa stamp)
- Complete Form DS-160 online for visa class H-1B and save the confirmation barcode page: ceac.state.gov/genniv. A separate DS-160 is generally needed per applicant, including H-4 dependents.
- Pay the visa application (MRV) fee through your country's official U.S. visa appointment website. The amount is country- and currency-specific and changes; confirm it on the official page. The portal differs by country (many use ustraveldocs.com/<your country>, some use ais.usvisa-info.com); start from your U.S. embassy's website.
- Create an account and schedule the visa appointment on that same country-specific system, entering your DS-160 confirmation and fee receipt. Check the global visa wait times to see how far out slots are.
- Schedule biometrics / OFC appointment if your post requires a separate one; the system usually books both together.
- Check the appointment wait time on the global visa wait times page (Petition-Based (H, L, O, P, Q) column for H-1B).
- Prepare your documents: valid passport, DS-160 confirmation, fee receipt, appointment confirmation, photo, the I-797 approval notice, and your petition/employment documents. Exact list varies by consulate.
- Attend the interview, or check interview-waiver ("dropbox") eligibility: interview-waiver information. Policy changes often; confirm current criteria.
- Passport returned with the visa if approved; a 221g administrative-processing hold can add unpredictable time. Track it at CEAC visa status.
- Enter the U.S. and check your I-94: retrieve your electronic I-94 and confirm it shows class H-1B and the correct admit-until date.
Phase 4: After you are in H-1B status
- Keep status valid and plan extensions. H-1B runs in up to 3-year increments, 6 years maximum on base status; AC21 allows extensions past 6 years once a green card is far enough along.
- Track any pending USCIS cases: case status and processing times.
Educational checklist, not legal advice. Fees, timeframes, and rules change; confirm every detail on the official government page. Verify with official sources and a licensed immigration attorney.
Job or Location Change Checker
Thinking about a promotion, a role or team change, a move to a new office, or switching employers while your green card is in progress? Pick what is changing and where you are in the process to see whether it is likely to affect your PERM, your petition, or your priority date, and the questions to raise with your immigration attorney. This is a prompt to check, not a legal verdict, and it never tells you whether a specific move is safe. Everything runs in your browser and nothing is saved.
A job, role, location, or employer change during the green card process can trigger a new PERM, an I-129 amendment, or affect your priority date, depending on exactly what changes and how far along your case is. The impact ranges from little effect (for example a same-MSA office move) to potentially needing a new PERM process, for example when the work location moves outside the area covered by the existing labor certification, with the actual effect depending on the specific change and your case stage. For the full stage-by-stage breakdown, use Check My Status, and always confirm your specific situation with a licensed immigration attorney.
Queue Position & Timeline Scenarios
Enter your category, country, and priority date to see where your priority date sits relative to the current cutoff, then drag the marker to explore how the timeline could look under different priority dates, and compare two scenarios (say EB-2 vs EB-3, or a cross-charge to another country) side by side. The years shown are a historical-pace scenario, not a prediction: for a backlogged category it measures how fast that cutoff has actually moved across roughly the last seven years of Visa Bulletins, using the median and quartiles of month-over-month movement (so one unusual month, a retrogression, or an October fiscal-year jump doesn’t skew it), then divides the gap between your priority date and today’s cutoff by that pace. It cannot know future demand, policy or statutory changes, spillover, or a fresh retrogression. Every result has a “How is this calculated?” panel with the full method, the exact data window, and the limitations, plus a “Why this range?” breakdown of the specific numbers behind your result. Everything runs in your browser and nothing is saved. For a fuller personalized read (status runway, PERM stage, cross-chargeability), use Check My Status.
History & Trends
Pick a green-card category and country to see how its cutoff dates have actually moved across years of past Visa Bulletins (October 2019 to August 2026). This is the “running to stand still” view: for badly backlogged categories the calendar keeps advancing while the cutoff barely moves. Everything here is historical and descriptive. It is not a forecast. The big jumps every October are largely the fiscal-year quota reset, not a trend. Cutoff movement is not the same as your personal wait time; always verify against the official Visa Bulletin. Not legal advice.
PERM Processing Time
How long the Department of Labor has taken to decide PERM labor-certification cases each fiscal quarter (FY2023 Q1 to FY2026 Q2). PERM is the first stage of an employment green card. It comes before the I-140 petition and the priority-date wait in the Visa Bulletin, so this is not the green-card wait itself. The median has roughly doubled over this window. Everything here is historical and descriptive, not a forecast, and not legal advice.
Live Tools & Official Sources
Government pages block automated fetching, so you will need to open them yourself and bring the numbers back here. Start with the official links, then use the parsers below to translate the numbers into plain English. Everything runs entirely in your browser; nothing is uploaded or saved.