Employment Law Report
H-1B Registration Opens on March 7th
By: Glen M. Krebs & Glen W. Krebs
The H-1B cap registration period for FY2026 will be held from March 7, 2025—until March 24, 2025. During this period, U.S. employers may register current or prospective employees they wish to sponsor for H-1B visa status. The H-1B visa is particularly useful for recent college graduates, just starting their career. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) will conduct an electronic lottery to select up to 85,000 registrations, and employers will then be able to submit an H-1B petition on behalf of each selected registrant.
The H-1B is a U.S. specialty occupation visa for positions that require at least a bachelor’s degree or its equivalent in a particular field. Congress has limited the number of available H-1B visas to 20,000 visas for individuals with U.S. master’s degrees or higher and another 65,000 visas for individuals holding at least a bachelor’s degree or its equivalent. (Universities and certain nonprofit or government research organizations are exempt from the cap and may file an H-1B petition at any time.) If a foreign worker is selected in the lottery, the employer must complete the application process by the end of June 2025 and the earliest an employee may begin employment in H-1B status is October 1, 2025—the start of the federal fiscal year.
The H-1B visa is valid for up to six years and provides a good path to permanent residence. It is also open to foreign nationals regardless of nationality. Before the registration period opens, cap-subject employers should consider which current or prospective employees might benefit from H-1B status. Among others, this may include:
- Students working on time-limited F-1 visa programs like CPT, OPT, and STEM OPT;
- Individuals in other temporary visa categories like TN, O-1, E-2, or E-3, which can be subject to travel restrictions during the green card process;
- Individuals in L-1B status, which has a five-year maximum with no possibility of further extensions;
- L-1A visa holders born in countries with major green card backlogs, such as India and China; and
- Individuals with Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), Temporary Protected Status (TPS), pending asylum applications, humanitarian parole, or other circumstances.
The registration process this year is a bit more expensive ($215) than in past years, but the process is similar. For FY2025, the selection rate in the H‑1B cap lottery was approximately 28%. If you have questions, or would like to register an employee for the H-1B Lottery, please contact: Glen M. Krebs , Glen W. Krebs , or Angie Thompson.
