H-1B FY2027 e-Registration Begins March, 2026 — Important Reminders

GG&W is reminding its clients that the H-1B FY2027 e-Registration period will be opening in less than 2 months (at the beginning of March 2026) like years past. As most are likely aware, the USCIS announced changes to the H-1B lottery process several years ago, including how the lottery is conducted. Pursuant to this new process, USCIS will first continue to conduct the lottery electronically, followed by the submission of an H-1B petition for only lottery winners. To be eligible for the lottery, the new process requires H-1B petitioners to register potential H-1B cases prior to the submission of an H-1B filing. Immediately after this registration period closes, the USCIS will conduct the lottery. Once the lottery winners are announced and notified via email, the petitioner shall have ninety (90) days to submit the completed H-1B petition to the USCIS.

As the H-1B visa has been the subject of many news articles and potential misinformation over the past several months, please find several informative notes below regarding this year’s H-1B lottery to provide you with more information and clarity on how these H-1B changes may impact this year’s lottery registrants.

• The $100,000 H-1B fee should not impact individuals physically present in the United States who currently hold another nonimmigrant visa status, such as F-1, TN, L-1, O-1, H-4, etc. The only nonimmigrant visa category that may be impacted by the $100,000 H-1B fee rule are those nonimmigrant visa holders in B-visa status (visitors for business or pleasure). For those beneficiaries who are outside the United States, the $100,000 fee rule will likely be required if selected in the lottery unless the rule is amended or terminated by the administration, court order, etc.

• Since most H-1B’s filed by our clients are done for those individuals currently in the U.S. (especially F-1 students, H-4 EAD visa holders, etc.), the $100,000 H-1B fee should have minimal impact on your ability to register an H-1B beneficiary like in years past. In fact, since there likely will be significantly less H-1B registrants due to the Presidents H-1B proclamation, there is a good chance this $100,000 rule will actually increase your foreign national employee’s or registrant’s chances of winning the lottery this upcoming year.

• Similarly, like change of employer petitions for those currently in the U.S., besides not being subject to the $100,000 fee, these beneficiaries who win the H-1B lottery and are subsequently approved for H-1B visa status should not be restricted in obtaining an H-1B visa at a U.S. embassy/consulate outside of the United States and thus should be able to travel internationally without issue.

• The USCIS has announced that it plans to use a weighted, wage‑level–based selection process for H‑1B cap registrations in order to prioritize higher‑skilled and higher‑paid foreign workers, giving those workers with higher-offered wages a better chance of selection.

• Under this rule, the exact wage offered will not be controlling on how many entries a registrant will obtain based on their offered salary. Instead, the USCIS will focus on the job occupation and wage levels, determining if the wage offered in that specific occupation is higher than other positions in the same SOC occupational category.

• For example, those sponsored foreign nationals whose offered wage meets or exceeds the Level 4 prevailing wage for their occupation and place of intended employment according to the DOL’s online wage library will be entered into the selection pool four times, those whose wage meets or exceeds Level 3 will be entered into the selection pool three times, those whose wage meets or exceeds Level 2 will be entered into the selection pool two times, and those whose wage meets or exceeds Level 1 will be entered into the selection pool only one time. 

• Therefore, GG&W will require information on the sponsored foreign national and the job being offered as soon as possible so an in-depth review of the file can be completed in order to provide the foreign national with the best selection odds that correspond to the offered role.

• Each unique beneficiary will only be counted once toward the numerical allocation projections, no matter how many times the beneficiary is entered in the selection pool (we will also need to monitor how the USCIS deals with multiple registrations by the same and/or different employers for the same intended beneficiary).

As always, we are also happy to discuss issues/concerns/questions with any candidate whom your company is thinking of sponsoring for an H-1B visa (or any other type of visa) in 2026 or beyond.

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MAY BE CONSIDERED ATTORNEY ADVERTISING. PRIOR RESULTS DO NOT GUARANTEE SIMILAR FUTURE RESULTS.