USCIS to Conduct Second H-1B Cap Lottery for FY2025

Today, July 30, 3024, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) announced that it will conduct a second random selection process (‘'lottery') for H-1B cap-subject registrations submitted in March of this year for the FY2025 annual H-1B cap. As has been the case in years past, the USCIS did not select a sufficient number of registrations in the initial lottery to satisfy the numerical limitation, and is conducting the second lottery to ensure that all available cap-subject H-1Bs are allocated.  This year’s second lottery will not include registrations filed under the advanced degree exemption (‘master’s cap’), as it has been determined that a sufficient number of master’s cap registrations were selected in the initial lottery to satisfy the exemption limit. Please note, however, that H-1B registrations eligible for the master’s cap that were not previously selected, will be included under the ‘regular cap’ for the second lottery drawing.

We expect to receive notifications of H-1B registrations selected in the second lottery over the next few days, and will be reaching out to affected clients as soon as we do.  The USCIS will announce when the second lottery process has been completed.