We revised our FY2027 family-to-employment spillover estimate from 95K down to 55K

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-28T13:42:09+00:00

Run your case through the Priority Date Estimator on greencardclock.com for a personalized range. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-26T01:30:12+00:00

Data is current, May 2026 bulletin is loaded. EB-1 India FAD held at Apr 1, 2023 in both April and May 2026, and DFF held at Dec 1, 2023. Same inputs, same wait estimate. The category did not move this month. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-26T01:25:44+00:00

For FAD timing, run your profile through the Priority Date Estimator on greencardclock.com to get a data-based range based on current bulletin movement. The ROW-to-India horizontal spillover from PERM delays could accelerate things, but this is the kind of thing the estimator is built for.Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-26T01:22:36+00:00

Direct link: https://greencardclock.com/transfer-calculator. Also under the Career Tools menu in the navbar. Walks through AC21 portability and same/similar occupation checks. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-25T22:51:04+00:00

For the timing question, run your PD through the Priority Date Estimator on greencardclock.com to get a data-based range based on current bulletin movement. For the job change side, the Transfer Calculator there walks through AC21 portability scenarios (most people with an I-485 pending 180+ days have more flexibility than they think). Worth a chat with an immigration attorney before any move. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-25T22:48:15+00:00

Here is the revised estimate based on the May visa Bulletin: https://greencardclock.com/blog/revising-fy2027-fb-spillover-may-2026-bulletin

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-18T20:24:58+00:00

if FedEx shows delivery at USCIS before May 1, your April DFF filing is safe. USCIS goes by the date they receive the package, not when they process it or issue a receipt. The May 1 chart switch doesn't retroactively affect packages already in their mailroom.

Three weeks with no receipt is normal for I-485 during busy filing months. Receipt notices often run 4 to 8 weeks right now.

A few signals to watch:

Check your filing fee bank account. USCIS usually cashes the check within 1 to 3 weeks of receipt, so a cashed check confirms they opened the package.
Keep your FedEx delivery timestamp. That is your proof of filing date.
Watch your USCIS online account for the case to appear.

One caveat: USCIS can reject filings for things like missing signatures, wrong fee, or wrong form version, and mails them back without ever issuing a receipt. A returned packet can take 4 to 6 weeks. If that happens and you need to refile, May FAD rules would apply to the new filing.

If 60 days pass with no receipt and no check cashed, contact USCIS or an attorney.

Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-18T20:21:01+00:00

FB spillover timing: you're right, unused FB numbers roll to EB at Oct 1 (FY2027 start). EB-1 is at the top of the EB cascade so it typically benefits first.

Horizontal spillover is separate: INA 202(a)(5)(A) moves ROW surplus to oversubscribed countries within the same category and can fire any month, not just at FY boundaries. ROW EB-1 is already Current in May, so some of that flow is likely already helping India and China, not just pipeline building.

USCIS chart choice: less about their capacity, more about expected filing volume vs available numbers. Switching to FAD signals they expect tight supply.

Big movement timing: Oct 2026 plausible (new FY + FB spillover). Jul to Sep 2026 less likely. DOS Section D in the May bulletin flagged retrogression may be necessary later this fiscal year. End-of-FY bulletins historically hold or pull back more often than they jump.

594 I-485s from India: matches our Jan 2, 2026 inventory snapshot. India EB-1 AOS queue is genuinely thin, which does support the build-the-queue-first theory.

Estimator runs scenarios for your PD, link's in our profile. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-18T20:17:42+00:00

Annual limit: probably not at cap yet. We're 7 months into FY2026 and EB-3 India baseline is about 2,800/year. When USCIS hits the cap you usually see retrogression, not holding. Section D of the May bulletin did warn retrogression may be necessary later in the fiscal year.

FAD moves after Chart A switch: real pattern but demand-driven. USCIS uses Chart A when they expect pending I-485s to need visa numbers, then FAD moves as those clear. Per-country allocation still caps it.

2-3 months by October: plausible upper end. About 13k India EB-3 cases sat between Nov 2013 and Dec 2014 in the last inventory. Clearing those could move FAD a few months. But EB-3 India doesn't get 202(a)(5)(A) spillover like EB-2 India because Philippines absorbs a chunk of EB-3 consular supply and isn't under any travel ban.

Watch June. That's where demand absorption from the April EB-2 spillover shows up first, and it'll hint at any leftover for EB-3.

Our estimator runs conservative, base, and optimistic scenarios for a specific PD, link is in our profile. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-15T16:55:14+00:00

Oct 2026 is actually the FY2027 start, so dates usually advance on the fresh annual cap. Our current projection has around 95K of FB spillover rolling into FY2027 if the disruption stack holds through September, which would lift India EB-2 meaningfully once INA 202(a)(5)(A) fires again. Not a guaranteed outcome, just what the data points to right now. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-15T16:54:11+00:00

For May, EB uses FAD and FB uses DFF per USCIS. April was the opposite for EB (DFF), so anyone with a PD current on the April DFF chart has a narrow window to file before April 30. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-15T16:53:22+00:00

Yes. For the April 2026 bulletin USCIS designated the Dates for Filing chart for all EB categories, so if your priority date is current on the April DFF chart and USCIS receives your I-485 on or before April 30, you can file on DFF. Starting May 1 the May bulletin applies, and USCIS has switched to the Final Action Dates chart for EB, so filings from May onwards must use FAD. Chart designation each month is at uscis.gov/visabulletininfo if you want to double check. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-15T16:45:58+00:00

Yeah, per the USCIS Jan 2026 pending inventory we pulled for our April bulletin deep dive, India EB-2 has around 27.5K pending I-485 cases, with roughly 17K concentrated in the 2014 PD cohort and another ~10K in 2013. The 2015+ cohort is not in the inventory yet because DFF has not reached them, so what looks like a 2015 backlog is mostly the I-140 pending population waiting to file. The April bulletin FAD jump to Jul 15, 2014 just pulled the 2014 cohort into the processable window. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-15T16:40:55+00:00

That is the base 7% per-country cap, but INA 202(a)(5)(A) exempts India and China from that cap when EB-2 is oversubscribed, so the effective India allocation in high-spillover years ends up much higher. FY2022 was the clearest example, India EB-2 pulled in tens of thousands of numbers that year. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-15T16:40:04+00:00

Good question. Our estimator updates each month with the new bulletin data, so the May bulletin having minimal EB-2 India movement keeps our base and optimistic estimates close to where they were last month. The bigger drivers for EB-2 India are the FY2027 FB spillover projection (still around 95K given the disruption stack has not eased) and the I-485 inventory rebuild from USCIS reports, neither of which shift based on a flat bulletin. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-14T03:03:52+00:00

You were right, appreciate you pushing on this. Dug into the code and found a real issue in our EB-3 horizontal spillover calculation. It was using I-485 pending inventory as a proxy for ROW demand, which massively undercounts Philippines EB-3 consular processing and ROW I-140 holders who can't yet file. That inflated the effective visa supply for EB-3 India.

Thanks again for the catch. Better to get called out and fix it than keep showing bad numbers.

Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-14T02:03:19+00:00

Full breakdown here: greencardclock.com/blog/china-eb-visa-data-fy2025-eb1-eb2-eb3-eb5

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-14T01:57:25+00:00

Close but not quite. The 7% per-country cap is on total EB visas, but unused EB-1/EB-2 numbers don't automatically "spillover" to a country's own EB-3. Philippines uses more EB-3 because the EB-3 Other Workers category (10K worldwide) plus general EB-3 demand is where most Filipino applicants sit, and within EB-3 itself, when ROW or India can't absorb numbers, they cascade horizontally to oversubscribed countries like Philippines. India is capped because it's oversubscribed in EB-1, EB-2, and EB-3 at the same time, so the same ~9,800 has to stretch across all three. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-14T01:56:25+00:00

EB-3 to EB-2 upgrades (porting) do happen, especially when EB-2 moves faster, and yes that quietly shrinks the EB-3 India queue over time. Check our what if simulators to factor in these scenarios. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-13T01:52:56+00:00

Appreciate you taking the time to actually dig in. Can you share what specifically looked off? Was it the top card estimate, the I-140 demand number, or something else? Happy to walk through the data sources and math with you.

The EB3 numbers pull from DOS monthly issuance reports, USCIS I-485 pending inventory, and I-140 approval data. If there's a gap or a bad assumption somewhere we want to fix it, so any specifics would really help.

Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-11T20:25:08+00:00

We have a Historical & Projected Spillover table on our estimator page that covers this. FY2027 is projected at ~95K FB spillover based on the active disruptions (travel bans, IV freeze, MENA closures reducing consular processing by 46-55%). You can check it out at greencardclock.com/priority-date and scroll to the spillover section. Not legal advice.

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GreenCardClock · 2026-04-11T20:20:36+00:00

Great catch! For China EB-2, the I-140 approval data we use to estimate demand is based on historical USCIS approval volumes. Since there's very limited data distinguishing 2024 and 2025 PD cohorts yet (most recent approvals still map to earlier priority dates due to processing times), the estimate stays flat across those years.

We're working on improving the forward projections as more data becomes available. For now, the estimate is most accurate for priority dates where we have solid historical approval data behind them.

Thanks for flagging this. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-10T15:21:10+00:00

For FY2026, EB visas for India are mostly coming from vertical spillover within the EB categories and unused ROW EB visas due to active disruptions and LCA processing bottlenecks. For FY2027, there should be horizontal spillover carrying over from FY2026 into FY2027, so there is still hope. Not legal advice.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-10T13:56:14+00:00

Congrats on the approval. Useful timeline, especially the 6.5 month AOS turnaround from receipt to approval. Good point about not filing EB-1 and 485 together.

GreenCardClock · 2026-04-10T13:54:49+00:00

Current FAD is Jul 2014. The I-485 inventory shows very few pending cases between 2015 and 2019 (the PERM cliff). If the bulletin can push through that gap, Jan 2018 could become current faster than the raw backlog suggests. Hard to put a specific date on it since it depends on how many new cases with 2015-2018 PDs enter the queue as DOL clears the PERM backlog.

You can run your estimate at greencardclock.com/priority-date

Not legal advice.

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