Employment preference · FY2026
I-140 EB-1 for China
Priority workers: people of extraordinary ability, outstanding professors and researchers, and multinational executives and managers.
4,921
Petitions filed
FY2026 born in China
1,349
Approved
in the same year
27.0%
Denied, of decisions
499 denials
3,073
Pending
still awaiting a decision
How long an I-140 takes
USCIS reported a median processing time of 3.4 months for I-140 in FY2026 Q2 — for the form as a whole. The agency does not publish a separate processing time for EB-1, or for any other preference, so no page on this site claims one.
What it does publish per preference is the volume: how many petitions were filed, approved, denied and left pending, by fiscal year and by country of birth. That is everything below.
EB-1 does not require a labour certification, which is why it is filed directly and why its volumes move with policy rather than with the job market.
Year by year for China
Fiscal years, by the year the petition was received.
| Fiscal year | Filed | Approved | Denied | Denial share | Pending |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FY2026 (part year) | 4,921 | 1,349 | 499 | 27.0% | 3,073 |
| FY2025 | 11,816 | 4,855 | 1,636 | 25.2% | 5,325 |
| FY2024 | 10,652 | 6,843 | 1,587 | 18.8% | 2,222 |
| FY2023 | 9,581 | 7,248 | 1,881 | 20.6% | 452 |
| FY2022 | 5,700 | 4,350 | 1,250 | 22.3% | 100 |
| FY2021 | 4,444 | 3,411 | 1,001 | 22.7% | 32 |
| FY2020 | 4,425 | 2,989 | 1,410 | 32.1% | 26 |
| FY2019 | 5,652 | 3,730 | 1,901 | 33.8% | 21 |
| FY2018 | 6,026 | 4,531 | 1,456 | 24.3% | 39 |
| FY2017 | 6,180 | 4,989 | 1,147 | 18.7% | 44 |
| FY2016 | 5,372 | 4,652 | 672 | 12.6% | 48 |
| FY2015 | 4,903 | 4,342 | 499 | 10.3% | 62 |
| FY2014 | 4,472 | 3,857 | 545 | 12.4% | 70 |
A petition received in one year is often decided in a later one, so approvals and denials in a row do not add up to that row's filings. The most recent year is partial — it runs only to the end of the quarter this release covers.
What EB-1 approvals were granted under
FY2026 approvals born in China. USCIS reports the sub-category only for petitions it approved, so there is no denial figure at this level.