Employment preference · FY2026

I-140 EB-2 for India

Professionals holding an advanced degree, people of exceptional ability, and national interest waiver petitions.

18,071

Petitions filed

FY2026 born in India

14,644

Approved

in the same year

2.0%

Denied, of decisions

294 denials

3,133

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-2, 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-2 is the most oversubscribed employment category for India and China. For those countries the visa queue after approval, not this petition, is what determines the wait.

Year by year for India

Fiscal years, by the year the petition was received.

Fiscal year	Filed	Approved	Denied	Denial share	Pending
FY2026 (part year)	18,071	14,644	294	2.0%	3,133
FY2025	43,974	36,069	3,701	9.3%	4,204
FY2024	43,339	39,263	2,763	6.6%	1,313
FY2023	40,040	39,106	829	2.1%	105
FY2022	46,590	45,002	1,559	3.3%	29
FY2021	39,019	37,394	1,597	4.1%	28
FY2020	36,471	34,854	1,576	4.3%	41
FY2019	45,192	43,208	1,933	4.3%	51
FY2018	41,193	38,942	2,190	5.3%	61
FY2017	43,659	40,831	2,754	6.3%	74
FY2016	50,800	47,401	3,308	6.5%	91
FY2015	34,112	31,517	2,541	7.5%	54
FY2014	26,969	24,977	1,919	7.1%	73

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-2 approvals were granted under

FY2026 approvals born in India. USCIS reports the sub-category only for petitions it approved, so there is no denial figure at this level.

Professionals with Advanced Degrees 14,268

National Interest Waiver 376