Future of H-1B Visas: $100K Fee, Wage Lottery, and Renewals

The future of H-1B visas is taking shape through three changes that hit at once: a $100,000 payment now required for petitions filed for workers who are outside the United States, a wage-weighted lottery replacing purely random selection starting with the FY 2027 cycle, and stricter rules on which jobs count as specialty occupations. The statutory caps have not moved (65,000 regular visas per year plus 20,000 reserved for holders of U.S. advanced degrees), but almost everything around them has.¹ If you are on an H-1B, planning to apply, or sponsoring workers, here is what the program looks like now and where it is headed.

The $100,000 Payment for Workers Abroad

A White House proclamation issued September 19, 2025, restricts the entry of H-1B specialty occupation workers who are currently outside the United States unless the petition is accompanied by a $100,000 payment.² This is not a USCIS filing fee. It is a separate payment imposed through executive authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act, and it sits on top of every other fee already required.

The restriction targets new entries. Workers already inside the United States are not directly affected. Anyone abroad who needs to enter or re-enter on an H-1B does face it. The proclamation directs the Department of Homeland Security to restrict decisions on petitions that lack the $100,000 payment for 12 months following the effective date, and instructs the State Department to prevent misuse of B (visitor) visas by H-1B beneficiaries whose employment start dates fall before October 1, 2026.²

There is a waiver path. The Secretary of Homeland Security can waive the requirement for individual workers, entire companies, or whole industries if hiring those H-1B workers is deemed in the national interest and does not threaten U.S. security or welfare. The proclamation also directs the Secretary of Labor to begin rulemaking to revise prevailing wage levels.

For any employer planning to bring in a worker from overseas, this changes the math overnight. Total costs of sponsoring a single worker from abroad can now exceed $100,000 before legal fees and other government charges.

A Wage-Weighted Lottery Starting FY 2027

Beginning with the FY 2027 cycle, H-1B lottery selection is no longer purely random. A final rule effective February 27, 2026, weights the selection pool by wage level whenever registrations exceed available slots.³ Rather than every registration getting one entry, USCIS enters each registration a number of times based on the Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) wage level the offered salary meets or exceeds:

Wage Level IV registrations are entered four times.
Wage Level III registrations are entered three times.
Wage Level II registrations are entered twice.
Wage Level I registrations are entered once.

Each unique beneficiary still counts only once toward the cap, regardless of how many times their registration appears in the pool. The practical effect: a worker offered a Level IV salary has roughly four times the selection odds of a Level I worker in the same occupation and geographic area.³

This reshapes strategy on both sides. Employers offering entry-level salaries for H-1B roles now face materially worse lottery odds. Employers willing to pay above the median gain a measurable advantage. If you are negotiating an offer that will need H-1B sponsorship, your salary now affects whether you get selected in the first place, not just your take-home pay.

The FY 2027 registration window opened at noon Eastern on March 4, 2026, and closed at noon Eastern on March 19, 2026, with a $215 registration fee per beneficiary.⁴ Selected registrants get at least a 90-day filing window for their cap-subject petitions.

Tighter Rules on What Counts as a Specialty Occupation

A modernization rule effective January 17, 2025, rewrote how USCIS evaluates whether a job qualifies as a specialty occupation. The statutory requirement (a bachelor’s degree in a specific specialty involving highly specialized knowledge) has not changed.¹ What changed is the strictness of “directly related.”

Under the new regulation, the required degree field must have a logical connection to the duties of the specific position. Employers can list a range of qualifying degree fields, but every field must be directly related to the job. A position described so broadly that a degree in any discipline could qualify is likely to be denied. The rule also clarifies that a job “normally” requiring a degree does not mean one that “always” requires a degree, giving adjudicators room to look at actual hiring patterns.⁵

This bites hardest at the edges of specialization. A software engineer role requiring a computer science degree is straightforward. A “business analyst” job that accepts degrees in business, communications, economics, or liberal arts invites a denial. Employers need sharper job descriptions and academic requirements that are genuinely tied to the work.

Extensions Get More Predictable

The same rule package also codified the deference policy. When an employer files to extend a worker’s status involving the same job and the same parties, USCIS officers are formally instructed to defer to the prior approval unless there is a material error of fact or law or new adverse information.⁶ The regulation lives at 8 CFR 214.1(c)(5), which means it cannot be withdrawn by a simple policy memo the way earlier versions were.⁵ For workers renewing after years in the same role, the default is now continuity rather than fresh scrutiny.

What Has Not Changed

A lot of the H-1B still works the way it did. The 65,000 annual cap holds, and workers with U.S. master’s degrees or higher still get a separate 20,000-visa pool; if they are not selected there, they roll into the regular pool for a second chance.¹

Cap-exempt employers are still cap-exempt. Institutions of higher education, affiliated nonprofits, nonprofit research organizations, and government research organizations can file H-1B petitions year-round without touching the lottery.⁷ For researchers and academics, the program remains far more accessible than it is in the private sector.

Job-loss protections also remain intact. Federal regulations give you a 60-day grace period after your last day of employment, during which you and any H-4 dependents keep valid nonimmigrant status. You cannot work during that window, and international travel is risky, but it is your time to find a new sponsor, change to a different visa status, or plan to leave.

Portability still works the way it always has. Once a new employer files a nonfrivolous H-1B petition on your behalf, you can start working. You do not wait for the approval, and you do not go through the lottery again, because you are already in H-1B status and are no longer cap-subject.⁸ And if a former employer dismisses you before the end of your authorized period, it is legally required to pay reasonable return transportation costs to your last place of foreign residence, regardless of why you were let go. Quit voluntarily and that obligation does not apply.¹

What Sponsorship Now Costs

Even setting aside the $100,000 payment for overseas hires, the stack of mandatory fees for an H-1B has grown. All of these are paid by the employer; passing most of them to the worker is illegal.

Registration fee: $215 per beneficiary for the electronic lottery registration.⁹
Base filing fee (Form I-129): $460 for small employers, $780 for larger ones.
ACWIA training fee: $750 for employers with 25 or fewer full-time employees, $1,500 for larger companies. Qualified nonprofits are exempt.
Fraud Prevention and Detection Fee: $500 on initial petitions and change-of-employer petitions.
Asylum Program Fee: $600 for employers with more than 25 full-time equivalent employees, $300 for smaller employers, and $0 for nonprofits.¹⁰
Premium processing (optional): $2,965 as of March 1, 2026, for a 15-business-day adjudicative action.¹¹

For a mid-size company filing an initial petition with premium processing, government fees alone can exceed $6,000 before attorney costs. Add the $100,000 payment for a worker abroad, and the sponsorship decision looks very different than it did in 2024.²

Domestic Visa Renewal Pilot

One development runs against the tightening trend. In January 2024, the State Department launched a pilot letting certain H-1B holders renew their visa stamps without leaving the United States, the first time domestic renewal has been available in nearly two decades.¹² The initial pilot was limited to roughly 20,000 participants, and the department said it would seek to expand the program’s scope after the first tranche.

For workers who qualify, this removes one of the more stressful parts of H-1B life: the trip abroad where a single administrative processing delay can strand you away from your job. Whether the pilot becomes permanent and expands to all H-1B holders is one of the more consequential open questions for the program.

What Congress Is Considering

Legislation is moving in the same direction as the regulations. The H-1B and L-1 Visa Reform Act of 2025, introduced by Senator Chuck Grassley in September 2025, was referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee.¹³ The Congressional Research Service has not yet summarized the current bill’s full text. Previous iterations of the same legislation have sought to replace the random lottery with a selection process favoring higher wages and advanced degrees, increase employer audit frequency, and tighten recruitment requirements to protect domestic workers.

Whether this bill advances depends on broader immigration politics. But the wage-weighted selection rule, the $100,000 entry fee, and tighter specialty occupation standards already in place all point in the same direction: an H-1B program built around higher-paid, more experienced workers rather than entry-level hires. For anyone planning around the visa, that is the trajectory to plan for.

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 USC 1184 – Admission of Nonimmigrants
2
The White House. Restriction on Entry of Certain Nonimmigrant Workers
3
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. H-1B Weighted Selection Small Entity Compliance Guide
4
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. FY 2027 H-1B Cap Initial Registration Period Opens on March 4
5
Federal Register. Modernizing H-1B Requirements, Providing Flexibility in the F-1 Program, and Program Improvements
6
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. USCIS Policy Manual Volume 2 Part A Chapter 4 – Extension of Stay, Change of Status, and Extension of Petition Validity
7
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. H-1B Specialty Occupations
8
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. FAQs for Individuals in H-1B Nonimmigrant Status
9
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. H-1B Electronic Registration Process
10
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. H and L Filing Fees for Form I-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker
11
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. How Do I Request Premium Processing
12
U.S. Department of State. Department of State to Process Domestic Visa Renewals in Limited Pilot Program
13
Congress.gov. S.2928 – H-1B and L-1 Visa Reform Act of 2025