Temporary Protected Status (TPS): Eligibility, Applying, and Renewal

Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, is a temporary immigration benefit that lets nationals of certain countries stay and work legally in the United States when conditions back home make return unsafe. The Secretary of Homeland Security designates which countries qualify, and eligible nationals already living in the U.S. can apply for protection from deportation together with a work permit. Congress created the program through the Immigration Act of 1990, and 15 countries currently hold active designations: Burma (Myanmar), El Salvador, Ethiopia, Haiti, Honduras, Lebanon, Nepal, Nicaragua, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Ukraine, Venezuela, and Yemen.¹

Who Qualifies

Eligibility rests on three things: your nationality, when you arrived, and whether anything in your record disqualifies you.

You must be a national of a country that currently has an active TPS designation (or, if stateless, someone whose last habitual residence was that country). Beyond that, two timeline requirements apply, both tied to dates published in your country’s Federal Register notice. You must have been continuously physically present in the United States since the effective date of the most recent designation, and you must have continuously resided in the United States since a separate date set out in that notice.² Those dates differ from country to country, so what matters is whether you were already here when your country was designated or most recently redesignated.

Short trips abroad during the required period do not automatically break continuous residence, as long as each absence was brief, had a legitimate purpose, was not caused by a deportation or voluntary departure order, and did not involve unlawful activity abroad.³ The burden is on you to document the reason and length of any absence, so hold onto travel records.

What Will Disqualify You

A felony conviction, or two or more misdemeanor convictions committed in the United States, is a hard bar to TPS, regardless of jail time.² The persecutor bar, terrorism-related bars, and other mandatory grounds that block asylum apply to TPS as well.

You also have to meet the general admissibility rules of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which cover health, criminal history, drug offenses, and security concerns.⁴ Some of these grounds are waivable for TPS purposes; serious drug trafficking and security threats are not. USCIS specifically instructs TPS applicants not to file waivers for the unlawful presence bars, the permanent bar for unauthorized reentry, or the bar for being present without admission, because those grounds are handled differently in the TPS context.

How Countries Get Designated and Why the List Changes

The Secretary of Homeland Security has sole authority to designate a country on three grounds: ongoing armed conflict that would threaten the safety of returning nationals; an environmental disaster (earthquake, flood, drought, epidemic) that substantially disrupts living conditions where the foreign government has requested the designation and cannot handle the return of its nationals; or extraordinary and temporary conditions preventing safe return, provided the designation is not contrary to U.S. national interests.²

Each designation runs for 6 to 18 months. Before it expires, the Secretary reviews country conditions and either extends, redesignates, or terminates it. Because a designation can end at any renewal point, check the current status of your country on the USCIS TPS page before you file or renew.

What TPS Gives You, and What It Doesn’t

While TPS is in effect, the government cannot execute a removal order against you, though it can still place you in removal proceedings or enter an order that would only take effect after TPS ends.² If your initial application is pending and you show a prima facie case of eligibility, you also get protection from removal while USCIS reviews the case. TPS lets you apply for an Employment Authorization Document so you can work legally, and it lets you apply for permission to travel abroad.

TPS does not lead to a green card by itself. There is no direct path from TPS to lawful permanent residence. You can pursue a green card through a separate family-based or employer-based petition, but those are independent processes with their own requirements. The Supreme Court held in Sanchez v. Mayorkas (2021) that having TPS does not, on its own, count as having been “inspected and admitted” for adjustment-of-status purposes. That matters for anyone who first entered the country without inspection, because inspection and admission is a prerequisite for adjusting status through most green card categories.

How to Apply

The core filing is Form I-821, the Application for Temporary Protected Status.⁵ Most applicants file Form I-765 at the same time to request an Employment Authorization Document.⁶ Online filing is available for certain designations.

Plan on submitting three categories of evidence:

Identity and nationality: a valid passport, a birth certificate paired with photo ID, or a national identity document from your home country.
Continuous residence: leases, utility bills, school transcripts, medical records, or similar documents showing your name and dates covering the required period.
Certified English translations for anything not already in English. Professional immigration translation typically runs $25 to $50 per page.

Accuracy on the forms matters. Disclose every entry into the United States, all prior addresses, your current immigration status, and any encounters with law enforcement. Omissions can trigger a Request for Evidence, delay processing, or raise credibility concerns that lead to denial.

Fees and Fee Waivers

TPS fees have shifted more than once recently. The 2024 USCIS fee rule eliminated the separate biometrics fee for most immigration filings but kept a $30 biometric services fee for Form I-821.⁷ The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (H.R. 1), signed on July 4, 2025, added TPS-specific fees, with inflation-adjusted amounts taking effect January 1, 2026.⁵ Check the USCIS fee schedule before you file. USCIS will reject any application postmarked on or after January 1, 2026, that does not include the correct fee.

If you can’t afford the fees, a partial waiver may be available through Form I-912. First-time TPS applicants can request a waiver of the biometric services fee.⁸ Current TPS holders can also request waivers for related filings like Form I-131 (travel document) and Form I-601 (waiver of inadmissibility). Qualifying evidence includes receipt of a means-tested government benefit, household income at or below the federal poverty guidelines, or documented financial hardship. Some of the new fees created by H.R. 1 cannot be waived or reduced, though standard regulatory fees may still qualify.

After You File

USCIS mails a Form I-797C receipt notice with your case number. Keep it. It proves your application is pending, and for EAD renewals it doubles as evidence of continued work authorization when paired with an expiring card.⁹

You’ll then get a biometrics appointment notice directing you to an Application Support Center for fingerprints, a photograph, and a digital signature. USCIS runs the results against federal criminal and security databases. Skipping the appointment without rescheduling stalls the case. Processing time varies widely; a decision can take anywhere from several months to well over a year.

EAD Extensions

The rules for automatic EAD extensions changed in 2025. Under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, TPS-based EAD renewals filed on or after July 22, 2025 can be automatically extended for up to one year or the remaining time on your country’s TPS designation, whichever is shorter.¹⁰ The earlier rule allowing up to 540 days no longer applies to renewals filed after that date.¹¹

To show your employer you can keep working during the extension, present the expired EAD along with the I-797C receipt for your pending renewal. The I-797C receipt date must be before the EAD expiration date, and both the expired card and the pending renewal must be in a TPS category (A12 or C19). USCIS can also extend TPS-based EADs directly through a country-specific Federal Register notice, which sets a new expiration date. Either way, an EAD cannot extend past the end of your country’s TPS designation.

Keeping Your Status: Re-registration and Late Filing

TPS does not renew on its own. Each time your country’s designation is extended, USCIS publishes a Federal Register notice with a re-registration window, and you must file a new Form I-821 during that window to keep your status. Miss the deadline and you can lose both TPS and your work authorization. Watch the USCIS TPS page for your country’s specific dates.

If you missed the very first registration period for your country, you may still qualify for late initial registration in limited circumstances. You qualify if, during the original registration period, you held a valid nonimmigrant status, had a pending application for change of status, adjustment of status, or asylum, were a parolee, or were the spouse or child of someone eligible for TPS.¹² The timing catch: you must file while that qualifying condition still exists, or within 60 days after it ends. If the condition existed only during a later extension period and not during the original window, late initial filing is not available. You still have to meet all the standard requirements, including continuous residence, continuous physical presence, and admissibility.

Traveling Outside the United States

Leaving the country without authorization puts your TPS at risk. Before any trip, file Form I-131 and wait for approval.¹³ If your TPS is already granted, USCIS issues Form I-512T as your travel authorization. If your initial TPS application is still pending, you get Form I-512L, an advance parole document.

Real risks remain even with approval. While abroad you could miss a Request for Evidence or biometrics appointment. If USCIS denies your TPS while you’re outside the country, returning may not be possible. At the port of entry, a DHS officer decides whether to readmit you into TPS: you need valid TPS, travel that complied with your authorization, and no mandatory criminal or security ground of inadmissibility.

Authorized travel carries one significant upside. Under a 2022 USCIS policy, a TPS holder’s return through a port of entry after authorized travel counts as being “inspected and admitted.” For someone who first entered without inspection, that return can supply the admission needed to later adjust status through an approved family or employment petition. This is the practical workaround to the Sanchez problem, and it’s worth discussing with an immigration attorney before you travel.

What Happens When TPS Ends

When the Secretary terminates a country’s designation, anyone without another lawful immigration status becomes subject to removal. USCIS has said it coordinates with Immigration and Customs Enforcement on the timing of any charging documents. You revert to whatever status you held before TPS, or to no status if you had none. That’s the reason to explore other forms of relief, family petitions, employment sponsorship, asylum, or U or T visas, while you still hold TPS rather than after a termination is announced.

1
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Temporary Protected Status
2
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 U.S.C. 1254a – Temporary Protected Status
3
eCFR. 8 CFR 244.1 – Definitions
4
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 U.S.C. 1182 – Inadmissible Aliens
5
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. I-821, Application for Temporary Protected Status
6
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. I-765, Application for Employment Authorization
7
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. 2024 Final Fee Rule
8
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. I-912, Request for Fee Waiver
9
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Form I-797C, Notice of Action
10
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Automatic Employment Authorization Document (EAD) Extension
11
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Update to TPS Page on EAD Automatic Extensions
12
eCFR. 8 CFR 244.2 – Eligibility
13
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. I-131, Application for Travel Documents, Parole Documents, and Arrival/Departure Records