US Immigration Chart: Final Action Dates and Dates for Filing

The U.S. immigration chart is the set of tables the State Department publishes each month inside the Visa Bulletin, and it tells you whether a green card number is available for your preference category and country this month. You read it by finding the row for your category, the column for your country of chargeability, and comparing the cut-off date in that cell to your priority date. If your priority date is earlier than the cut-off, you can move forward. If it is later, you keep waiting.

Who the Chart Applies To

Not every green card applicant needs the chart. Immediate relatives of U.S. citizens (spouses, unmarried children under 21, and parents of citizens who are at least 21) are exempt from the numerical limits that create the waiting lines. A visa is always available for them.¹

Everyone else falls into a preference category with an annual cap, and the chart is how the government meters those visas out. Family preference applicants sit in one of five rows: F1 (unmarried adult sons and daughters of citizens), F2A (spouses and minor children of permanent residents), F2B (unmarried adult sons and daughters of permanent residents), F3 (married sons and daughters of citizens), and F4 (siblings of adult citizens).² Employment-based applicants sit in EB-1 through EB-5, from priority workers down through immigrant investors.³

Your Priority Date and Country of Chargeability

Two pieces of information decide where you stand on the chart.

Your priority date is your place in line. For family petitions, it is the date USCIS properly received the Form I-130. For employment petitions, it depends on labor certification: if certification was required, the priority date is when the Department of Labor accepted the labor certification application; if no certification was needed, it is when USCIS accepted the Form I-140.⁴⁵

Chargeability is the country your visa is counted against. It is almost always your country of birth, not your country of citizenship. Most countries share one column labeled “All Chargeability Areas Except Those Listed.” Countries with the highest demand get their own columns. As of 2026, those are mainland China, India, Mexico, and the Philippines.

Cross-Chargeability for Spouses and Children

If your spouse was born in a different country, federal law lets you use your spouse’s chargeability instead of your own to keep the family together.⁶ For someone born in India waiting under EB-2, that swap can cut a wait of more than a decade down to nothing. Children can be charged to either parent’s birth country.

What Each Cell Means

Every cell on the chart shows one of three things.

A calendar date. You may proceed only if your priority date is earlier than the date shown. If the cell reads 01 SEP 17 and your priority date is in August 2017, you qualify. October 2017, you do not.
“C” for current. No backlog exists in that category; visas are available to all qualified applicants regardless of priority date.⁷
“U” for unavailable. No visas are being issued in that category at all.⁴

Check the chart every month. Dates usually inch forward, but not always in a straight line.

The Two Charts: Final Action Dates and Dates for Filing

Each month’s Visa Bulletin contains two charts for family and employment categories, and knowing which one applies to you is where most confusion starts.

The Final Action Dates chart (Chart A) is the finish line. When your priority date is earlier than the cut-off on this chart, a visa number is actually available and your case can be approved.

The Dates for Filing chart (Chart B) usually sits further out and reaches more applicants. When it is in effect, you can submit your paperwork (Form I-485 for adjustment of status, or Form DS-260 for consular processing) even though no visa number is available for final approval yet. That lets you complete background checks, medical exams, and interviews so everything is ready when the Final Action Date catches up to you.

USCIS decides each month whether adjustment applicants may use Chart B or must rely on Chart A, and it posts that determination on its website, usually within a week of the Visa Bulletin’s release.⁸ If Chart A is already current for your category, or Chart A’s date is later than Chart B’s, you can file using Chart A regardless of what USCIS announces.

What the Numbers Look Like in Practice

Wait times across categories vary enormously. In the June 2026 Visa Bulletin, F2A for most countries showed a cut-off of January 2025, roughly a one-year wait. F4 for Mexico showed a cut-off of April 2001, a wait of more than 25 years.⁷

Employment-based categories look just as uneven. In the same bulletin, EB-1 was current for most countries but showed December 2022 for India. EB-2 for India showed September 2013, meaning EB-2 applicants born in India were facing a wait exceeding 12 years.⁷

Why the Waits Get So Long

Federal law caps family preference visas at a floor of 226,000 per year and employment-based visas at 140,000.⁹¹⁰ Each employment group receives roughly 28.6% of the total, with unused numbers flowing between categories.¹¹

On top of those caps, no single country can receive more than 7% of the visas available in either stream in a given fiscal year.⁶ That 7% cap is why India, China, Mexico, and the Philippines have their own columns and dramatically longer waits than everywhere else.

The Diversity Visa Chart Works Differently

The Visa Bulletin also carries a chart for the Diversity Visa program, which offers up to 55,000 visas a year to applicants from countries with historically low immigration to the United States. In practice some numbers are redirected, and the DV-2026 limit was reduced to approximately 52,000.¹² The DV chart uses lottery rank numbers rather than priority dates: visas are available only to applicants whose rank falls below the regional cut-off shown.

Diversity visa eligibility expires at the end of the fiscal year. All DV-2026 selections lose eligibility on September 30, 2026, regardless of processing delays, and numbers can run out before that date.¹²

When Dates Move Backward

Sometimes a cut-off moves in the wrong direction. That is called retrogression, and it happens when more people apply in a category than the available numbers can accommodate. It tends to hit late in the fiscal year (which runs October through September) as annual limits near exhaustion. When October arrives, fresh numbers appear and dates usually jump forward again.¹³

If you have already filed your I-485 and the date retrogresses past your priority date, your pending application is not canceled. Your work authorization and travel documents stay valid, and you can still change employers after your I-485 has been pending for at least 180 days. USCIS just cannot approve the application until your priority date becomes current again on the Final Action Dates chart.

What Filing Under the Chart Unlocks

One reason to file the I-485 as soon as the chart allows (even under Chart B, before a visa number is available) is that filing opens up interim benefits. You can apply for an Employment Authorization Document, which lets you work for any U.S. employer while the green card application is pending.¹⁴ You can also apply for advance parole, a travel document that lets you leave and re-enter the country without abandoning the pending case.¹⁵ Leaving the country without advance parole while an I-485 is pending generally means the application is treated as abandoned.

Which Chart Counts for a Child’s Age

Children listed as dependents can “age out” by turning 21 before the visa is available. The Child Status Protection Act adjusts the calculation by subtracting the time the petition spent pending from the child’s age when a visa becomes available; if the result is under 21 and the child is unmarried, the child still qualifies.¹⁶

A policy change took effect on August 15, 2025: USCIS now uses only the Final Action Dates chart to determine when a visa “becomes available” for CSPA purposes. Earlier guidance sometimes let the Dates for Filing chart lock in a younger calculated age. Petitions filed on or after that date fall under the new rule.¹⁷

1
U.S. Department of State Foreign Affairs Manual. Numerical Limitations Overview
2
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Green Card for Family Preference Immigrants
3
U.S. Department of State. Employment-Based Immigrant Visas
4
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Visa Availability and Priority Dates
5
U.S. Department of Labor. Permanent Labor Certification
6
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 USC 1152 – Numerical Limitations on Individual Foreign States
7
U.S. Department of State. Visa Bulletin for June 2026
8
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Adjustment of Status Filing Charts from the Visa Bulletin
9
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 USC 1151 – Worldwide Level of Immigration
10
U.S. Department of State Foreign Affairs Manual. 9 FAM 502.4 Employment-Based IV Classifications
11
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 USC 1153 – Allocation of Immigrant Visas
12
U.S. Department of State. Visa Bulletin for May 2026
13
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Visa Retrogression
14
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Employment Authorization Document
15
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. While Your Green Card Application Is Pending with USCIS
16
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Child Status Protection Act (CSPA)
17
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. USCIS Updates Policy on CSPA Age Calculation