The USMCA professional list is the closed set of roughly 60 occupations, set out in Appendix 2 to Annex 16-A of the agreement and implemented at 8 CFR 214.6, whose practitioners can enter the United States in TN nonimmigrant status.1eCFR. 8 CFR 214.6 – Citizens of Canada or Mexico Seeking Temporary Entry Under USMCA to Engage in Business Activities at a Professional Level The list divides into four categories: general professions, medical and allied health, scientists, and one teaching role. Each occupation carries its own credential requirements, typically a bachelor’s degree in a directly related field, sometimes a professional license, and in a handful of cases a defined mix of post-secondary training and experience.
The list is exhaustive. If a job title does not appear in Appendix 2, it does not qualify for TN status, no matter how strong the applicant’s credentials or how closely the work resembles a listed profession. There is no catch-all for “related” occupations and no discretion at the port of entry to add one.
General Professions
These roles span business, design, law, science support, and consulting. Most require a bachelor’s degree (a Baccalaureate in the U.S. and Canada or a Licenciatura in Mexico), though several accept a post-secondary diploma or certificate combined with three years of experience.
- Accountant: bachelor’s degree, or a CPA, CA, CGA, or CMA designation
- Architect: bachelor’s degree, or a state or provincial license
- Computer Systems Analyst: bachelor’s degree, or a post-secondary diploma/certificate plus three years of experience
- Disaster Relief Insurance Claims Adjuster: bachelor’s degree plus completion of disaster relief claims training, or three years of claims adjustment experience plus the same training
- Economist: bachelor’s degree
- Engineer: bachelor’s degree, or a state or provincial license
- Forester: bachelor’s degree, or a state or provincial license
- Graphic Designer: bachelor’s degree, or a post-secondary diploma/certificate plus three years of experience
- Hotel Manager: bachelor’s degree in hotel or restaurant management, or a post-secondary diploma/certificate in that field plus three years of management experience
- Industrial Designer: bachelor’s degree, or a post-secondary diploma/certificate plus three years of experience
- Interior Designer: bachelor’s degree, or a post-secondary diploma/certificate plus three years of experience
- Land Surveyor: bachelor’s degree, or a state, provincial, or federal license
- Landscape Architect: bachelor’s degree
- Lawyer (including Notary in the Province of Quebec): LL.B., J.D., LL.L., B.C.L., or Licenciatura degree (five years), or membership in a state or provincial bar
- Librarian: M.L.S. or B.L.S., for which a separate bachelor’s degree was a prerequisite
- Management Consultant: bachelor’s degree, or a statement or professional credential attesting to five years of experience as a management consultant, or five years of experience in a specialty related to the consulting agreement
- Mathematician (including Statistician): bachelor’s degree
- Range Manager / Range Conservationist: bachelor’s degree
- Research Assistant (at a post-secondary institution): bachelor’s degree
- Scientific Technician / Technologist: theoretical knowledge in an eligible science or engineering discipline and the ability to solve practical problems, or two years of training in those areas (must work under the supervision of a professional in an eligible field)
- Social Worker: bachelor’s degree
- Sylviculturist (Forestry Specialist): bachelor’s degree
- Technical Publications Writer: bachelor’s degree, or a post-secondary diploma/certificate plus three years of experience
- Urban Planner: bachelor’s degree
- Vocational Counselor: bachelor’s degree
Medical and Allied Health Professions
The medical category covers clinical and therapeutic roles, each requiring a bachelor’s degree or its equivalent unless the entry specifies otherwise. One important limit: physicians can hold TN status only for teaching or research positions. Direct clinical practice is not permitted under TN.
- Dentist: D.D.S., D.M.D., Doctor en Odontología, or Doctor en Cirugía Dental, or a state or provincial license
- Dietitian: bachelor’s degree, or a state or provincial license
- Medical Laboratory Technologist: bachelor’s degree, or a post-secondary diploma/certificate plus three years of experience
- Nutritionist: bachelor’s degree
- Occupational Therapist: bachelor’s degree, or a state or provincial license
- Pharmacist: bachelor’s degree, or a state or provincial license
- Physician (teaching or research only): M.D., Doctor en Medicina, or a state or provincial license
- Physiotherapist / Physical Therapist: bachelor’s degree, or a state or provincial license
- Psychologist: state or provincial license, or Licenciatura degree
- Recreational Therapist: bachelor’s degree
- Registered Nurse: state or provincial license, or Licenciatura degree
- Veterinarian: D.V.M., D.M.V., or Doctor en Veterinaria, or a state or provincial license
Scientists
The scientist category is the longest in the agreement. Every sub-specialty listed here requires a bachelor’s degree.2Office of the United States Trade Representative. USMCA Chapter 16 – Temporary Entry for Business Persons
- Agriculturist (including Agronomist)
- Animal Breeder
- Animal Scientist
- Apiculturist
- Astronomer
- Biochemist
- Biologist
- Chemist
- Dairy Scientist
- Entomologist
- Epidemiologist
- Geneticist
- Geochemist
- Geologist
- Geophysicist (including Oceanographer in Mexico and the U.S.)
- Horticulturist
- Meteorologist
- Pharmacologist
- Physicist (including Oceanographer in Canada)
- Plant Breeder
- Plant Pathologist
- Poultry Scientist
- Soil Scientist
- Zoologist
Teacher
The teaching category contains a single occupation: college, university, or seminary teacher. A bachelor’s degree is required. Primary and secondary school teachers are not eligible for TN status.
Credential Rules That Trip People Up
The default requirement is a bachelor’s degree in a field directly related to the job offered. An engineering degree qualifies you for an engineering role; a general science degree usually will not. Immigration officers check this match closely, and a mismatch between the degree field and the job is one of the most common reasons for TN denial.3U.S. Department of State Foreign Affairs Manual. 9 FAM 402.17 USMCA Professionals – TN and TD Visas
Experience does not substitute for a degree unless the agreement expressly says so. Outside the specific alternatives written into the list, there is no workaround. A computer systems analyst with twenty years of experience, no degree, and no qualifying post-secondary diploma does not qualify, because that occupation’s only alternative to a bachelor’s degree is a post-secondary diploma or certificate plus three years of experience.
A few occupations have distinctive pathways worth calling out. Management consultants can qualify on five years of consulting experience, or five years in a field related to the specific consulting engagement, documented through a professional credential or a sworn statement.4U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Chapter 6 – Requirements for Specific Occupations Scientific technicians and technologists do not need a bachelor’s degree at all, but they must show theoretical knowledge in an eligible scientific or engineering discipline and must work under the supervision of a professional in that field. Disaster relief insurance claims adjusters can qualify with three years of adjustment experience in place of a degree, but they also need documented training in disaster relief claims and evidence of a declared disaster event.
Licensed professions accept a state or provincial license in place of, or in addition to, a degree, depending on the occupation. Where the agreement lists a license as an alternative, an unlicensed applicant needs the degree; where it lists both, the license itself will do the work.
Degrees earned outside the United States, Canada, or Mexico require a formal credential evaluation from a recognized evaluation service to establish equivalency to a U.S. bachelor’s degree. Canadian and Mexican credentials are accepted at face value as long as they meet what the agreement requires for the occupation.
Why the List Could Change After 2026
The professional list exists only because the USMCA exists. The agreement includes a joint review every six years, and the first of those reviews falls in 2026, six years after the agreement took effect on July 1, 2020. If all three countries confirm the agreement at the six-year review, the termination date resets to a new 16-year window. If any party declines to confirm, the three countries enter annual reviews for up to ten years to resolve outstanding issues before the agreement would expire. Anyone planning to rely on TN classification for a long horizon should be aware that the list, and the classification itself, ride on that review process.