Visa Bulletin Dates for Filing vs. Final Action Dates

On the monthly Visa Bulletin, the Dates for Filing chart shows the earliest priority date that lets you submit your green card application, while the Final Action Dates chart shows the earliest priority date the government can actually approve and issue a visa on. Both charts are published together by the Department of State every month, and the gap between them is often months or years. Understanding which chart controls your case at which moment is the whole point of reading the bulletin.¹

What Each Chart Actually Controls

The two charts look nearly identical. Same preference categories down the side, same country columns across the top, dates in each cell. What differs is the stage of your case each one governs.

The Dates for Filing chart sets the earliest date your priority date can be for you to start assembling and submitting the application package. Filing this early lets the government begin background checks, review documents, and work through the administrative queue before a visa number is formally ready. The idea is that when your number opens up, your file is already processed rather than sitting in an intake pile.

The Final Action Dates chart is stricter. It sets the point at which a green card or immigrant visa can actually be issued. Your case cannot be approved until your priority date is earlier than the date shown on this chart for your category and country. Filing under the earlier chart does not accelerate approval; it just gets your paperwork into the system. The file waits, fully reviewed, until Final Action Dates catch up.

So the practical way to think about it: Dates for Filing is a “you may submit” line. Final Action Dates is a “you may be approved” line. They are set independently, they move independently, and they answer different questions.

Which Chart You Can Use This Month

Here is the piece that trips people up. The Department of State publishes both charts every month, but for adjustment-of-status applicants inside the United States, USCIS decides separately which chart is available for filing that month. That decision usually appears within about a week of the bulletin’s release on the Adjustment of Status Filing Charts page of the USCIS website.²

The rule USCIS applies: if it determines that more immigrant visas are available for the fiscal year than there are known applicants, it authorizes the Dates for Filing chart. Otherwise, it directs applicants to the more conservative Final Action Dates chart. Some months allow the earlier chart for some categories and the later chart for others.²

There is one edge case worth knowing. If your category is listed as “current” on the Final Action Dates chart, or if the Final Action Dates cutoff for your category and country is actually later than the Dates for Filing cutoff, you can file using the Final Action Dates chart regardless of USCIS’s general designation that month.²

If you are going through consular processing abroad rather than adjusting status inside the United States, USCIS’s monthly designation does not apply to you. The National Visa Center follows the Department of State’s charts directly. The takeaway: never rely on the Visa Bulletin alone if you are filing an I-485. Always check the USCIS page to confirm which chart is active before you file.

How to Read Either Chart

Both charts are read the same way. You need three pieces of information about yourself: your priority date, your preference category, and your country of chargeability.

Priority Date

Your priority date is your place in line. For family-sponsored cases, it is the date USCIS received the Form I-130 petition filed on your behalf. For most employment-based cases, it is the date the Department of Labor received your labor certification application, or the date the I-140 petition was filed if no labor certification was required. The date appears on Form I-797, Notice of Action, that USCIS sends after accepting the petition.³

Preference Category

The bulletin is organized by preference category. Family-sponsored categories (F1, F2A, F2B, F3, F4) are based on the family relationship between petitioner and beneficiary.⁴ Employment-based categories (EB-1 through EB-5) are based on the type of job offer or the worker’s qualifications.⁵ Your approval notice will tell you which category your petition falls under.

Immediate relatives of U.S. citizens (spouses, unmarried children under 21, and parents) do not appear on the Visa Bulletin at all. Their visas are not numerically limited, so no priority date wait applies. If you are in that group, neither chart is relevant to your case.

Country of Chargeability

Chargeability is based on your country of birth, not your current citizenship or where you live now. Federal law caps the visas available to natives of any single country at 7 percent of the total in each category.⁶ That cap is why applicants born in India, China, Mexico, and the Philippines often wait years or decades in categories that are current for people born elsewhere.

Each chart has five country columns: “All Chargeability Areas Except Those Listed,” and then separate columns for China (mainland born), India, Mexico, and the Philippines. If you were born in a country not specifically listed, use the first column.

If your country of birth is heavily backlogged but your spouse was born in a country with shorter waits, you may be able to cross-charge to your spouse’s country. Children can cross-charge to either parent’s country. Parents can never cross-charge to a child’s country.⁷

Reading the Cell

Find the row for your preference category and the column for your country of chargeability. The date in that cell is the cutoff. If your priority date is earlier than that date, you meet the cutoff for whichever chart you are looking at. If your priority date is on or after that date, you do not.

Two letters can appear instead of a date. A “C” means the category is current for that country, and anyone in that category can file or be approved regardless of priority date.⁸ A “U” means the category is unavailable, and no one in that category can file or be approved that month for that country.³

When Dates Move Backward

The dates on either chart can move backward from one month to the next. This is called retrogression, and it happens when more people apply in a category than there are visas available.⁹ Retrogression is the reason the two-chart system matters as much as it does: filing early under the Dates for Filing chart protects your ability to receive interim benefits even if the Final Action Dates cutoff later slides back past your priority date.

If you already filed your I-485 and retrogression puts your priority date behind the new Final Action Dates cutoff, your case is not denied. USCIS holds it in abeyance, essentially paused, until a visa number becomes available again. Processing resumes once Final Action Dates advance past your priority date.⁹

In the meantime, if you filed Form I-765 for work authorization and Form I-131 for a travel document alongside your I-485, you can generally keep both while you wait. That is the practical payoff of filing under the earlier chart when USCIS allows it: you lock in the ability to work and travel long before your case is actually approvable.⁹

1
U.S. Department of State. The Visa Bulletin
2
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Adjustment of Status Filing Charts from the Visa Bulletin
3
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Visa Availability and Priority Dates
4
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Green Card for Family Preference Immigrants
5
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 USC 1153 – Allocation of Immigrant Visas
6
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 USC 1152 – Numerical Limitations on Individual Foreign States
7
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Adjustment of Status Policies and Procedures
8
U.S. Department of State. Visa Bulletin for March 2026
9
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Visa Retrogression