EB-3, China
Where this line's cutoff stands, how it has moved a fiscal year at a time, and what USCIS counts behind it. From the State Department's bulletins, October 2014 to September 2026.
This month
- Final action, September 2026
- Jan 1, 2022
- Dates for filing, September 2026
- Jan 8, 2022
- Across the archive
- It moved 153 months of priority dates across 143 months of bulletins. It went backwards or shut 8 times, most recently in October 2024.
Final action decides when a green card can be approved; dates for filing, when USCIS allows it, decides when an I-485 can be filed. How the visa bulletin works.
Check your priority date
Is my priority date current?
And which way the cutoff has been moving. Cutoffs go backwards as well as forwards.
When a green card can actually be approved.
Reading the September 2026 visa bulletin.
These figures come from that bulletin and the ones before it. Cutoffs change every month, in both directions.
How the cutoff has moved
Bulletin month along the bottom, the cutoff it published up the side. The shaded part of each column is the range of priority dates that qualified that month, so a taller column is a month more people were current in.
- The cutoff that month
- Dates that qualified
From the 144 visa bulletins published between October 2014 and September 2026.
What this can’t tell you
- Enter a priority date to see where it sits against the cutoff.
- It can’t tell you this month's cutoff. It holds archived bulletins only, and the archive itself stops at September 2026. Check the current bulletin before acting on any of it.
A fiscal year at a time
The final action cutoff in each year's first bulletin (October) against its last (September), the year the State Department plans visa numbers for. Newest first.
| Fiscal year | First bulletin | Last bulletin | Moved | Steps back |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| FY2026 | Mar 1, 2021 | Jan 1, 2022 | +306 days | 0 |
| FY2025 | Apr 1, 2020 | Dec 1, 2020 | +244 days | 0 |
| FY2024 | Jan 1, 2020 | Sep 1, 2020 | +244 days | 0 |
| FY2023 | Jun 15, 2018 | Sep 1, 2019 | +443 days | 0 |
| FY2022 | Jan 8, 2019 | Apr 22, 2018 | -261 days | 1 |
| FY2021 | Jul 1, 2017 | Jan 8, 2019 | +556 days | 0 |
| FY2020 | Nov 1, 2015 | Feb 15, 2017 | +472 days | 0 |
| FY2019 | Jun 1, 2015 | Jan 1, 2014 | -516 days | 1 |
| FY2018 | Jan 1, 2014 | Nov 1, 2014 | +304 days | 1 |
| FY2017 | Jan 22, 2013 | Jan 1, 2012 | -387 days | 1 |
| FY2016 | Oct 15, 2011 | Jan 1, 2010 | -652 days | 1 |
| FY2015 | Apr 1, 2009 | Dec 22, 2004 | -1,561 days | 2 |
What USCIS counts in this line
- Approved petitions waiting for a visa number
- 11,070
- as of June 2026, primary applicants
- I-485s pending, visa number available
- 3,694 to 4,054
- inventory of 2026-08-05
- I-485s pending, waiting for a visa number
- 0
- inventory of 2026-08-05
The approved count is USCIS's quarterly file and counts petitions, not people: no family members, and one person can hold more than one. The I-485 counts are USCIS's monthly inventory, where cells of 1 to 10 are withheld, so they're ranges. People getting their visa abroad aren't in the I-485 counts at all.
Count everyone ahead of your date in this lineVisa bulletin: adoption.state.gov (the State Department's own page, served to scripts; travel.state.gov refuses them) · data through Sep 2026 · monthly Cutoff dates as the State Department published them each month. Nothing here is forecast.
Petitions awaiting a visa: USCIS approved employment-based petitions awaiting a visa (uscis.gov) · data through Jun 30, 2026 · quarterly Approved I-140, I-360 and I-526 petitions whose beneficiary is still waiting for a visa number, by preference and country of birth, as of the month USCIS states. Primary beneficiaries only, dependents excluded.
I-485 pending inventory has not refreshed in 54 days. It should update monthly, so the figures below are the last ones that arrived rather than the current ones. Source: USCIS employment-based I-485 inventory (uscis.gov) · data through Aug 5, 2026.
The rules behind these numbers
Other calculators
- Green card timeline
- PERM processing time
- Prevailing wage queue
- I-140 queue
- I-485 queue position
- Green card line
- EB-2 vs EB-3
- Which green card fits
- Salary explorer
- Compare my offer
- I-140 trends
- Priority dates
- PERM deadlines
- RFI deadline
- Wage determination validity
- H-1B six-year limit
- Priority date retention
- Green card fees
- Wage levels