On July 30, 2024, USCIS announced that it will be conducting a second H-1B lottery "soon." We anticipate that this second round will occur on or about August 1. Employers who submitted entries in March 2024 and were not selected in the first round will remain eligible for the second round and will be automatically entered into the second round.
USCIS has confirmed that the Masters Cap has been completely filled, so the second round lottery will be for all remaining applicants , regardless of their degree level or graduation country.
If an entry is selected in the second round, employers will receive an email from their My USCIS account notiftying them that there has been a change in their account. Once they log in, they will be able to see the additional selections and retrieve the offical selection notice from their site. These notices contain important information about where the application should be submitted as well as required deadlines.
Entrants selected in this round will be required to submit their completed H-1B applications on or before December 1, 2024.
Below is the USCIS email notification in full:
In March, USCIS conducted an initial random selection on properly submitted electronic registrations for the fiscal year 2025 H-1B cap, including for beneficiaries eligible for the advanced degree exemption. Only those petitioners with selected registrations for FY 2025 are eligible to file H-1B cap-subject petitions during the filing period on their registration selection notice. The initial filing period for those with selected registrations for FY 2025 was from April 1 through June 30, 2024.
We recently determined that we would need to select additional registrations for unique beneficiaries to reach the FY 2025 regular cap numerical allocation. Soon, we will select additional registrations for unique beneficiaries from previously submitted electronic registrations using a random selection process, and we will notify prospective petitioners with selected registrations from this second round of selection that they are eligible to file an H-1B cap-subject petition for the beneficiary named in the applicable selected registration. We will announce when we have completed this second process of selections and notifications.
We will not be conducting a second selection for the advanced degree exemption (the master's cap), as enough master's cap registrations were already selected and sufficient petitions were received based on those registrations as projected to meet the FY 2025 masters cap numerical allocation. The second round of selection for the regular cap will include previously submitted registrations that indicated eligibility for the master's cap along with those that indicated only eligibility for the regular cap.
Those with selected registrations will have their USCIS online accounts updated to include a selection notice, which includes details of when and where to file.
For additional information, please contact your Duane Morris Immigration Attorney.
Disclaimer: This Alert has been prepared and published for informational purposes only and is not offered, nor should be construed, as legal advice. For more information, please see the firm's full disclaimer.