Last updated: November 2026 (data checked November 2, 2026). Every figure on this page was recomputed from two official USCIS Form I-140 workbooks: fiscal year (FY) 2026 Q3, dated September 8, 2026, and FY2025 Q4. We update this page when USCIS posts a new quarter.
USCIS does not publish an official EB2 NIW approval rate 2026 figure, but it does publish the counts needed to work one out. From April to June 2026 (FY2026 Q3), USCIS approved 3,835 national interest waiver (NIW) petitions and denied 3,103. Approvals were therefore 55.3% of the NIW decisions made that quarter. The same calculation gives 42.5% for October to December 2025 and 48.1% for January to March 2026. For all of FY2025 (October 2024 to September 2025) it gives 55.2%.
Below you will find the method, the exact workbook cells we used, a table for each fiscal year, the NIW filing counts by country of birth that USCIS publishes, and what these numbers cannot tell you. This page reports USCIS data only. It contains no tracker samples, no forecasts and no claims about any individual case.
Key takeaways
- USCIS publishes counts, not rates. The approval rate here is approvals ÷ (approvals + denials) for NIW petitions decided in the same quarter.
- FY2026 Q3 (April to June 2026): 3,835 approved and 3,103 denied, so 55.3% of 6,938 decisions were approvals. FY2026 Q1 to Q3 combined: 49.1% (9,238 of 18,823).
- 96,297 NIW petitions were awaiting a decision on June 30, 2026, against 74,392 on September 30, 2025.
- In NIW filings by country of birth for FY2026 Q3, China ranked 1st, India 2nd, Brazil 3rd, Pakistan 4th, Bangladesh 5th and Nigeria 6th.
- USCIS publishes no NIW denials by country, so no approval rate by country can be calculated from these files.
- Decisions in a quarter are not the same petitions as filings in that quarter. Many decisions involve petitions filed earlier.
How to calculate the NIW approval rate from USCIS data
We used two workbooks from the USCIS Immigration and Citizenship Data page, both titled “Form I-140 by Fiscal Year, Quarter and Case Status”:
- i140_fy2026_q3_v1.xlsx (FY2026, Quarter 3). The USCIS data library dates it September 8, 2026, and the file says the data were queried in July 2026.
- i140_fy2025_q4_v1.xlsx (FY2025, Quarter 4). The file says the data were queried in October 2025.
The method takes three steps:
- Open the “RADP Summary” sheet and find the row “National Interest Waiver (NIW)”. It is row 13 in both files.
- For each quarter, read the four columns USCIS publishes: Received, Approved, Denied and Pending.
- Approval rate = Approved ÷ (Approved + Denied). Denial rate = Denied ÷ (Approved + Denied). We round to one decimal place.
Worked example for FY2026 Q3: 3,835 ÷ (3,835 + 3,103) = 3,835 ÷ 6,938 = 55.3%. The denial rate is 3,103 ÷ 6,938 = 44.7%. USCIS defines approved and denied as the number “approved during the reporting period” and “denied during the reporting period.” Pending means “awaiting a decision as of the end of the reporting period.”
EB2 NIW approval rate 2026, quarter by quarter
USCIS’s fiscal year runs from October 1 to September 30, so FY2026 Q1 is October to December 2025. The FY2026 file covers three quarters so far.
| FY2026 quarter | Received | Approved | Denied | Decided | Approval rate | Pending at quarter end |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q1 (Oct–Dec 2025) | 13,884 | 2,365 | 3,200 | 5,565 | 42.5% | 82,935 |
| Q2 (Jan–Mar 2026) | 12,648 | 3,038 | 3,282 | 6,320 | 48.1% | 89,307 |
| Q3 (Apr–Jun 2026) | 13,831 | 3,835 | 3,103 | 6,938 | 55.3% | 96,297 |
| Q1–Q3 total | 40,363 | 9,238 | 9,585 | 18,823 | 49.1% | 96,297 |
Source: i140_fy2026_q3_v1.xlsx, RADP Summary, row 13, cells B13 to M13 for the quarters and R13 to U13 for the year-to-date total. The Q4 columns are still zero because USCIS had not yet published July to September 2026.
FY2025 for comparison
| FY2025 quarter | Received | Approved | Denied | Decided | Approval rate | Pending at quarter end |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q1 (Oct–Dec 2024) | 20,141 | 4,683 | 2,790 | 7,473 | 62.7% | 56,611 |
| Q2 (Jan–Mar 2025) | 17,610 | 6,591 | 3,206 | 9,797 | 67.3% | 64,475 |
| Q3 (Apr–Jun 2025) | 14,542 | 5,290 | 4,511 | 9,801 | 54.0% | 68,821 |
| Q4 (Jul–Sep 2025) | 13,983 | 2,968 | 5,356 | 8,324 | 35.7% | 74,392 |
| FY2025 total | 66,276 | 19,532 | 15,863 | 35,395 | 55.2% | 74,392 |
Source: i140_fy2025_q4_v1.xlsx, RADP Summary, row 13, cells B13 to Q13 for the quarters and R13 to U13 for the full year.
Read down the two tables and the figure moves a lot. It was 67.3% in FY2025 Q2 and 35.7% in FY2025 Q4, the lowest quarter in these files. It then rose in each FY2026 quarter published so far: 42.5%, 48.1% and 55.3%. The workbooks give no reasons for any of these movements, so we do not offer any.
NIW petitions pending at the end of each quarter
The pending column grew from 74,392 on September 30, 2025 to 96,297 on June 30, 2026. In each FY2026 quarter, USCIS received more NIW petitions than it decided. In Q3, for example, it received 13,831 and decided 6,938. USCIS cautions that some actions, “such as administrative closures and transfers between offices,” are not reflected, “thus the total pending counts cannot be calculated using data from previous reporting periods.” For what this means for waiting times, see our guide to EB-2 NIW Processing Time.
NIW filings by country of birth, as USCIS publishes them
Two sheets in the same workbook, “Rec-COB” and “App-COB”, give NIW receipts and approvals by the beneficiary’s country of birth. Three things to know before reading them:
- They cover a single quarter, not the whole year.
- USCIS sorts the sheets by total I-140 receipts in all categories. The rank below is our own sort of the NIW column only.
- Approvals count “only primary beneficiaries,” and they are assigned to the period in which a petition was approved, not the one in which it was filed.
| Rank in NIW receipts | Country of birth | NIW receipts, Apr–Jun 2026 | NIW approvals, Apr–Jun 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | China | 2,119 | 717 |
| 2 | India | 1,586 | 423 |
| 3 | Brazil | 1,377 | 111 |
| 4 | Pakistan | 759 | 202 |
| 5 | Bangladesh | 667 | 305 |
| 6 | Nigeria | 659 | 42 |
| 7 | Venezuela | 643 | 9 |
| 8 | Colombia | 616 | 41 |
| 9 | South Korea | 615 | 382 |
| 10 | Iran | 362 | 68 |
| 11 | Ghana | 352 | 70 |
| 23 | Kenya | 93 | 14 |
| 25 | United Kingdom | 77 | 29 |
| – | All countries | 13,831 | 3,835 |
Source: i140_fy2026_q3_v1.xlsx, sheets Rec-COB and App-COB, column F (“National Interest Waiver (NIW)”). The receipts rows are India 7, China 8, Brazil 10, South Korea 13, Nigeria 14, Pakistan 15, Bangladesh 16, Kenya 17, Venezuela 18, Colombia 19, Ghana 21, Iran 26 and United Kingdom 28.
In NIW receipts that quarter, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nigeria ranked 4th, 5th and 6th, behind China, India and Brazil. In NIW approvals, India ranked 2nd (423), Bangladesh 4th (305), Pakistan 5th (202) and Nigeria 16th (42). Country guides: EB2 NIW from Pakistan, EB2 National Interest Waiver Nigeria and Can Indians Apply for EB-2 NIW?
Do not divide one column by the other. Receipts and approvals in the same quarter are different groups of petitions. USCIS also gives no denials or pending counts by country, so approvals ÷ receipts is not an approval rate. The files do not explain differences between countries either.
The previous quarter with country data: FY2025 Q4
| Rank in NIW receipts | Country of birth | NIW receipts, Jul–Sep 2025 | NIW approvals, Jul–Sep 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | China | 2,330 | 715 |
| 2 | India | 1,685 | 426 |
| 3 | Brazil | 1,388 | 101 |
| 4 | Pakistan | 984 | 122 |
| 5 | Iran | 827 | 276 |
| 6 | Venezuela | 739 | 32 |
| 7 | Bangladesh | 692 | 148 |
| 8 | Nigeria | 655 | 157 |
| 9 | Korea, South | 585 | 127 |
| 10 | Colombia | 542 | 49 |
| 14 | Ghana | 201 | 49 |
| 23 | Kenya | 63 | 10 |
| 25 | United Kingdom | 54 | 20 |
| – | All countries | 13,983 | 2,968 |
Source: i140_fy2025_q4_v1.xlsx, sheets Rec-COB and App-COB, column F. Country names appear as written in each file, so this one says “Korea, South” where the FY2026 file says “South Korea.” Pakistan was the 4th-largest source of NIW filings in both quarters shown.
Want your own evidence reviewed rather than national totals? Our free EB-2 NIW profile evaluation checks your degree, experience and proposed endeavor against the USCIS criteria. It is a review of your evidence, not a forecast of any USCIS decision.
What the EB2 NIW approval rate 2026 data does not show
- No rate by country. USCIS publishes NIW receipts and approvals by country of birth, but not denials or pending counts.
- Decisions are not filings. USCIS notes that petitions “approved, denied, or pending a decision may have been received in previous reporting periods.” A quarter’s rate describes decisions made in that quarter. It is not the outcome of the petitions filed in it.
- Petitions, not people. The report “could contain multiple petitions for a single individual.”
- No detail on decisions. This workbook gives no reasons for denials, no counts of Requests for Evidence or Notices of Intent to Deny, no field of work, and no split between premium and regular processing.
- Not a green card count. An approved I-140 still waits for a visa number under the Visa Bulletin. See EB2 National Interest Waiver Priority Date.
- Numbers get revised. USCIS states that “counts may differ from previous periods due to system updates and post adjudicative outcomes.” The two files were queried at different times (October 2025 and July 2026).
- Nothing about a single case. These are aggregate counts of past decisions. They say nothing about how any individual petition will be decided.
A third USCIS file, Form I-140 Receipts and Current Status by Preference and Country, groups petitions by the fiscal year they were filed. It lists NIW approvals separately, but its denied and pending rows cover EB-2 as a whole, so it cannot give an NIW-only rate. Its country sheets cover only the five countries with the most FY2026 receipts: India, China, the Philippines, Brazil and Vietnam.
When this page is updated
USCIS posts I-140 data by quarter. As of November 2, 2026, the newest I-140 file on the USCIS data page is the FY2026 Q3 workbook dated September 8, 2026. The next file will cover FY2026 Q4 (July to September 2026), and we will add it here once USCIS posts it. We do not estimate a date. We keep copies of every workbook used, so each figure can be checked again.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the EB2 NIW approval rate in 2026?
USCIS does not publish one. Calculated from its counts, approvals were 55.3% of NIW decisions in April to June 2026 and 49.1% across October 2025 to June 2026.
What is the EB2 NIW denial rate?
Using denials ÷ (approvals + denials), it was 44.7% in FY2026 Q3 (3,103 of 6,938) and 50.9% for FY2026 Q1 to Q3 combined (9,585 of 18,823).
How many EB2 NIW petitions are pending?
USCIS reported 96,297 NIW petitions awaiting a decision on June 30, 2026, the latest date published.
Does USCIS publish NIW approval rates by country?
No. It publishes NIW receipts and approvals by country of birth, but no denials by country, so a rate per country cannot be calculated from its files.
Why do other websites show different NIW approval rates?
Some quote an earlier release, and USCIS revises its counts between releases. Others use private case-tracker samples or a different formula. This page uses the current USCIS workbooks only and shows the cells used.
Preparing an NIW petition? Start with our free profile evaluation. Our petition team reviews your evidence against the USCIS criteria and tells you where it looks thin. The review does not predict any USCIS decision.
Related guides
This article is general information, not legal advice. Skycap Consultancy is a petition-preparation consultancy, not a law firm. Requirements and fees change; check the linked USCIS pages before filing.
