The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has released H-1B visa statistics for FY2026, showing a sharp fall in new visa approvals even as Indian nationals continue to dominate the programme.
According to the data, new H-1B approvals dropped 37% year-on-year to around 120,000, down from about 190,000 the previous year.
The number of new unique applicants also fell 30%, from 486,000 to roughly 339,000, bringing approvals back to levels last seen in 2020.
Indian nationals accounted for 71% of all H-1B beneficiaries in FY2026. While this is slightly lower than the peak of 74.9% in 2020, it remains significantly higher than the 43% share recorded in 2004.
Indian-American venture capitalist Deedy Das, who analysed the USCIS data in a detailed social media thread, said the decline was real but not dramatic.
“Overall, the US cut down on H-1B is very real, but not massive,” he noted.
Das said the dominance of Indian professionals is closely tied to the rise of computer-related jobs.
“The growth of Indians seems driven largely by computer occupations, which rose from 43% in 2005 to a peak of 69.5% in 2020, and now stands at 63.9%,” he explained.
He also pointed out a notable shift in age demographics. The 35–44 age group of H-1B holders has nearly doubled since the mid-2000s, a trend Das attributed to mid-career IT services employees from large Indian firms moving directly from India to the US.
Overall approval rates, including extensions, fell to 71.9%, the lowest level in 21 years. Total approvals stood at around 328,000, the lowest in a decade, even though total applications touched about 456,000 — the second-highest figure on record.
The data also shows a steady rise in wages. Median compensation for H-1B workers has increased from $53,000 in 2004 to about $120,000 in FY2026, reflecting an average annual growth of around 4%.
Das highlighted two key takeaways from the 2004–2025 data: growth in the H-1B programme has largely come from extensions of existing visas rather than new issuances, which remain capped; and consistent wage growth across all salary bands challenges the argument that the programme is built on cheap labour.
The full H-1B report is available on the USCIS website.