Unreserved EB-5 Visa Limit Reached
September 16, 2025 5 Comments
Today, Department of State announced Annual Limit Reached in the EB-5 Unreserved Category. This is good news overall — meaning that all Unreserved EB-5 visas available for FY2025 (at least 11,229 visas by my count) have been issued and won’t be lost to EB-5. The announcement clarifies that DOS did remember to include carryover of unused FY2023 Reserved visa numbers in FY2025’s Unreserved limit. I’ll be interested to see which countries ultimately benefited from the last-minute flurry of Unreserved visa issuance.
Consular interviews interview scheduling and I-485 adjustments Visa issuance for Unreserved EB-5 will now stop until FY2026 visas become available in October. (“Since all available EB-5 unreserved visas for FY 2025 have been used, embassies and consulates may not issue visas in these categories for the remainder of the fiscal year.”)
Apparently, FY2025 annual limits have sadly not been reached for EB-5 reserved categories, which means harm to the Rural and High Unemployment backlogs but future benefit to Unreserved from unused visas and carryover. For background, see my previous post on the October 2025 Visa Bulletin.
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Hi Suzanne, Thanks for the helpful update. With ~two weeks left in FY2025, do you expect DOS/USCIS to actively push out more reserved EB-5 visas to minimize year-end waste? I have heard a lot of people with I526e approvals are waiting for their AOS approvals.
I certainly hope that this is happening! It’s a September tradition. But I don’t know what to expect, since I don’t understand why AOS approvals earlier in the year were apparently so low despite some volume of I-526E approvals.
Hi Suszanne,
I have my consulate appointment scheduled for Sept 29. Does this mean it will have to be rescheduled?
This is a good question for your lawyer. I do not know how or whether year-end visa number cut-offs affect already-scheduled interview appointments. (Also, I corrected the language in my post to be more precise that the cut-off is specific to visa issuance. Thank you for highlighting this point!)
hi Carlos what’s your priority date and the consulate.