How to read the Visa Bulletin

The Visa Bulletin looks like a spreadsheet and reads like a code. It is neither a waiting list you can find your name on nor an estimate of how long you will wait. It is a set of cut-off dates, published monthly, that answer one question: for each category and country, how far down the queue has the government reached.

The two charts

The State Department publishes the bulletin every month with two charts for each preference category. USCIS describes both on its priority dates page: the Application Final Action Dates chart, which is consistent with previous bulletins, and the Dates for Filing Applications chart, which indicates when applicants should be notified to assemble and submit required documentation to the National Visa Center.

Read plainly: Final Action Dates is the point at which a green card can actually be issued. Dates for Filing is an earlier point at which the paperwork can be lodged so it is ready when the visa becomes available. The gap between the two can be months or years.

Which chart applies to you

Not both. For adjustment of status filed inside the United States, USCIS decides each month which chart it will accept, and it decides separately for family-sponsored and employment-based cases. The rule it applies is on the same page: when USCIS determines there are more immigrant visas available for the fiscal year than there are known applicants, applicants may use the Dates for Filing chart; otherwise they must use the Final Action Dates chart.

The decision is posted on the filing charts page each month, and the Visa Bulletin tracker records the current one. For September 2026, family cases use Dates for Filing and employment cases use Final Action Dates, which is a common split.

If you are applying from outside the United States through a consulate, this decision does not apply to you; the National Visa Center works from the bulletin directly.

Finding your row and column

The rows are preference categories. Family-sponsored runs F1 through F4, from unmarried adult children of citizens to siblings of citizens. Employment-based runs EB-1 through EB-5, from priority workers to investors.

The columns are countries of chargeability, and the important word is chargeability rather than citizenship. It is normally the country of birth, which is why a citizen of one country born in another is charged to the country of birth, and why cross-chargeability to a spouse's country is sometimes available.

Most columns say "All Chargeability Areas Except Those Listed", and a handful of countries with the largest demand have their own columns with dates years behind.

Reading the cell

The cell holds either a date or a letter. A date is a cut-off: if your priority date is earlier than the date shown, you are inside the cut-off for that month. USCIS gives the example directly: if the bulletin shows 15DEC07 for China in the F1 category, visas are available for immigrants whose priority date is earlier than December 15, 2007.

"C" means current: no backlog, everyone in that category and country is inside. "U" means unavailable: no visas in that category and country this month.

The comparison is strictly earlier-than. A priority date equal to the cut-off is not inside it.

What the dates are not

They are not a queue position, and they are not a prediction. A category can move forward several months in one bulletin and sit still for a year. It can also move backwards, which is retrogression, described in green card priority dates explained. Movement depends on how many people in each category and country are actually ready to be processed, which the State Department estimates from case data, not on a schedule.

Anyone selling a forecast of next month's dates is selling a guess. The only reliable practice is to check the bulletin and the USCIS chart decision each month, and to have documents ready when the filing window opens rather than after.