October 2026 Visa Bulletin - OK now but *GOOD NEWS AHEAD* transcript

Hello friends, Mandar here. I'm back with another video. Today, October 2026 visa bulletin is finally out. From my perspective, there are not many surprises, but with the speculation that we had and a lot of people in this waiting list had, I think it deserves to have a little bit of a detailed conversation. So, we'll look at the family based section, which is not a meaningful progress, but nevertheless, there is some progress.

We'll look at the employmentbased section, which is a mixed bag really. There is some progression, there is some stallment and there is also some retrogression that is I am a little bit concerned about. We have lot of moving parts October visa seems to be as per my expectations conservative estimates but I have some super important thoughts on the upcoming visa. So lot to unpack watch this video until the end and let's get started.

Now the most important question is why can't the department of state release the visa bulletin on Friday afternoon so that we can have some peace of mind some time to reflect on it and our actions going forward. But no, they had to release it on Tuesday morning, right? Very convenient. Anyways, it's here and I'm so glad. So, first of all, before getting into the detail sideby-side comparison of September visa versus October, what are my initial thoughts?

So, there is no meaningful forward progression in the family based section. Although we know that the ban was lifted towards the end of the year, it seems that the department of state advanced Mexico and Philippines in the family based section rather than the backlog communities such as India and China and Philippines. But that also makes sense because do had also published that certain countries such as Mexico and Philippines due to some government actions their visa allocations had been declining.

So in order to create some more demand they are advancing those dates. And in the employment base section although we don't know the exact numbers of spillovers we have speculated it I had calculated it and I think that's what they are going with with the actual numbers will be reflected in November and December visit in my opinion but as I made some predictions the October visit is pretty close to what I was thinking would happen.

So let's start with the comparison of the family based section first and then we'll deep dive into the employment based section. What are the factors? What are the things that we can speculate in November and December visa. So as you can see here the September 2026 visiting is on the left and October 2026 visiting is on the right. Now let's go down to the family base section first. The final action dates for family based section.

So what can we see in the final action dates for family based section? So basically for India, China and rest of the world the dates remain the same January 20th 22nd of 2020. For Mexico, however, for F1, the dates moved from 1st of January 2008 to 8th of September 2008, about 8 months of forward movement. For F1, for Philippines, the dates moved forward from 1st of May 20 2013 to 1st of November 2013, about 6 months of forward movement.

For F2A, India, China, and the rest of the world, August 22nd, 2026 to September 22nd, 2026, about 1 month of forward movement. Mexico moved from August 22nd 2025 to May 22nd of 2026. 7 month of forward moment for F2B India, China and rest of the world. It there is no change for F2B Mexico there is about 15 months of forward moment. Now the new date is May 15th of 2010. F2B for a Philippines 4 months of forward moment to October 1st of 2013.

F3 category India, China and rest of the world no change. It's stuck at October 22nd, 2014. F3 for Philippines has moved forward by 5 months. July 22nd of 2006. F4 for India moved forward by about month and a half to December 15th of 2006. And for Philippines, it moved forward by 9 months from August 22nd, 2007 to May 15th of 2008. So we are seeing for the backlog countries such as India and China and rest of the world the dates haven't really moved forward for F1, F_sub_2A and F_sub_3 but for Mexico and Philippines the dates have moved forward for the reason that I've just mentioned before.

Now let's go to the filing date chart. Let's see if there is any moment over here. In the filing date chart you can see for F1 all chargeability China and India the dates have remained the same to 1st of February 2020. For Mexico and Philippines, the dates also have remained the same. For F2A category, the dates remain current. For F2B category, the dates haven't changed at all except for Mexico and Philippines where they have progressed for almost 10 months.

F3 category dates haven't changed for all chargeability China and India. They have remained at 1st of November 2014. For Mexico, the dates have moved forward by almost one and a half year from July 2001 to December 2002, which is a great progression. Philippines has moved forward from August 2006 to October 2006. Modest improvement there. And for F for all chargeability and China dates have not changed, but for India dates have progressed by about 2 months.

So now you might ask why did these dates did not move forward? Because of the worldwide ban. So for the last couple of weeks in the last year in this fiscal year 2026 the issuance of the green cards at the consulates have basically stalled. So they are not giving out any green cards at that con. So the people who are who are supposed to get their green cards haven't received them. So obviously they have to hold the dates because there are there's still already the demand that they need to cater to before creating any new demand.

So so because of the ban in the visa insurance or green card is insurance they have to use that somewhere else. So for most of the year there was a ban from those 75 countries. Remember those green cards were not given out. So obviously they have to make those green card available to somebody else right. So that's where the Mexico and Philippines comes into play is my speculation to use up those visa numbers. They had to create some demand in some other places and that's why Mexico and Philippines have been moved forward just speculatively.

Now family based section is really complicated because there is there are these lawsuits going on. the 75 country ban was lifted. But again, this all worldwide green card is insurance has come to a halt and that and we haven't received any update on that. We don't know what's going to happen with this ban lifting because that's not going to be in the news. So really this this is going to be an area to look at even going into the fiscal year 2027.

Now you might say where are these visa numbers that were not utilized in this? So remember the speculation that I made the conservative speculation of maybe 20 to 30,000 visa numbers and uh most optimistic scenario in which I said 94,000 spillover numbers will be available from family to employment based but again that you have to also deduct the 50,000 plus visa numbers that are pending inventory. So in effect we will know for sure in November and December but I would say roughly 40 to 45,000 visa numbers at the most will be available as pillovers and my speculation is those numbers have not been considered in the October visa bulletin maybe some have been considered but not all.

So let's keep going for now. The now let's start with the final action dates for employment based section. Now final action dates for EB1. All chargeability remains current. China has remained same at 1st of July 2023. India has progressed from 15th of October 2022 to 1st of February 2023. This is as per my expectation. Mexico and Philippines remain current for EB1. Now EB2 here's what is happening. Here's the interesting part.

EB2 was current in September visa but it has retrogressed in the October visit. Now the new date for all chargeability rest of the world EB2 is 1st of January 2025 which is a sad story actually. Now China has progressed from 1st of September 2021 to 1st of October 2021. Just one month of progression India has been unblocked. They were unavailable. their visa numbers were unavailable for most part of the last two months of 2026 but now going into 2027 October they have put a priority date which is 1st of November 2013.

Now remember what department of state had said in the previous month that in October visitin we will take the EB to India back to where it was in May visitin which would have been in July of 2014 but no as I had speculated in my realistic scenario we the numbers don't match because there is a lot of inventory pending inventory in EB2 which which still needs to be cleared out. So that's why I had very conservative estimate for EB2 India and that's exactly what happened.

The progression has only gone until 1st of November 2013. Mexico and Philippines also have a date which is also not a good story. The the reason I'm saying is because of this retrogression in all chargeability uh basically rest of the world other than India and China is that there will not be any lateral spillover into EB2. So EB2 category is going to be crawling in the next couple of months. It has the pending inventory which has to be cleared.

It has no lateral spillover. So which means that it will only be subject to those 3,000 or 4,000 visa numbers that will be available for each country. So it is very difficult time for EB2 especially India. Now let's look at EB3. EB3 has also retrogressed for all chargeability which is rest of the world. It went back from 1st of September 2024 to 15th of May 2024 which is not a good thing. Again there will be no no lateral spillover in my opinion because the demand is higher than number of visas available in the rest of the world.

Let's look at China. China has progressed by merely 7 days from 1st of January 2022 to 8th of January 2022. India has not progressed at all. First it remains at 1st of January 2014. Mexico has retrogressed from 1st of September 2024 to 1st of May 2024. Philippines has progressed by about 15 days to August of 2023. Other workers category has also retrogressed for all chargeability which is a sad news. India, China, the dates have remained same.

For Mexico, the dates have pro uh retrogressed. For Philippines, the dates have progressed. So, it's all mixed back in EB4 cate in the other workers category. And if you look at the rest of the chart, fifth unreserved category for China has remained the same. For India, it is unblocked because the visa numbers were unavailable. Now there is a date 1st of December 2023. And then the rest of the chart for final action chart is remain uh remains this remains current for EB5.

Now let's look at the filing dates for EB category. Now EB1 all chargeability remains current which is good news. China remains uh China has progressed from 1st of December 2023 to 1st of July 2024. India has progressed from 1st of December 2023 to 1st of July 2024 which is a good news because I was thinking a modest progression in October visa and and then incremental progression in November and December. But I guess they have already accounted for good chunk of demand that they are expecting and visa number availability and thus they have progressed the dates for final action chart for EB1 India.

So that's good news for EB1 India. Now the final action date has moved forward by almost 7 months. Now Mexico and Philippines remain the same remain current. EB2 all chargeability remains current. China has progressed by one full year from 1st of January 2022 to 1st of January 2023. India has remained the same at 15th of January 2015. No surprise there. Mexico and Philippines have retrogressed. Now there is a date uh associated with those with the second preference category for Mexico and Philippines.

Not a good news for India for lateral in terms of lateral spinover. EB3 for all chargeability has a date. So EB2 and EB23 both have retrogress and this has going and this is again as I said before this is going to have implications on both EB2 and EB3. There is not going to be any lateral spillover in the upcoming months until we see these dates current for all chargeability which is not a good news for EB3 as well. So China has progressed from 8th of January 2022 to 1st of April 2024.

Great progression for China. India EV3 has remained stuck at 15th of January 2015. They had moved these dates like a year back and they are not able to move them forward until they clear the backlog. Uh Mexico has uh also has a date now and Philippines has not progressed. So not a good news. The entire rest of the world is now more number of people than the visa numbers available. And one thing we can attribute to this two is that 75 country ban because nobody was able to apply for their green cards although they were eligible to apply and now those pending people are suddenly going to come into the inventory because that ban has been lifted.

So they are going to use up a lot of in lot of those visa numbers which means there is not going to be any lateral spillover for EB2 and EB3 India. Now the rest of the chart other workers category has modestly progressed for the rest of the world. Mexico and Philippines. For fourth preference category, there is a big big progression from 2023 to 2025 for China and India. For the rest of the world, for across the world for fourth preference category for a certain religious workers category also progressed by almost 2 years, unreserved category for EB5 has remained the same.

The dates are the same for China and India and the rest of the chart remains current. Now let's quickly look if there are any special notes uh other than the first note that I see availability of family sponsored and employment based visas for FY25 with the availability of FY2027 immigrant visa numbers dates for filing and final action dates have advanced across various immigrant visa categories. However, some employment based visa categories for rest of the world countries have retrogress and these retrogressions are necessary to keep the visa issuance within FY2027 quarterly and annual limits.

So they are making it clear why these categories retrogressed because there was a stop in the issuance of the green cards worldwide and now those people are going to go back into the queue to get their green cards. Those categories have been retrogressed which means there will be no spillover lateral spillover from EB2 to EB2 India or China. We are stuck with the 7% limit plus any additional visa numbers that we may get through the spillovers that are unused from EB1, EB2 that will trickle down to EB3.

That is the only consolation that EB2 and EB3 has in the upcoming months. So if you are desperate, if you are stuck in EB2 or EB3 and if you are desperate to get your green card sooner, there are only few other options such as EB1A, EB1 C and EB5. If you have a specific scenario where you must get your green card for whatever your future plans are, consult with an immigration lawyer or contact me on Calendarly and I will tell you some paths and or I will assess your situation.

What would be a what would be a best recommendation for you to go forward with getting your green card a little bit sooner in other categories. Now most important question that I am getting in my WhatsApp channel. By the way, if you haven't joined my WhatsApp channel, go and check out the link and join that channel because there is lot of conversation, meaningful conversation that is happening. I'm really glad that we built that community which filled up pretty fast by the way, but people are dropping and you might find a spot to get into that WhatsApp channel.

The other channels that I have created is Discord and Telegram. Find loads of links in the description or on the screen as well and try to join those communities as well. There is a lot of information on those channel that is going on. Now before we complete I have couple of more thoughts. Now remember I had made two predictions. One is the realistic scenario and one is the optimistic scenario. Obviously the optimistic scenario did not play out but the realistic scenario did play out which was what my expectation was.

So let's go through it what happened right and then I will also talk about where did those spillover numbers go? were they used or were they not used and what are my thoughts. So let's look at it this realistic scenario. As you can see in the October visa, I had predicted that uh the final action for EB1 would stay at January 2023. It went to February of 2023. So that's great. Okay. For filing chart for EB1 would go to December of 2023.

It actually went to July of 2024. This is based on the speculation or the speculative spillover numbers that the department of state has already considered coming in from the family based section to the employment based section. Now remember the first crack at all those spillovers those are divided up by those are divided up by the country limit but again once the country limit is reached those numbers come back to EB1.

So EB1 gets the first crack at any leftover from the spillover numbers that come in. If there are any leftovers from EB1, they go to EB2. If there are any leftovers from EB2, they go to EB3. Then they go to EB4 and EB5 and then they come back to EB1. So EB1 unless they use maximum of those visa numbers. They are not going to spill over anything to EB3 and EB EB2 and EB3. So EB1 is going to get the most benefit of all the spillovers.

So that is what is reflected in this forward progression of filing date chart for EB1 India. Now for EB2 I had predicted October of 2013. It went to November of 2013. Pretty close. Uh for filing chart I had predicted January. It will stay at January and it stayed at January. For EB3 final action I had said that it will stay at January and it did stay at January. And EB3 filing chart also stayed at January 2015. So pretty close to the realistic scenario that I had predicted.

I am expecting that the going forward this is what it's going to be. It's pretty much what I had said before except now that we know that EB1 filing dates were progressed to July I would say that now they will progress to August in November and Dece uh and December 2024 in December visa splitting. So that is what my prediction the rest of the chart you can see what it is. Now the to answer the question how did we calculate those spillover numbers okay the spillover numbers I had calculated that 50,000 visa numbers that were unused from those 75 country ban those will still be available plus any visa numbers that were unused from the ban worldwide ban that we have seen.

So I had calculated about 94,000 total spillover numbers that may come in from family based to employment based section. Now out of those as you can see on this chart we had these inventory numbers in the past about 13,455 for EB1 about 25,000 for EB2 and about 14,300 for EB3 making it total of 52,700 visa numbers that will be given out to the spending numbers from 2026. So that leaves us with approximately 40,000 spillover numbers net.

That is what I I I think has not been calculated in the October visa. Now some speculation might have been done for the EB1 in moving forward the date to July of 2024 but the rest of the chart for EB2 and EB3 has not been considered for this spillover number. If you compare the similar number of spillover like 40,000 46,000 from last year, we see a modest progression in EB2 and EB3 dates for November and December. So the chart that I will display on the screen right now is what is my speculation for November and December after considering all the spillover numbers that have come in.

Now some might ask that there is a case going on in the court where they want to hold on to these unused visa numbers from family based category and continue to use them from 2026 for that family based category. I think that is against the law that will not go ahead. The spillover must happen and they will happen. So from my perspective 40,000 spillovers net net eliminating those inventory numbers no matter what the outcomes of all these lawsuits and things are things will settle in as per the chart is my speculation.

Now will things change after November? It's anybody's guess and I will make a separate video on what would happen going forward. But thankfully now we have much more clarity on what's going to happen in the next couple of months based on what we have seen so far. Now there are some more factors that are going to affect when is this worldwide ban going to be lifted? What capacity will the consulates have to process all these backlogs from the family based section?

Will we continue to see spillovers from family based section in the upcoming years? My speculation is yes more and more so. So even though this year might be stalled and crawling especially for AB2 and EB3 I think the better days are ahead of us after a year when we'll see even more number of spillovers coming into the employment based section. What is my advice to you? If you are not documentarily complete do that first.

Now those letters that everybody has been getting regarding 485 that means that they are notifying you that your case is being worked on. Now as soon as your case becomes current file your supplement J file your medicals make it documentarily complete so that once the visa officer picks up your case there is reason for them to not make a decision on your case. So that is what I want you to do. Now there is one more question that are uh spouses and dependents calculated in this visa numbers.

Yes. Sometimes we get confused. Number of approved I140s is only the primary applicants but number of green cards available is for each and every person that includes dependents and children. So remember when you have say 100 I140s approved that means you need to have three times that number for those number of families to get their green cards approximately. And one more thing even in this visa if USCS has made some speculation on the spillover numbers they have to wait until each and every number unused is calculated which will only be available towards the end of October or November.

So that's why I'm saying the November and v December visa and we'll still see some progression which will be the correction in the number of spillovers that USCs will use to adjust those dates. So all in all family based section not so much progression for rest of the world China and India but great progression for Philippines and u Mexico and in employment based section it's mixed bag good news for EB1 but not so good news for EB2 and EB3 but we'll continue to monitor what happens in the next few months look at my speculative chart what would happen and let me know in the comment section below what you think about this if you want to reach out to me regarding your specific situation because there are a lot of scenarios that are going to play out which will impact your life, whether you want to stay in the US, whether you want to go back to your home country, whether you want to start a business, whether you want to change the job, whether you want to travel.

There are a lot of questions that will be coming into your mind looking at this visa. Let me know in the comment section below. Join my community channels. Reach out to me if you have any specific scenario that you want to discuss with me. As usual, like, comment, subscribe, and share this video to enter into the giveaway which will be announced in my next video. And if you like the content of this video, hit the like button and consider subscribing to my channel.

And I'll see you in the next one.