not only developers. in 2.5 years that I have been following this category I have seen everything and more.

People from Asia, South America and Africa all want to go to usa. It’s simple.

Could you share more insight？ @Anto A

@B B but they didn’t start to go to the US this year

@Lynn Ding they started from 2023 November. Before 2022, 10000 NIW EB2 application per year. Now 80000 NIW EB2 application per year. In one year, they can offer may be 30000 green card per year. 50% of them goes to kids and spouse of applicant. So, they can’t offer green card more than 15000 per year for NIW EB2, my estimate, EB2 also involves application with industry sponsorship in addition to NIW EB2. All students inside the USA from Asia, Africa and South America are trying to get green card from NIW EB2. Also all students from Asia, Africa, South America who did PhD in European countries are also applying for green card under this category. so we don’t have enough green card. Until you do premium processing, they are not giving decisions for NIW EB2 applications nowadays. When someone with one wife and 2 kids apply for green card, he will occupy the 4 green cards of NIW EB2. So they don’t have enough green cards for EB2 category. If your profile is good enough, try EB1 where they have enough green cards. Or try premium processing and be prepare for RFE as REF is common nowadays if you request premium processing.

@B B Thank you for the sharing. So the huge increase was caused by the increase of international students inside and outside of US? My guess is the layoff of SDEs. Becaue the trends of layoff and niw surge matches.

@Lynn Ding before 2022, PhD students used to wait for few publications and 50 citations to apply for NIW EB2. Now they are applying with one/two papers with 5/10 citations. Most of people don’t want to return their country after graduation. PhD requires 5 to 7 years and it is enough time to disconnect you from your country so people would love to stay in USA permanently after graduation, therefore all the blame goes to applicants, you apply first, then share in social media with friends, they also apply and now everyone is applying, if you have gathering inside the university, all international students are talking about citations and NIW EB2 green card.

@B B is right. also many aggressive lawyers specially from South America promised eb2 niw green card as a piece of cake. back in 2021-2023 that was very easy to get the approval because of the Biden administration policy very favorable to immigration (stem degree -> niw almost automatic), but now the new administration closed the floodgate.

@Lynn Ding I don't think the layoff of sde is the reason of this backlog. those are mostly Indians who have their specific category. it's really mostly the Biden administration as I said above, plus the premium processing which started the backlog, plus other things like the end of COVID etc. i guess USCIS has its monthly target of i140 to process and it's overwhelmed and very behind, but I agree that 2 years is insane.