- within Immigration topic(s)
- in United States
- within Insurance and Transport topic(s)
On Sept. 16, 2025, the U.S. Department of State (DOS) officially announced that all available immigrant visas in the Employment-Based Fifth Preference (EB-5) unreserved category have been issued for Fiscal Year (FY) 2025. The unreserved category does not include the set-aside visa categories enumerated under the EB-5 Reform and Integrity Act of 2022 (RIA), including the visas for high unemployment areas, rural areas, and infrastructure projects (the reserved categories) where the EB-5 investor filed the I-526 or I-526E Petition after March 2022.
The unreserved visas are capped annually under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). Specifically, INA 203(b)(5) allocates 7.1% of the worldwide employment-based visa limit to EB-5 visas. Of this, 68% is designated for unreserved categories, which include:
- C5 (Direct Investment)
- T5 (Targeted Employment Area)
- I5 (Regional Center)
- R5 (Rural Area)
- RU and NU (Other subcategories)
Additionally, the RIA allows for unused reserved EB-5 visas from FY 2023 to be reallocated to the unreserved pool for FY 2025. These reallocated visas also have been included in the total count and the annual limit that has been reached includes these unused reserved EB-5 visas.
Impact on Investors
U.S. embassies and consulates will no longer issue EB-5 unreserved visas for the remainder of FY 2025, which ends on Sept. 30, 2025. This pause affects EB-5 investors in the unreserved EB-5 category who have not yet received their visas. However, the annual visa limits will reset with the start of FY 2026 on Oct. 1, 2025, and U.S. embassies and consulates will resume issuing immigrant visas in the EB-5 unreserved categories to qualified investors. For those investors who have been scheduled for an immigrant visa interview between Sept. 16 and Sept. 30, 2025, EB-5 investors should be prepared to attend the interview unless they receive a cancellation notice from the U.S. embassy or consulate.
For more detailed information, please refer to the DOS alert.
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