Company logo
Search
Company logo
Part 1 of 3

Who wins the H-1B lottery?

The H-1B is the main US temporary work visa for college-educated foreign professionals. Employers want far more of them than Congress allows, so the visas are allocated via lottery. Federal records obtained under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) cover 363,024 approved petitions from the four FY2021–24 lotteries, and they reveal a group that differs from the US working-age population in many respects. Part one of this series examines their demographic makeup, including their age, gender, and country of birth.

H-1B Worker Demographics

Approved H-1B petitions, FY2021–24
31
median age
a decade younger than the US working-age population, median 42
67%
are men
the US working-age population splits almost evenly
67%
born in India
with China, more than 80% of the total
71%
age 25–34
vs about 23% of the US working-age population
How the lottery works

The odds are one in five

The H-1B is the largest US temporary work visa for foreign professionals in “specialty occupations.” This means a job that requires a bachelor’s degree or higher in that specific field. H-1B visa holders range from software engineers to accountants to doctors. Congress caps new visas at 85,000 a year: 65,000, plus 20,000 for people holding a graduate degree from a US university. Employers submit registrations for far more, so each spring the government runs a lottery. Across the four FY2021–24 lotteries, employers submitted 1.8 million registrations; about one in five ended in an approved H-1B petition. Those 363,024 approvals are the basis for the analysis that follows.

Read more

Employers, not workers, enter the lottery. A company submits a registration naming each person it wants to sponsor (the “beneficiary”), and US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) draws winners from eligible registrations. Each registration drawn allows one petition to be filed for that worker, and the worker can take the job only if USCIS ultimately approves the petition.

Employers submitted 1,847,661 registrations across the four FY2021–24 lotteries, of which 1,804,286 met USCIS eligibility requirements. Just under a third were drawn in the lottery. A petition was filed on two-thirds of those draws — some employers did not end up submitting petitions, despite winning the draw — and one registration in five ended in an approved petition. The following analysis is based on the 363,024 approved petitions that meet our sample criteria, which the notes set out in full. Universities and research organizations are not part of these data as they are exempt from the cap and hire outside the lottery.

Profiles

Three groups, three profiles

The US native-born and foreign-born working-age populations differ in age but otherwise look broadly alike. Approved H-1B petitions differ from both on nearly every measure: the median age is 31, 67 percent of the petitions went to male workers, and the most common level of education is a master’s degree.

Approved H-1B petitions, next to the US native-born and foreign-born populations
Working ages 20–64
US native-born
Age41
% Men50%
EducationHigh school or less
US foreign-born
Age44
% Men50%
EducationHigh school or less
Approved H-1B petitions
Age31
% Men67%
EducationMaster’s degree
Source: H-1B: USCIS petition records obtained under FOIA, FY2021–24, approved petitions. US native-born and foreign-born: Census Bureau, CPS ASEC 2022 (age and gender from Table 1.1, education from Table 1.5). Each card shows the group’s median age, its gender distribution, and its most common highest degree.
Additional notes & methods

US native-born. A US citizen at birth: born in the fifty states or the District of Columbia, born in Puerto Rico or a US island area, or born abroad to a US-citizen parent.

US foreign-born. Everyone who was not a US citizen at birth, whether or not they have naturalized since.

What is being measured. Age and gender describe ages 20 to 64; education describes age 25 and over, the standard Census universe for schooling. The age shown is each group’s median. Age and gender are recorded on every approved petition; highest degree on 82.6 percent of them, and on 82.4 percent of those age 25 and over — the universe the education row uses.

Origins

67% were born in India

The US foreign-born population comes from all over the world, and no single country dominates it. The largest country of origin, Mexico, accounts for 22 percent of the total. Approved H-1B petitions differ in this respect. Two-thirds of them name someone born in India, and another 15 percent someone born in China. Together, the two countries make up more than 80 percent of the approved petitions.

Country of birth: approved H-1B petitions and the US foreign-born population
Share of each group by country of birth · FY2021–24
IndiaChinaMexicoOthersApproved H-1B petitionsIndia 67%China 15%Others 19%US foreign-born6%5%Mexico 22%Others 67%0%25%50%75%100%Each bar splits the group by country of birth; “Others” is every remaining country.
Source: H-1B: USCIS petition records obtained under FOIA, FY2021–24, approved petitions. US foreign-born: Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2024 1-year, table B05006, national. Each bar splits 100% of the group by country of birth.
Additional notes & methods

The US foreign-born bar. Every share on it is a share of the 50.2 million foreign-born residents the survey counted in 2024.

China definition. China only, excluding Hong Kong and Taiwan, on both bars, so that the two bars are measured the same way. “Others” is every remaining country.

Rounding. Each label is rounded from its own exact share, so a bar’s labels may not sum to 100. Hovering or tapping a segment shows its share to one decimal.

Age & gender

Young and mostly men

Compared with the US working-age population, approved H-1B petitions go disproportionately to young workers: 71 percent name someone age 25 to 34, the early-career years. Just 23 percent of the US working-age population falls in that bracket.

The gender balance is just as lopsided: 67 percent of approved petitions are for men, whereas the US working-age population divides almost evenly.

Approved H-1B petitions go disproportionately to younger and male workers relative to the US working-age population
Percentage of each group by age bracket and gender · FY2021–24
US total working-age populationApproved petitions, menApproved petitions, womenMENWOMEN0055101015152020252555-6450-5445-4940-44635-3912430-34211125-29241520-24
Source: H-1B: USCIS petition records obtained under FOIA, FY2021–24, approved petitions. US total population (age 20–64): Census Bureau, CPS ASEC 2022, Table 1.1.
Additional notes & methods

The outline. The total US population age 20–64, including naturalized citizens and noncitizens.

The bottom line

Approved H-1B petitions go to people who look very different from the US working-age population:

  • They are younger: a median age of about 31, roughly a decade younger than the US working-age population median age of 42; 71 percent are age 25–34, compared to about 23 percent of the US working-age population.
  • They are mostly men: 67 percent of approved petitions went to male workers, whereas the US working-age population is 50 percent men.
  • They come overwhelmingly from one place: 67 percent were born in India and more than 80 percent were born in India or China, whereas the US foreign-born population as a whole comes from everywhere (its largest country of origin, Mexico, makes up just 22 percent of the foreign-born population).
Notes
About these figures

The H-1B statistics on this page are based on 363,024 approved petitions from the FY2021–24 H-1B lotteries.

The H-1B process begins with a registration, submitted by an employer into an online system, that puts a candidate’s name forward for consideration. Because there are far more candidates than visas, US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) runs a lottery to select who is allowed to move forward. An employer whose registration is selected may then file a petition, and the worker can take the job only once USCIS approves that petition.

The data are individual approved petitions filed by US employers that meet the sample criteria below. One worker could be registered by several employers and in more than one year, so a single person can appear more than once.

The rules have since changed. The FY2021–24 lotteries described here drew registrations at random. From FY2025 on, USCIS has drawn unique beneficiaries rather than registrations, which sharply reduced multiple registrations, and from FY2027 on, the draw is to be weighted toward higher-paid jobs.

How do we construct the sample?

In total, 1,847,661 registrations were submitted across the four lotteries. USCIS removed 43,375 before releasing the data (same-employer duplicates, registrations deleted before the filing period closed, invalid passport or travel-document information, and failed payments), leaving 1,804,286 eligible registrations, which is what the FOIA files contain.

We dropped 139 rows redacted by USCIS in full, since they contain no information. We drop 907 observations whose beneficiaries were not of working age 20–64 at registration: 638 with a plausible birth year but an age outside the band; and 269 whose birth year is unusable. That leaves 1,803,240 working-age registrations.

Of those, 571,926 were selected via the lottery. Selection is only an invitation to file: employers actually filed an H-1B petition (Form I-129) for 376,348 of them. From these we keep only ordinary new cap filings: petitions for new employment, in the standard H-1B classification, entered under either the regular (bachelor’s) cap or the US advanced-degree (master’s) cap. We drop 740 petitions that fail one of these checks (extensions, transfers, and amendments; other classifications; or a cap question that marks neither cap), leaving 375,608. Finally, we keep only the petitions USCIS approved, dropping 12,584 (11,030 denied and 1,554 still pending). That leaves the 363,024 approved petitions shown throughout.

Do the characteristics of the approved petitions resemble those of the pool of registrations?

The lottery drew at random, so those selected should resemble the pool they were drawn from, and on age and gender they do. Between registration and approval, the median age moves from 32 to 31, and the share who are men from 69 percent to 67 percent.

Country of birth is the exception, as a result of the discrepancy between the registrations drawn in the lottery and the petitions employers ultimately file. India accounts for 77 percent of registrations and 75 percent of selections, but only 67 percent of petitions filed. This effect occurs mostly because a worker registered by several employers can be drawn more than once but usually ends up with only one petition filed on their behalf.

Definitions

Each field below is followed by the share of the 363,024 approved petitions on which it is recorded.

Age. 100 percent. Age at registration: the lottery fiscal year minus the birth year on the registration. The sample is limited to ages 20–64.

Gender. 100 percent. As recorded on the registration.

Country of birth. 100 percent. As recorded on the registration. China means China only, excluding Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Highest degree. 82.6 percent. The beneficiary’s highest degree as reported on the petition.

Sources

USCIS FOIA H-1B registrations and I-129 petitions (FY2021–24). US comparisons: Census Bureau Current Population Survey, 2022 ASEC (age and gender from Table 1.1, education from Table 1.5, both by nativity and citizenship) and American Community Survey, 2024 1-year, table B05006 (foreign-born population by country of birth).

Replication

The underlying data, the code behind every figure on this page, and the full method notes are available on request.

For questions or comments, please reach out to the Hoover Immigration team at hooverimmigration@stanford.edu.

Expand
overlay image