How to Read the Visa Bulletin If You've Never Seen One Before

What the Visa Bulletin actually is

Every month, the U.S. Department of State (DOS) publishes a document called the Visa Bulletin. It tells you which green card applicants are eligible to move forward in the process based on their priority date, preference category, and country of birth. If you're waiting for an employment-based or family-based green card, this one PDF basically controls your life for however many years you're stuck in the queue.

The bulletin usually drops in the second or third week of the month before the month it covers. So the bulletin for May 2025 typically comes out sometime in mid-April 2025. This trips people up constantly because the dates on the bulletin header are one month ahead of when you're actually reading it. DOS publishes it on their website at travel.state.gov, and USCIS also posts a corresponding page that tells you which chart to use for filing.

People call it all kinds of things: the visa bulletin, the DOS bulletin, the priority date chart, the green card queue. They're all talking about the same document. It's the single most important monthly update for anyone in the employment-based or family-based green card pipeline.

Chart A vs. Chart B: why there are two tables

The bulletin has two separate charts, and this is where most of the confusion starts. Chart A is called "Final Action Dates" and Chart B is called "Dates for Filing." Chart A tells you when a visa number is actually available so your case can be approved. Chart B tells you an earlier date at which you're eligible to submit your I-485 adjustment of status application, even though the visa isn't technically final yet.

Here's the catch: USCIS decides each month whether to honor Chart B or not. They publish a separate page telling you which chart applies for the current month. Some months they say "use Chart B for employment-based categories" and other months they say "use Chart A only." You cannot just look at the DOS bulletin alone. You always need to check what USCIS says about which chart is active. For consular processing cases, the National Visa Center uses Chart A exclusively.

Why does this two-chart system exist? It's meant to let applicants get their paperwork into the system earlier, which helps USCIS manage workload and keep the pipeline moving. When Chart B is open, you can file your I-485, get a work permit (EAD), and get advance parole, even if your final green card approval is still months or years away. That can be a huge deal if you're currently on H-1B and want the flexibility to change jobs.

In practice, USCIS has been allowing Chart B for employment-based categories fairly consistently in recent years, but it's never guaranteed. Always check the current month's USCIS filing chart page before making assumptions.

Finding your preference category

The rows on the Visa Bulletin correspond to preference categories. For employment-based green cards, these are EB-1, EB-2, EB-3, EB-4, and EB-5. EB-1 is for people with extraordinary ability, outstanding professors, or multinational executives. EB-2 is for people with advanced degrees or exceptional ability. EB-3 covers professionals with bachelor's degrees, skilled workers, and other workers. EB-4 is for special immigrants (religious workers, certain government employees), and EB-5 is for investors.

For family-based green cards, the categories are F1 (unmarried adult children of U.S. citizens), F2A (spouses and minor children of permanent residents), F2B (unmarried adult children of permanent residents), F3 (married adult children of U.S. citizens), and F4 (siblings of adult U.S. citizens). Each category has its own line in the bulletin and moves at its own pace.

If you went through PERM labor certification and your employer filed an I-140 for you, your category was selected at that stage. Check your I-140 approval notice if you've forgotten. Most people going through employer sponsorship end up in EB-2 or EB-3, depending on the job requirements and whether the position required a master's degree or equivalent.

Country of chargeability: it's about birth, not citizenship

The columns on the bulletin represent chargeability areas. You'll see "All Chargeability Areas Except Those Listed," plus specific columns for China-mainland born, El Salvador/Guatemala/Honduras, India, Mexico, and Philippines. This is one of the most misunderstood parts of the whole system.

Your chargeability country is based on where you were born, not your citizenship or where you live now. If you were born in Mumbai but became a Canadian citizen ten years ago, you're still charged to India for visa bulletin purposes. If you were born in Hong Kong or Taiwan, you're not charged to China-mainland. If you were born in a country that doesn't have its own column, you fall under "All Chargeability Areas" which is the default and generally has the fastest-moving dates.

There's a cross-chargeability rule that sometimes helps. If your spouse was born in a different country, you can be charged to their country instead, if their country has a better (more current) date. This comes up a lot with India-born applicants whose spouses were born in, say, the UK or Canada. It's a legitimate option but you need to claim it at the right stage of the process.

This birth-country rule is exactly why the India and China backlogs are so severe. It's not about how many people from those countries are applying right now. It's the cumulative result of decades of applications from two countries that happen to produce large numbers of skilled workers who end up in the U.S. employment-based immigration pipeline.

Understanding priority dates and what 'current' means

Your priority date is essentially your place in line. For employment-based cases, it's typically the date your PERM labor certification application was filed with the Department of Labor. For some EB-1 and EB-2 National Interest Waiver cases that skip PERM, it's the date the I-140 petition was filed. For family cases, it's the date the I-130 petition was filed.

When the bulletin shows a date like "01MAR19" under your category and country, it means applications with priority dates before March 1, 2019 are eligible to move forward. If your priority date is February 15, 2019, you're good. If it's March 15, 2019, you're not there yet. If the bulletin shows a "C" instead of a date, that means "Current" and everyone in that category and country can file regardless of their priority date. If it shows a "U," that means "Unavailable" and nobody can file.

Say your priority date is March 15, 2019, and you're filing under EB-3 for China-mainland born. You'd look at Chart A (or Chart B, depending on what USCIS says for that month), find the EB-3 row, find the China-mainland born column, and check the date. If the date shown is 01APR19 or later, your date is current under that chart. If it shows 01FEB19, your date is not current yet and you need to keep waiting.

Dates in the bulletin move forward most months, but they can also retrogress, meaning they move backward. This happens when DOS realizes too many people have filed or are about to file in a given category. Retrogression can be brutal. You might see your date become current one month and then jump back six months the next. This is why experienced applicants watch the bulletin like hawks and don't delay filing when their date is current.

When the bulletin comes out and how to stay on top of it

DOS doesn't publish the bulletin on a fixed calendar date. Based on historical patterns, it usually shows up between the 8th and 15th of the month, but it's been as early as the 5th and as late as the 22nd. The bulletin for a given month (say June 2025) will come out in the previous month (May 2025). There's no email notification from DOS, so people end up refreshing the travel.state.gov page obsessively or relying on immigration forums and tracking sites to alert them.

Once the DOS bulletin is out, USCIS typically posts their filing chart guidance within a few days, though sometimes it takes longer. The USCIS page is what actually tells you whether you can use Chart B or are stuck with Chart A that month. Until USCIS posts their guidance, you know what DOS says but you don't know which chart USCIS will accept.

For each month, the sequence is: DOS publishes the bulletin, immigration lawyers and forums start analyzing it, USCIS publishes which chart to use, and then applicants have the rest of the month to act. If you're close to current, you want to have your documents, medical exam, and forms ready to go so you can file as soon as the window opens.

Common mistakes and how to avoid them

The single most common mistake is looking at the wrong chart. People see their date is current on Chart B, get excited, file their I-485, and then realize USCIS said to use Chart A that month. Your application might get rejected or sit in limbo. Always verify the active chart on the USCIS website before filing anything.

Another frequent mistake is confusing country of citizenship with country of birth. I've seen people born in India who are now Australian citizens assume they fall under "All Chargeability Areas." They don't. Birth country is what matters, period. The only exception is the cross-chargeability option through a spouse born in a different country.

People also get tripped up by the month labeling. The "June 2025" bulletin is for visa availability in June 2025, but it's published in May 2025. If someone tells you "the new bulletin is out" in April, they're talking about the May bulletin. It sounds obvious, but when you're stressed and waiting on a date that controls your entire immigration status, small details like this cause real confusion.

One more thing: the bulletin is not a prediction. It's a statement of current availability for that month only. Last month's forward movement doesn't guarantee this month will move forward too. Visa availability is based on demand, annual per-country limits, and DOS's internal estimates of how many cases will be adjudicated. Treat each month's bulletin as a fresh data point.