EB-2 India Is Unavailable Until October: What the July 2026 Visa Bulletin Just Did

The June bulletin warned that "unavailable" was on the table. The July 2026 visa bulletin used the word.

EB-2 India's Final Action Date is gone. Not retrogressed, gone. The chart shows "U", and Section F spells it out: "India's pro-rated EB-2 limit was reached and the category is unavailable for the remainder of FY 2026".

That means no EB-2 India green card approvals in July, August, or September. No immigrant visa issuance at consulates, no I-485 approvals at USCIS, no new EB-2 India I-485 filings. The category is dark until the FY 2027 numbers arrive on October 1, 2026.

If that sentence made your stomach drop, keep reading. The mechanics are less scary than the headline, DOS put an unusual promise about October in writing, and the rest of the bulletin actually moved forward.

The Movements

Here's what changed from June to July in the employment-based Final Action Dates.

Notice the pattern? India's top two categories got cut while nearly everything else advanced. EB-5 India unreserved also went unavailable per Section I. EB-2 China held at September 1, 2021, EB-3 Philippines held at August 1, 2023, and F2A didn't move.

That's not random. DOS is steering the remaining FY 2026 numbers away from the buckets that are empty and into the buckets that still have room.

What "Unavailable" Actually Means for You

We walked through this scenario in the June retrogression analysis when it was still a warning. Now it's real, so here's the operational version.

Your pending I-485 stays pending. USCIS doesn't deny it, close it, or send it anywhere. It sits in the queue until numbers come back, then adjudication resumes in priority date order.

Your EAD and Advance Parole keep working. Both are tied to the pending I-485, not to visa number availability. Renewals keep getting the 540-day auto-extension if you file before expiration.

AC21 portability keeps running. The 180-day clock on your pending I-485 doesn't pause, and job changes to same-or-similar roles remain available once you're past it.

H-1B extensions beyond year six keep working. Your approved I-140 still supports three-year extensions under AC21 106(a) and 104(c). Unavailability changes none of that.

So a dark category pauses the finish line. It doesn't touch your work authorization, your travel document, or your job mobility. The people actually hurt by July's bulletin are the ones whose EAD renewal is sitting unfiled on the kitchen table.

The October Floor DOS Put in Writing

Here's the part most coverage is skimming past. Section F doesn't just turn the lights off. It tells you where the switch is.

"It is likely that in October the final action date will advance to at least the final action date announced in the May 2026 Visa Bulletin".

The May 2026 EB-2 India Final Action Date was July 15, 2014. DOS just told you, in the bulletin itself, that October should open at or past that date. That's about 10.5 months ahead of where EB-2 India stood in June before it went dark.

DOS hedges, of course. The actual date "is dependent on the demand for EB-2 numbers by Indian applicants and the FY 2027 annual limit". But this kind of forward guidance is rare, and it's the same playbook as EB-1 India last year: that category went unavailable at the end of FY 2025 and reopened on October 1, 2025 once the new fiscal year's numbers arrived.

What do you do with a written floor? You get filing-ready. If your EB-2 India priority date is before July 15, 2014, treat October 1 as your deadline to have the whole I-485 package assembled: medical exam signed, tax documents gathered, translations done, photos taken, application drafted.

Fiscal-year-rollover windows tend to be short. The April 2026 bulletin jumped EB-2 India 10 months forward, and within two bulletins the date had retrogressed past its starting point and then gone dark. If October opens a window, plan to file in weeks, not months.

EB-1 India: Two Cuts in Two Months

EB-1 India retrogressed to October 15, 2022. That's 2 more months on top of June's cut, and 5.5 months below the April 2026 peak of April 1, 2023.

Section E repeats the June warning almost word for word: further retrogression "or making the category unavailable" may be necessary if India's pro-rated EB-1 limit is reached before September 30. Given that DOS just followed through on the identical warning for EB-2, take it literally.

If you have an approved EB-1 I-140 with an India priority date, here's what the wait after approval actually looks like. The short version: your priority date is locked, retrogression can't take it away, and the FY 2027 reset should pull EB-1 India forward again in October.

One quiet bright spot: EB-1 China advanced 2 months to June 1, 2023, its first move since April. China-born EB-1 applicants are being handed the numbers India can't use.

The EB-3 Downgrade Window Just Got Wider

In June, EB-3 India was 3.5 months ahead of EB-2 India and we called the downgrade lever "quietly reopened". July changed the math entirely.

EB-3 India's Final Action Date is January 1, 2014, and it advanced this month. EB-2 India's is "U". A category with a date beats a category without one, full stop.

If your EB-2 PERM priority date is earlier than January 1, 2014, an EB-3 downgrade puts you in a lane where green cards are being approved right now, this month, while your EB-2 lane is closed until at least October. The mechanics haven't changed: same PERM, same priority date, new I-140 filed under EB-3.

Two honest caveats. First, a new I-140 takes time or premium processing money, and the FY 2026 clock runs out on September 30 anyway, so a downgrade filed today is really a bet on FY 2027 positioning in both categories.

Second, if enough EB-2 India applicants pile into EB-3, the EB-3 date retrogresses. That's exactly what happened in the 2022-2023 downgrade wave. The lever works best for people who move before the crowd does.

Run the numbers with your attorney. The band of priority dates where this makes sense is wider than it's been at any point this fiscal year.

Why Everything Else Advanced

The same bulletin that zeroed out EB-2 India gave EB-3 China almost 5 months, EB-3 worldwide 2 months, and EB-1 China 2 months. What gives?

Section D explains it. Immigrant visa issuance from certain countries has dropped under Presidential Proclamations 10949 and 10998, so DOS has been advancing dates elsewhere to make sure the FY 2026 numbers actually get used before they expire on September 30. We dug into that redistribution mechanic in the Section D deep dive.

The flip side of "use it or lose it" is that DOS overshoots. Section D warns that retrogression may be necessary "in the upcoming months to keep issuances within annual limits", and Sections G and H specifically name EB-2 China and EB-3 Philippines as candidates for retrogression or unavailability before the fiscal year ends.

If you're China-born in EB-2 or Philippines-born in EB-3 with a current or near-current date, the same advice we gave India applicants in May applies to you now: file while the window is open. Warnings in this bulletin have a track record of coming true the following month.

Chart Selection: Still Final Action Dates

USCIS confirmed it will honor the Final Action Dates chart for employment-based I-485 filings in July, the third straight month on Chart A.

That matters because EB-2 India's Dates for Filing entry still reads January 15, 2015 on paper. Don't be fooled: with USCIS on Chart A and the Chart A value at "U", there's no new EB-2 India I-485 filing this month, period. If you're new to the two-chart system, here's which date actually matters.

A Chart B reopening before October is hard to imagine with two India categories dark. The realistic next decision point is the October bulletin and its chart determination, usually published at uscis.gov/visabulletininfo a few days after DOS posts the bulletin in mid-September.

Quick Reference: July 2026 vs June 2026

The employment-based Dates for Filing chart didn't move. F2A stays Current for filing across the board.

What To Do This Week

If you have a pending EB-2 India I-485: Nothing about your case changed except the approval timeline. Check your EAD and Advance Parole expiration dates today, and file any renewal that's inside the six-month window.

If your EB-2 India priority date is before July 15, 2014: DOS wrote you an October floor. Spend August and September assembling the complete I-485 package so you can file the week the window opens.

If your EB-2 India priority date is before January 1, 2014: You have the stronger version of the same play, plus a live EB-3 downgrade option right now. Talk to your attorney about which lane, or both.

If you're China-born in EB-2 or Philippines-born in EB-3: Sections G and H put you on notice. If your date is current or close, file before the September crunch. June's warning to India became July's unavailability.

If you're India-born and still deciding on a pathway: July is the clearest illustration yet of why a second, self-petitioned lane matters. EB-1A and EB-2 NIW keep your case moving on your own evidence instead of a category that just proved it can go dark with 90 days left in the fiscal year.

FAQ

Bottom Line

The July 2026 bulletin did what June's Section E said it might: EB-2 India ran out of FY 2026 numbers and went unavailable, EB-1 India got cut another 2 months to October 15, 2022, and EB-5 India unreserved went dark alongside. Meanwhile DOS pushed the spare capacity outward, advancing EB-1 China, EB-3 China, and EB-3 worldwide.

The two dates that matter for the next 75 days are January 1, 2014 and July 15, 2014. The first is EB-3 India's live Final Action Date, which defines who can act right now through a downgrade. The second is the floor DOS itself set for EB-2 India's October reopening, which defines who should spend the rest of the summer getting filing-ready.

Want to see how a dark EB-2 lane changes your overall picture? The comparison tool runs every employment-based and family-based pathway against the July 2026 dates for your country of birth and visa status, including the self-petition routes that don't depend on a category staying open.