Trackers / The queue, visualized
The queue, visualized
About 1,264,495 people were waiting for an employment-based green card at the end of 2025. Each dot below is 1,000 of them.
Roughly 79% of the whole line was born in one country, India, because no country can receive more than 7% of green cards in a year.
Compare your wait by country → · What a 179-year wait means →
How this works
Counts come from the National Foundation for American Policy's analysis of December 2025 government data, as reported by the Cato Institute and Day1CPT. They include workers and their family members in EB-1, EB-2 and EB-3. The Philippines figure is the reported EB-3 count; 'everyone else' is the remainder of the total. Updated when NFAP publishes new figures.
- Cato Institute: Employment-based backlog exceeds 1.2 million people
- Day1CPT: Indian EB-2 wait could reach 179 years (NFAP, Aug 2026)
An estimate, not legal advice. Your own case can differ; talk to an immigration attorney before acting on it.