H-1B Denial Rates 2009-2023: The Full USCIS History in One Table

One in Four, Then One in Fifty

In 2018 almost one in four first-time H-1B petitions was refused. Four years later it was one in forty-five. Nothing about the applicants changed that much — which tells you how little a denial rate says about you, and how much it says about the year.

9 November 2026 2 min read Visas

People talk about H-1B odds as though they are a fixed property of the visa. They are not. We pulled every annual file USCIS publishes — fiscal years 2009 to 2023 — and totalled the approvals and denials.

The rate moved by a factor of eleven inside seven years.

The complete series

Fiscal year	Initial approvals	Initial denials	Initial denial rate	Continuing denial rate
2009	99,790	18,099	15.35%	5.87%
2010	84,038	7,352	8.04%	4.53%
2011	114,863	8,583	6.95%	2.85%
2012	140,809	7,401	4.99%	3.03%
2013	130,736	9,596	6.84%	2.69%
2014	130,616	10,645	7.54%	2.94%
2015	111,846	7,644	6.40%	2.98%
2016	105,092	11,295	9.70%	4.45%
2017	96,166	14,518	13.12%	5.24%
2018	87,889	28,181	24.28%	11.83%
2019	132,967	35,633	21.13%	11.67%
2020	122,894	18,276	12.95%	6.65%
2021	141,194	5,667	3.86%	2.28%
2022	138,381	3,132	2.21%	1.93%

From 6.40% in FY2015 to 24.28% in FY2018 to 2.21% in FY2022. The same visa, the same statute, the same kind of applicant.

The part that hurt most

Look at the last column rather than the headline one.

In FY2018, 11.83% of continuing petitions were refused — nearly one in eight. In FY2015 it had been 2.98%, and by FY2022 it was 1.93%.

A continuing petition is an extension for someone already in the United States, already approved at least once, usually in the same job at the same employer. Those are people with apartments, car loans, school places and spouses on H-4. A one-in-eight refusal rate on that population is a different kind of event from a hard year for new applicants.

In FY2018 and FY2019 together, 67,045 continuing petitions were refused. That is the number behind a great many abrupt departures from the US.

What actually changed

Not the applicants. Initial approvals in FY2018 were 87,889 against 111,846 in FY2015 — fewer people getting through, from a pool that had not shrunk. The adjudication standard moved, and then moved back.

This is why a single year's denial rate is a weak signal about an employer and a weaker one about you. The firms that look risky in one file look safe in another. Our employer-level table uses FY2022 — a historically permissive year — and the same employers carried five to ten times those rates four years earlier.

How to read this if you are deciding now

Treat current rates as a floor, not a forecast. FY2022's 2.21% is the lowest in fifteen years of published data. The series says conditions tighten as well as loosen.
Weight the continuing column when you plan. Your first petition is one event; your extensions are many, and they are the ones that catch you mid-life.
Prefer employers who file well in bad years, not good ones. Anyone looks clean at 2%. Ask how their petitions fared in FY2018 and FY2019 — a firm that kept its people through that period is telling you something a current table cannot.
Keep the structural options open. Cap-exempt employers and the green card track both reduce how many times you have to roll this dice.

What this data cannot tell you

These totals are the sum of the per-employer rows USCIS publishes, so they count petitions decided in each fiscal year rather than people, and an individual may appear more than once across years.

FY2023 is excluded from the table. Its file contains 38,315 initial approvals against FY2022's 138,381 — roughly a quarter of the volume — and appears to be a partial-year export rather than a full year, so its rate is not comparable with the rest of the series.

The file does not say why anything was refused. Requests for evidence, specialty-occupation findings, worksite arrangements and employer-employee relationship questions all end in the same denial column. Attributing the swing to any single policy is beyond what this data supports — what it shows is the size and timing of the swing.

Questions

What is the highest H-1B denial rate ever recorded?

In the USCIS Employer Data Hub series covering fiscal years 2009 to 2023, the peak was FY2018 at 24.28% of initial petitions — 28,181 denials against 87,889 approvals. Continuing petitions that year were refused at 11.83%.

What is the current H-1B denial rate?

In FY2022, the most recent complete year published for download, initial petitions were refused at 2.21% and continuing petitions at 1.93%. Those are the lowest figures in the fifteen-year published series.

Were H-1B extensions also harder to get?

Yes, and that was the sharpest part of the swing. Continuing petitions — extensions for people already working in the US — were refused at 2.98% in FY2015, 11.83% in FY2018 and 11.67% in FY2019, before falling to 1.93% by FY2022. Across FY2018 and FY2019 together, 67,045 continuing petitions were refused.

Does a low denial rate today mean H-1B is safe?

It means conditions are currently permissive. FY2022's 2.21% is the lowest in fifteen years of published data, and the same series shows the rate rising from 6.40% to 24.28% in three years between FY2015 and FY2018. Treat current rates as a snapshot of a policy era rather than a forecast.

Why is fiscal year 2023 not in the table?

The FY2023 file USCIS publishes for download contains 38,315 initial approvals against FY2022's 138,381 — about a quarter of the volume — which indicates a partial-year export rather than a complete year. Including it would distort the series.

Note: This is general information drawn from official sources, not legal or immigration advice. Immigration rules change and individual cases differ — confirm your own position with the official source linked above or a licensed attorney before acting.