How USCIS decides which chart adjustment applicants may file on
Written by Paulo Henrique · Last reviewed 2026-09-01
The Visa Bulletin publishes both charts every month. It does not say which one an adjustment of status applicant may file on. That decision belongs to USCIS, is made monthly, and appears on the USCIS website rather than in the bulletin itself.
This trips people up because the two documents look like one process. They are not. A bulletin can be released with a generous Dates for Filing chart, and USCIS can decline to use it that month, and both things are entirely normal.
The rule USCIS states
USCIS compares the number of immigrant visas it expects to be available in the fiscal year against the number of applicants it already knows about. Where there are more visas available than known applicants, it accepts the Dates for Filing chart, because there is room to bring more cases into the pipeline. Where the known demand already meets or exceeds supply, it uses Final Action Dates, because adding filings would only lengthen a queue that is already longer than the numbers.
That is the whole logic. It is a supply-and-known-demand test, decided fresh each month, and it explains why the answer moves around: known demand changes as filings arrive, and expected supply changes as the year is consumed.
It is decided per chart, not per month
USCIS makes the determination separately for the employment-based and family-sponsored charts. It is ordinary for a month to accept Dates for Filing for family cases and Final Action Dates for employment cases, or the reverse. Reading one and assuming the other is a reliable way to file at the wrong time.
Where to look, and when
USCIS publishes the determination on its own adjustment of status filing charts page, usually within a few days of the bulletin being released and effective for the same month. The bulletin comes first; the USCIS decision follows.
Consular processing is not affected by any of this. The National Visa Center uses Dates for Filing to decide when to request documents, and Final Action Dates govern issuance. There is no monthly USCIS determination in that route because USCIS is not the agency issuing the visa.
What it does not change
- It does not change your priority date.
- It does not change the Final Action Date, which still has to be reached before anything is approved.
- It does not create a visa number. Filing early on the Dates for Filing chart puts a case on file; it does not put a number behind it.
- It does not carry over. A determination applies to the month it was made for.
What it does change is real enough: filing an I-485 unlocks work and travel authorisation applications and, for many people, the ability to change employers under portability rules once the application has been pending long enough. That is why the monthly determination is worth watching even though it moves nobody forward in the queue.
This site records the USCIS determination alongside an issue where it has been transcribed, and states the rule where it has not. Both charts for the current issue
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