The visas granted to immigrants in the United States are called “green cards.” These cards allow legal residence to foreigners on different bases. There are five types of employment-based green cards: EB 1, EB 2, EB 3, EB 4, and EB 5. Consult an EB-1 Visa attorney Dallas to secure first preference employment-based green cards.
Difference
The EB-1 green card is a type of employment-based visa granted to foreigners because they display extraordinary abilities in their respective fields. The extraordinary ability of the cardholder must be proved by valid evidence in the fields of science, arts, business, or athletics. The fields are unlimited. The Eb-2 visa card is granted to professionals with advanced degrees or exceptional expertise in science, arts, business, etc.
EB-1 Processing Time
Generally, the EB-1 green card takes less processing time than the time taken for EB-2. This happens due to the following reasons:
There is no requirement for PERM certification in the case of EB-1 Green Cards, which reduces the processing time.
All the origin countries of applicants are given current priority dates. This facilitates the availability of visa numbers in the same month the petition is filed.
As a result of these reasons, the applicants only have to wait for the review and processing of the I-140 petition. The time taken for processing depends on how occupied your local USCIS center is. It generally takes a few weeks to several months to complete.
EB2 Green Card Processing Time
The EB-2 processing time is comparatively slow compared to the time taken for processing EB-1 visas. This is due to the mandate of Labor Certification and the reason that visa applicants from India and China must wait for several years before their priority dates become current.
The USCIS only issues about 140,000 employment-based visas every year. As a result, lower preference categories are required to wait for some time before visa numbers are available. This results in an even longer time for visa processing of Eb-2 applicants and other applicants for lower preference visas.
Applicants are suggested to wait for their LCA approval before filing an I-140 by their employers. After that, they will be required to wait for the DOS announcement regarding their priority date. In case an applicant’s priority date is not current for a certain period, USCIS will keep your processing on hold until your priority date is near.
Most applicants must wait a few months or even years for the application for status adjustment (I-485). This delays the process and causes an even longer time for processing EB-2 green cards.
