USCIS Reports 260,542 Principal U Visa Petitions Pending as Some 2017 Filers Report Approvals

Nearly nine years after filing, some people with July and August 2017 I-918 receipt dates say they are finally receiving U visa approvals. The reports come from private Facebook groups, not from an official USCIS processing-date announcement, and U Visa News could not independently verify them. Still, they offer a small sign of movement to people who have spent years watching nearby receipt months and wondering when their own turn will come.

The new federal numbers explain why those reports carry so much weight. At the end of December 2025, USCIS counted 260,542 principal U-1 petitions still pending. Another 172,928 petitions for derivative family members brought the combined I-918 inventory to 433,470. Against that scale, the 2,876 principal approvals recorded from October through December represent progress, but not a quick path through the line.

A 2017 receipt date is a life chapter, not merely a place in a queue. KERA News reported in 2021 on Beatriz Torres and José Jesús Ramirez, who applied in 2017 after a hit-and-run killed their 16-month-old son, Neithan, and seriously injured Ramirez. Four years after filing, their case was still pending. Torres described postponing plans for a home and being unable to work legally. Their experience at that time showed how a petition created to protect crime victims can leave a family planning around an unresolved case for years.

Before a U visa is approved, USCIS can take a first look at a case and decide it appears genuine. That step is called a bona fide determination, or BFD. It is not the visa. What it can bring is permission to work and deferred action—temporary protection from deportation—while a person keeps waiting.

Between October and December, USCIS made 8,179 of these favorable determinations: 5,128 for crime victims themselves and 3,051 for their family members. Another 4,465 cases were found not to qualify at this stage.

This matters when reading the government’s own numbers. USCIS reports a 13.3-month median for I-918 petitions, and it is easy to assume that means most people wait a little over a year for a decision. It does not. That clock measures the time from filing to the first BFD review, not the time to a final answer, which is still measured in years.

USCIS received 4,860 petitions from crime victims this quarter. Last year the average was 9,847 per quarter, so new filings were about half as high. Petitions from family members dropped further, from an average of about 7,030 per quarter to 3,024, a decline of roughly 57%.

One quarter is not a trend, and these numbers do not tell us why the drop happened.

Even so, the line got longer. More petitions came in than were completed—a difference of 1,212 cases. The number of petitions waiting at the end of December was 11,688 higher than at the end of the last fiscal year.

Congress caps U visas at 10,000 per year for crime victims. USCIS approved 2,876 in this one quarter, already more than one-quarter of the year’s supply. Later quarters may move slower or faster, but the number shows how quickly the yearly limit can come into view.

Approvals for spouses, children and other qualifying family members do not count against that 10,000.

Certain qualifying family members can have a separate Form I-929 petition. At the end of December, 1,872 of those petitions were pending, with a median processing time of 28 months. That figure is measured differently from the I-918 median above, which stops at the first BFD review rather than the final decision.

Two things are true at the same time. Approvals are happening, including reports from people who filed nearly nine years ago. And the line is still enormous.

Reports from other applicants can be encouraging, but no one else’s approval predicts yours. USCIS does not publish which month of receipts it is currently deciding, so families are left piecing together clues while work, housing and reunion plans stay tied to a process counted in years.