United States · Employment
L-1 Intracompany Transferee Visa (L-1A / L-1B)
Open
Last verified July 2026
Open, and not subject to the USD 100,000 H-1B entry fee. Proclamation 10973 of 19 September 2025 applies only to H-1B. USCIS Policy Manual guidance updated in May 2026 tightened the rules for New Office L-1 petitions. Virtual offices are generally no longer enough. Petitioners must show secured physical premises, credible funding and a real plan to start operations.
For a family that already owns an operating business abroad, L-1A to EB-1C is usually faster, cheaper and less capital-intensive than EB-5. It also skips PERM entirely. The catch is that USCIS increasingly treats small-company L-1A as presumptively a working owner rather than a manager, and EB-1C approval rates sit around 78–82%.
The facts
- Total landed cost
- USD 15–45k in filing and legal fees per transferee. The real cost is standing up and funding a genuine qualifying foreign and US entity.
- Route type
- By employment
- Timeline
- 1–8 months (Premium processing is available, at 15 business days. A blanket L visa through a consulate can move even faster, but expect scrutiny: RFE rates run around 24% for L-1A and around 26% for L-1B.)
- Physical presence
- Employment-based. You must actually work in the US role.
- Family
- Spouse, on L-2 status, which comes with work authorisationUnmarried children under 21, on L-2 status
- Permanent residency
- L-1A status maps almost directly onto EB-1C, the multinational manager or executive category, which requires no labour certification
- Citizenship
- 5 years after receiving the green card
- Language test
- English and civics, tested at naturalisation
- Dual citizenship
- Permitted
- Requirements
- One continuous year of employment with the qualifying foreign entity in the preceding three years.A qualifying corporate relationship, whether parent, subsidiary, affiliate or branch, that persists throughout.The US role must be managerial or executive for L-1A, or specialised knowledge for L-1B.For New Office: secured physical premises and credible funding.
What can go wrong
- New Office L-1A is granted for only one year initially. At extension, you must prove the US entity actually grew enough to support a genuine managerial role. Failure here has stranded many founder families.
- The qualifying foreign entity must remain operational throughout. Winding it down after the move breaks the L-1 and the EB-1C.
- Small-company L-1A cases must show management of staff or of an essential function, not the applicant doing the work themselves. This is the top denial ground.
- Blanket L is L-1A only and requires size and volume thresholds. New Office cases cannot use it.
- L-1B specialised knowledge is the most inconsistently adjudicated category at USCIS.
- L-1A is capped at 7 years total, L-1B at 5. If the EB-1C is not filed and approved in time, the family must leave.