I-140 Final-Stage Waits Hold Near 21 Days, Down 67% From Last Year

The 21-day median is a one-day nudge from last week's 20 days, a move well within the normal week-to-week scatter of the past 12 weeks, which has ranged from 16 to 31 days. Against that backdrop, the week-over-week change is not a signal of acceleration; it is the ordinary variation of a process that has been running fast since mid-summer. The 12-week trailing average of 20 days confirms that this week is essentially on trend.

The 8-week regression slope of +1.1 days per week points mildly upward, but the R² of 0.50 is in the moderate range, meaning the linear fit leaves roughly half the weekly variance unexplained. The 12-week window itself spans 16 to 31 days, which conveys the realistic spread more honestly than any single projected number. The upward drift is worth tracking, but it has not yet produced a consistent pattern the data can confirm with confidence.

The arc over 12 weeks tells the main story. The median opened at 31 days in the week of June 29, fell to 16 days by late July, then climbed gradually back to 21 days through September. The 25th percentile (p25) has stayed near 14 days throughout, meaning a quarter of cases are clearing in roughly two weeks. The 75th percentile (p75) this week is 62 days, indicating that the slower quarter of approvals can take two months or more. The spread between those two bounds is wide enough that applicants' individual experiences may differ considerably from the headline median.

The 21-day final-stage metric covers only cases that were approved this week, not the broader pool of cases still in the queue. According to Stage durations (30-day raw data), the 'USCIS Is Currently Processing the Case' status holds about 60% of active cases across roughly 172,770 observations in the last 30 days, with a median wait of 80 days at that stage (25th percentile 45 days, 75th percentile 150 days). The 'Request for Additional Evidence (RFE) Was Sent' status accounts for 17% of the active pipeline, at a median of 84 days (p25 66 days, p75 93 days, across 48,798 cases in the 30-day window). Both stages carry substantially longer waits than the final-stage headline implies.

Once an RFE (Request for Evidence) response is submitted, cases move faster than many applicants may expect. The 'Response To USCIS Request For Evidence Was Received' status carries a median of 29 days to the next milestone, with a 25th percentile of 15 days and a 75th percentile of 53 days, across 33,560 cases in the 30-day window. That post-response pace is broadly consistent with the 21-day overall final-stage median, suggesting RFE responses do not necessarily create a second extended bottleneck once submitted.