I-821D medians hit a 12-week low, but the year-ago gap remains wide
The final-stage wait fell to 113 days in Week 39, the lowest reading since early July. That improvement is real and sustained, yet the same week last year posted 84 days, a gap that the current trajectory has not yet closed.
I-821D renewal processing continued its downward run this week, with the median final-stage wait dropping 15 days to 113 days, the lowest point in the 12-week window. The decline follows a linear slope of -9.4 days per week at R² = 0.88, a fit strong enough to call the trend genuine. The catch: the same week last year posted 84 days across 774 approvals, leaving a 29-day gap that the current pace has not yet erased. Renewal applicants are waiting meaningfully longer than peers did a year ago, even as the trend moves in a favorable direction.
- The Week 39 median fell to 113 days, down 15 days from 128 the prior week, the steepest single-week drop in the 12-week window.
- The 8-week slope of -9.4 days per week at R² = 0.88 confirms a sustained decline, not a one-week fluctuation.
- Despite the improvement, the year-over-year gap stands at +35.8%: this week's 113 days compares with 84 days in the same week of 2025.
- The rfe_fast anomaly flag fired this week: RFE (Request for Evidence)-stamped cases cleared with a median of 10 days, versus 147 days for cases with no RFE.
- If the current slope holds, the projected median for the week of October 19 is 76 days, which would place final-stage waits below last year's same-week reading for the first time in months.
The fastest week in three months, but still 29 days slower than last year
This week's median of 113 days marks the endpoint of eight consecutive weeks of decline, a run that began from a peak of 181 days in late July. The 15-day drop from last week's 128-day reading is the largest single-week improvement in the current window. The improvement is real. The baseline context, however, is less encouraging: the same week in 2025 recorded a median of 84 days across 774 approvals, placing this week's figure 29 days, or about 36%, above that prior-year reference point.
Nine days a week: the slope behind the decline
The 8-week linear regression produces a slope of -9.4 days per week, with an R² of 0.88. In plain terms: the median has been falling by roughly 9 days each week, and that linear fit accounts for 88% of the week-to-week variance in the trend. An R² above 0.70 supports direct language about direction, and 0.88 is near the high end. This is a sustained, consistent decline, not a noisy one. Earlier in the 12-week window, medians ranged from 86 days (W29, July 13) to 181 days (W31, July 27), a span that reflected genuine instability. Since W31, the trajectory has been steady.
The peak of 181 days came in late July. This week's 113-day median represents a 68-day improvement over that high, spread across roughly 8 weeks of approvals. The decline has not been perfectly linear week by week, but the regression line fits tightly enough that the direction is not in question.
It is the consistency of the decline across eight weeks, not the size of any single drop, that gives this week's reading weight.
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