Effective today, November 1, 2025, the U.S. Department of State has flipped the long-standing consular-shopping model on its head: every immigrant-visa applicant—family-, employment- or Diversity-Visa alike—will now be scheduled for interview at the U.S. embassy or consulate that serves the applicant’s country of residence. Applicants who prefer to appear in their country of nationality may ask for an exception, but consular posts will grant waivers only for narrow humanitarian, medical or foreign-policy reasons. The National Visa Center (NVC) will begin re-routing new cases immediately.
The rule is intended to restore predictable workloads after pandemic-era backlogs drove applicants to third-country posts promising shorter waits. Consular managers say residence-based scheduling will allow them to compare interview answers with local police, tax and civil-registry data, reducing document fraud and identity misrepresentation. For applicants, however, the change removes the option to “forum-shop” for faster appointments, potentially lengthening wait times in high-demand posts such as Manila or Mumbai.
![State Department Shifts All Immigrant Visa Interviews to Applicant’s Country of Residence]()
Applicants already holding interview notices generally keep their dates, but those who had transferred their files to a third country must decide whether to proceed or request a transfer back home. The Department warned that post-to-post transfers now require a formal NVC inquiry rather than direct e-mail to a consulate; applicants should expect added document requests to prove residence.
Companies moving talent to the United States should audit all pending immigrant cases and reset timelines: internal mobility teams may need to budget for longer home-country stays and offer remote-work options while employees wait. Diversity-Visa (DV-2026) lottery winners are especially affected because they have a firm fiscal-year deadline to be issued their visas. Finally, assignees living in countries where U.S. visa services remain suspended—Russia, Iran, Venezuela and others—must travel to a designated “surrogate” post listed by State, adding cost and logistical complexity.
Immigration counsel recommend updating mobility worksheets immediately, flagging cases that will now require medical exams, police clearances or translations obtainable only in the home country. They also urge multinational employers to brief affected staff on the limited scope of exceptions, emphasizing that ‘convenience’ will no longer justify a third-country interview.
The rule is intended to restore predictable workloads after pandemic-era backlogs drove applicants to third-country posts promising shorter waits. Consular managers say residence-based scheduling will allow them to compare interview answers with local police, tax and civil-registry data, reducing document fraud and identity misrepresentation. For applicants, however, the change removes the option to “forum-shop” for faster appointments, potentially lengthening wait times in high-demand posts such as Manila or Mumbai.
Applicants already holding interview notices generally keep their dates, but those who had transferred their files to a third country must decide whether to proceed or request a transfer back home. The Department warned that post-to-post transfers now require a formal NVC inquiry rather than direct e-mail to a consulate; applicants should expect added document requests to prove residence.
Companies moving talent to the United States should audit all pending immigrant cases and reset timelines: internal mobility teams may need to budget for longer home-country stays and offer remote-work options while employees wait. Diversity-Visa (DV-2026) lottery winners are especially affected because they have a firm fiscal-year deadline to be issued their visas. Finally, assignees living in countries where U.S. visa services remain suspended—Russia, Iran, Venezuela and others—must travel to a designated “surrogate” post listed by State, adding cost and logistical complexity.
Immigration counsel recommend updating mobility worksheets immediately, flagging cases that will now require medical exams, police clearances or translations obtainable only in the home country. They also urge multinational employers to brief affected staff on the limited scope of exceptions, emphasizing that ‘convenience’ will no longer justify a third-country interview.
