Indian professionals holding H-1B, L-1 and other petition-based visas woke up on 26 January to find that every US consulate in India now shows “No Appointments Available” for 2026. The first open interview dates—where any are visible at all—are in the first quarter of 2027, according to screenshots shared by immigration lawyers in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad and Kolkata.
The queue crunch began in December 2025 when consular sections abruptly rescheduled thousands of January–March 2026 interviews to October. A second wave of automatic re-bookings last week pushed those same applicants into 2027. Consular sources blame tightened social-media screening rules that came into force on 15 December, alongside the end of third-country “visa-run” options for Indians. Officers now spend significantly longer on each case, reducing daily throughput.
At a time when consular calendars look bleak, VisaHQ’s India platform (https://www.visahq.com/india/) can help travelers monitor appointment availability in real time, compile compliant documentation, and explore substitute visa strategies or third-country processing possibilities where they still exist. Its experts track policy shifts day by day, giving employers and employees clearer options and timelines amid the uncertainty.
![H-1B Visa Stamping Crisis Deepens: US Consulates in India Push Appointments to 2027]()
The fallout is severe for Indian tech workers in the United States. Anyone travelling home for family emergencies or business will risk being stranded for 12–15 months while waiting for a fresh visa foil. Large IT firms have issued “do-not-travel” advisories, and some are exploring short-term remote-work arrangements from Canada or Mexico to avoid productivity gaps.
Start-ups that rely on founders shuttling between Bengaluru and Silicon Valley face disrupted fund-raising schedules. Families are split across borders; dependants on H-4 visas who left the US for winter break cannot return. Travel-management teams are pivoting to virtual meetings and warning senior leadership that critical on-site support for US clients may have to be delivered from India.
Experts do not foresee improvement until the US State Department deploys additional adjudicator teams or revives the domestic pilot for visa renewals inside the United States. In the interim, companies should track individual visa-stamp expiry dates, build in remote-work contingencies and budget for premium I-131 Advance Parole applications where eligible.
The queue crunch began in December 2025 when consular sections abruptly rescheduled thousands of January–March 2026 interviews to October. A second wave of automatic re-bookings last week pushed those same applicants into 2027. Consular sources blame tightened social-media screening rules that came into force on 15 December, alongside the end of third-country “visa-run” options for Indians. Officers now spend significantly longer on each case, reducing daily throughput.
At a time when consular calendars look bleak, VisaHQ’s India platform (https://www.visahq.com/india/) can help travelers monitor appointment availability in real time, compile compliant documentation, and explore substitute visa strategies or third-country processing possibilities where they still exist. Its experts track policy shifts day by day, giving employers and employees clearer options and timelines amid the uncertainty.
The fallout is severe for Indian tech workers in the United States. Anyone travelling home for family emergencies or business will risk being stranded for 12–15 months while waiting for a fresh visa foil. Large IT firms have issued “do-not-travel” advisories, and some are exploring short-term remote-work arrangements from Canada or Mexico to avoid productivity gaps.
Start-ups that rely on founders shuttling between Bengaluru and Silicon Valley face disrupted fund-raising schedules. Families are split across borders; dependants on H-4 visas who left the US for winter break cannot return. Travel-management teams are pivoting to virtual meetings and warning senior leadership that critical on-site support for US clients may have to be delivered from India.
Experts do not foresee improvement until the US State Department deploys additional adjudicator teams or revives the domestic pilot for visa renewals inside the United States. In the interim, companies should track individual visa-stamp expiry dates, build in remote-work contingencies and budget for premium I-131 Advance Parole applications where eligible.
