One of the most common EB-1A questions is this: Can I file my I-140 and I-485 at the same time?
The honest answer is: sometimes yes, sometimes no, and the answer can change from month to month. It depends on whether an immigrant visa is immediately available for your category, country of chargeability, and priority date. USCIS says that concurrent filing is permitted only when an immigrant visa number is immediately available at the time of filing, and that the applicant must be physically present in the United States.
What does "concurrent filing" actually mean?
Concurrent filing means filing your EB-1A petition (Form I-140) and your green card application (Form I-485) at the same time, before the I-140 has been approved. USCIS will consider both forms concurrently filed when they are filed together with all required fees and supporting documentation to the same filing location.
That can be a significant advantage because it may allow the applicant to move into the adjustment stage sooner and become eligible for interim benefits such as employment authorization and advance parole while the case is pending. But concurrent filing is not automatically available to every EB-1A applicant. It is only available when a visa is immediately available under the Visa Bulletin rules.
Why the Visa Bulletin matters so much?
For many clients, the real issue is not whether they qualify for EB-1A. The real issue is whether they can file the I-485 now.
That depends on the monthly Visa Bulletin published by the U.S. Department of State, and critically, on USCIS’s separate monthly determination of which chart applicants must use — the Final Action Dates chart or the Dates for Filing chart. These are two different charts, and USCIS’s choice between them can significantly expand or narrow who is eligible to file in any given month.
What changed for May 2026 — and why it matters
This is the most important practical point for anyone filing right now.
For April 2026, USCIS allowed all employment-based preference categories to use the Dates for Filing chart — the more generous of the two charts. But for May 2026, USCIS switched to requiring the Final Action Dates chart for all employment-based preference categories.
For EB-1 applicants from China and India, this is a significant rollback. Under the Dates for Filing chart in April, applicants with priority dates through approximately December 2023 could file. Under the May 2026 Final Action Dates chart, the EB-1 cutoff for both China and India is April 1, 2023 — a loss of roughly eight months of filing eligibility.
Under the May 2026 Visa Bulletin, the EB-1 Final Action Date is current for all chargeability areas except China and India, and April 1, 2023 for both China and India.
That means, as of the May 2026 bulletin, many EB-1A applicants from countries other than India and China may be able to file adjustment of status right away if they are otherwise eligible and present in the United States. But applicants chargeable to India or China generally cannot file I-485 concurrently unless their priority date is before April 1, 2023. For those applicants, this is not a filing strategy question — it is a waiting game controlled entirely by the Visa Bulletin.
What if you are outside the United States?
Then adjustment of status is not the path. The Form I-485 instructions require that the applicant be physically present in the United States at the time of filing. If you are abroad, the case moves through consular processing at a U.S. embassy or consulate instead of adjustment of status through USCIS.
Why this topic matters so much for clients
If a person can file I-485, they may also become eligible to file Form I-765 for employment authorization and Form I-131 for advance parole while the adjustment application is pending. If they cannot file I-485 yet, they must wait for visa availability before reaching that stage.
So from a client perspective, the question is not just “Will my EB-1A be approved?” It is also “When can I actually move into the green card stage — and what benefits become available when I do?”
A word about retrogression risk
The Department of State has warned in the May 2026 Visa Bulletin that if demand for immigrant visa numbers increases or the government revises its current restrictive immigrant visa actions, it may be necessary to retrogress some cutoff dates before the fiscal year ends on September 30, 2026. That means even dates that are currently “current” are not guaranteed to remain so. Applicants who are eligible to file should consider doing so promptly rather than assuming the window will stay open indefinitely.
The real takeaway
EB-1A approval and I-485 filing are related, but they are not the same thing. You may have a strong EB-1A case and still be unable to file for an adjustment of status if the Visa Bulletin is not current for your country and priority date. And as May 2026 shows, USCIS can switch from the Dates for Filing chart to the Final Action Dates chart with just one month’s notice, narrowing the filing window significantly. Because both the Visa Bulletin and USCIS’s chart choice change monthly, the filing window can open or close quickly. The key is to check the current Visa Bulletin and the current USCIS filing-chart determination before making any filing decisions — and to act promptly when the window is open.
Note: Visa Bulletin data and USCIS chart determinations change monthly. The information above reflects May 2026 data and should be verified at uscis.gov before filing.
