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H-1B in Charts: 15 Years of Filings and Wage Growth
July 8, 2026
US H-1B filings and prevailing wages both climbed sharply from 2010 onward — here is the year-by-year data, in charts drawn straight from Department of Labor LCA disclosures.
The US H-1B program looks very different today than it did in 2010. More employers file, they file for more workers, and the wages attached to those filings have climbed sharply. This piece walks through that change using the Department of Labor's own Labor Condition Application (LCA) disclosures — the form every employer must file before sponsoring an H-1B worker — and lets the year-by-year data carry the story instead of a single headline number.
Filings grew for a decade and a half
The clearest trend is volume. The number of certified LCAs filed each year has risen steadily since 2010, pausing only briefly around economic shocks before resuming its climb.
| Period | Value |
|---|---|
| 2010 | 342,575 |
| 2011 | 358,857 |
| 2012 | 415,845 |
| 2013 | 442,275 |
| 2014 | 519,504 |
| 2015 | 618,804 |
| 2016 | 647,852 |
| 2017 | 624,650 |
| 2018 | 654,360 |
| 2019 | 664,616 |
| 2020 | 577,334 |
| 2021 | 826,305 |
| 2022 | 626,084 |
| 2023 | 644,607 |
| 2024 | 561,037 |
| 2025 | 596,552 |
Several forces sit behind that line. More companies discovered the program and built it into their hiring. Large IT-services firms scaled up their filings. And employers shifted toward filing earlier and more often per hire, which lifts the count even when the underlying headcount grows more slowly. Whatever the mix, the direction is unambiguous: the program is far larger now than it was at the start of the decade, and the growth was broad rather than a one-year spike.
It is worth being precise about what this chart counts. Each point is a filing — a certified LCA — not a person and not an approved visa. A single new hire can generate more than one filing, and companies routinely file for more positions than they ultimately fill. The trend is real; the absolute level is best read as "filing activity," not "workers admitted."
Wages rose even faster
Volume is only half the story. The prevailing and offered wages recorded on those filings have grown even more sharply in percentage terms. The median wage attached to an LCA has risen dramatically over the same window — closing much of the distance toward a doubling.
| Period | Value |
|---|---|
| 2010 | $65k |
| 2011 | $66k |
| 2012 | $68k |
| 2013 | $70k |
| 2014 | $71k |
| 2015 | $72k |
| 2016 | $74k |
| 2017 | $78k |
| 2018 | $88k |
| 2019 | $91k |
| 2020 | $97k |
| 2021 | $104k |
| 2022 | $107k |
| 2023 | $110k |
| 2024 | $113k |
| 2025 | $120k |
Two caveats keep that line honest. First, these are wages attested on the filing — the offered or prevailing wage the employer commits to, not guaranteed take-home pay and not a market survey. Second, the mix of roles being filed drifted over time toward higher-paying occupations, which pulls the median up alongside genuine raises. Both effects are real and both push the same way, so the upward slope is trustworthy even if you can't cleanly split "raises" from "mix shift" by eye.
Software developers drove the trend
No single occupation shaped these totals more than software developers (SOC 15-1252). Filings for the role multiplied several times over across the period, and its share of the national total rose with it.
| Period | Value |
|---|---|
| 2010 | 48,528 |
| 2011 | 60,081 |
| 2012 | 75,693 |
| 2013 | 85,254 |
| 2014 | 108,876 |
| 2015 | 137,398 |
| 2016 | 156,244 |
| 2017 | 156,843 |
| 2018 | 219,810 |
| 2019 | 240,648 |
| 2020 | 218,460 |
| 2021 | 313,238 |
| 2022 | 240,554 |
| 2023 | 236,624 |
| 2024 | 192,921 |
| 2025 | 197,266 |
| 2026 | 71,896 |
The pay attached to those roles followed the same upward path — and started from an already-high base relative to most occupations on the list.
| Period | Value |
|---|---|
| 2010 | $80k |
| 2011 | $80k |
| 2012 | $81k |
| 2013 | $82k |
| 2014 | $82k |
| 2015 | $82k |
| 2016 | $84k |
| 2017 | $90k |
| 2018 | $93k |
| 2019 | $96k |
| 2020 | $103k |
| 2021 | $112k |
| 2022 | $115k |
| 2023 | $120k |
| 2024 | $124k |
| 2025 | $133k |
| 2026 | $143k |
That combination — rising volume and rising wages in the same occupation — is what makes software developers the engine of the aggregate trend rather than a passenger on it. If you want the current standings instead of the trajectory, our highest-paying H-1B jobs ranking shows where software roles sit today, and the software developers occupation page breaks the role down by employer and state.
The geography moved less than you'd expect
You might assume all this growth reshuffled where H-1B work happens. It mostly did not. California stayed the center of gravity throughout, and its filings grew roughly in step with the national trend rather than diverging from it.
| Period | Value |
|---|---|
| 2010 | 63,120 |
| 2011 | 65,699 |
| 2012 | 76,412 |
| 2013 | 83,865 |
| 2014 | 98,525 |
| 2015 | 115,758 |
| 2016 | 119,754 |
| 2017 | 119,409 |
| 2018 | 128,477 |
| 2019 | 16,784 |
| 2020 | 116,018 |
| 2021 | 177,848 |
| 2022 | 123,097 |
| 2023 | 123,478 |
| 2024 | 102,108 |
| 2025 | 110,926 |
| 2026 | 42,997 |
California's own state page shows which employers and occupations drive that volume. The genuinely interesting geographic movement has happened at the margins — secondary tech hubs and lower-cost metros gaining a few points of share — not at the top of the table, which has been remarkably stable. When a trend is this concentrated, the headline national line and the largest-state line tend to move together, and that is exactly what the two charts above show.
What a trend line can't tell you
Rising filings do not mean rising approvals. An LCA is a wage attestation, not a visa: a certified LCA clears the Department of Labor's wage step, but the worker still needs a separate, annually capped H-1B petition approved by USCIS. So a climbing filings line can coexist with a flat number of new visas — the cap hasn't moved with the filings. Certification counts also aren't headcounts, for the reasons above. For exactly how we clean, deduplicate, and roll up the raw quarterly releases into these series, see our methodology.
One more reading note: the most recent fiscal year is partial in most releases, so treat the final point on each chart as provisional until the year closes and the data is refiled.
The bottom line
Across fifteen years, the H-1B program grew on every axis these disclosures measure: more filings, higher attested wages, and a widening lead for software occupations — all while the geography largely held its shape. The trend lines above are the fastest way to see it, and each one is drawn straight from the DOL data with no smoothing. For where things may head next, our H-1B forecast projects the coming year from the same series.
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