February 3, 2026 — The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Department of Labor (DOL) have released an additional 64,716 H-2B visas for fiscal year 2026, roughly doubling the number of temporary nonimmigrant work visas.
The U.S. government typically authorizes 66,000 visas annually, and businesses have complained that amount is too low to meet seasonal demand – including from the seafood processing sector. To increase availability, Congress has regularly authorized the government to roughly double the number of available visas, and DHS has typically done so.