US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is raising six of the fees it collects under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, known as H.R. 1, to account for inflation. The fiscal year (FY) 2027 amounts, set out in a Federal Register notice published October 1, take effect for requests postmarked on or after October 16, 2026. The parole fee instead follows the date parole is granted.
USCIS described the adjustments as minor. The annual fee charged while a Form I-589 asylum application remains pending rises from $102 USD to $105 USD. The H.R. 1 fee for an initial Employment Authorization Document (EAD) on Form I-765 goes from $560 USD to $570 USD in each of three categories: asylum applicants, parolees and Temporary Protected Status (TPS) applicants. The H.R. 1 fee on Form I-821, the TPS application, climbs from $510 USD to $520 USD, and the immigration parole fee listed with Form I-131 increases from $1,020 USD to $1,050 USD.
| H.R. 1 fee | FY 2026 | FY 2027 |
|---|---|---|
| Annual Asylum Application Fee | $102 USD | $105 USD |
| Form I-131 Immigration Parole Fee | $1,020 USD | $1,050 USD |
| Form I-765 initial EAD (asylum applicant, parole or TPS) | $560 USD | $570 USD |
| Form I-821 Application for Temporary Protected Status | $510 USD | $520 USD |
H.R. 1 also limited the validity of initial and renewal EADs for parolees and for TPS applicants and holders to one year, or to the end of the parole period or TPS duration if that comes sooner, a change EmpleoBilingue reported in December 2025.
The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said the October 16 date gives the agencies time to issue guidance and the public time to adapt requests already in process. Under the notice, requests postmarked on or after that date without the proper fee will be rejected.
How the Adjustment Is Calculated
H.R. 1, Public Law 119-21, became law on July 4, 2025. It created new immigration fees and requires the agencies that collect them to adjust most of them for inflation every fiscal year, beginning in FY 2026. USCIS announced the fees it collects in a July 22, 2025, notice, and its FY 2026 adjustment took effect January 1, 2026.
The law ties each adjustment to the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) for July. According to the FY 2027 USCIS notice, the index published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics stood at 323.048 in July 2025 and 333.918 in July 2026, an increase of about 3.36 percent. H.R. 1 requires most of these fees to be rounded down to the next lowest multiple of $10 USD, while the annual asylum fee and the Form I-94 fee are rounded down to the nearest dollar.
Fees That Stay the Same
Rounding leaves several H.R. 1 fees where they are: the $100 USD initial asylum fee on Form I-589, the $280 USD fee for renewing or extending a parole or TPS work permit, the $280 USD re-parole EAD fee, the $250 USD Special Immigrant Juvenile fee on Form I-360 and the $24 USD Form I-94 fee. The $275 USD fee to renew or extend an asylum applicant’s EAD is also unchanged, because H.R. 1 does not provide for an inflation adjustment to it.
Parole, Travel and Immigration Court Fees
A companion DHS notice published the same day by US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) applies the $1,050 USD parole fee across CBP, USCIS and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), in addition to any other fee authorized by law. That notice ties the fee to the grant of parole rather than to the filing. The $1,050 USD amount will be collected from anyone granted parole on or after October 16, 2026, “regardless of when the underlying application or request was submitted,” unless the person shows DHS that one of the law’s 10 exceptions applies. The notice also raises the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) fee from $40.27 USD to $40.62 USD and the Electronic Visa Update System (EVUS) enrollment fee from $30.75 USD to $31.75 USD, both effective October 16.
Cases in immigration court or before the Board of Immigration Appeals follow a different calendar. The US Department of Justice adopted its FY 2027 H.R. 1 adjustments in a final rule on August 21, 2026, and the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) set out the amounts for four DHS forms filed in immigration proceedings in a notice published September 29. The same increases in the annual asylum fee, to $105 USD, and the Form I-821 fee, to $520 USD, apply to filings with the immigration courts and the Board of Immigration Appeals on or after October 1, 2026, about two weeks before the USCIS date. For forms filed with EOIR, the H.R. 1 portion of the Form I-485 fee rises from $1,540 USD to $1,590 USD, and the H.R. 1 portion of the Form I-601 fee rises from $1,070 USD to $1,100 USD. According to EOIR, these H.R. 1 fees are separate from the regular DHS filing fees, and its payment portal shows the combined total.
DHS said in the USCIS notice that it may write the annual adjustments into its fee regulations, part 106 of Title 8 of the Code of Federal Regulations, in a future rule.
(Photo: Image by geralt from Pixabay)