As of August 20, 2010, 33,900 petitions had been received by US Citizenship and Immigration Services (US CIS) for the cap of 65,000 new H-1B visas that are available each year.

This total does not include the 6,800 visas set aside under U.S.-Chile and U.S.-Singapore Free Trade Agreements or the unused numbers in this allocation from the previous year.

The H-1B filing period for Fiscal Year 2011 started on Thursday, April 1, 2010. Petitions filed for new H-1B workers will have a start date of October 1, 2010.

Access to the current H-1B cap count is available by clicking here.

US CIS reports that it has also received 12,600 petitions against the U.S. Master's cap of 20,000. If the Master's cap is reached before the general H-1B cap is reached, Master's degree cases will not be rejected, but will count against the general cap. Once the H-1B cap is reached in both categories, no further H-1B petitions will be accepted until April 1, 2011. At that point, the earliest start date for new H-1B petitions will be October 1, 2011.