Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico · Americas

Some descriptions for this country are still Russian only: 65% translated. Numbers, prices and timelines are complete.

Entry

Entry rules depend on citizenship. Choose a passport to see the requirement for that one.

Work and visas

Visa types: Puerto Rico is part of the United States for the purposes of immigration law: 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(38) names the island as part of the «United States» in the geographical sense, and § 1101(a)(36) as a «State». The island has NO visa or immigration law of its own. · The consequence: any visa or green card issued for the United States is good in Puerto Rico as well; no separate Puerto Rican permit exists, and the island has no quota of its own. · US citizens and permanent residents arrive from the mainland without a passport and without passing immigration control: a flight from the continental United States is a domestic one. · Employment grounds — H-1B, L-1A and L-1B, O-1, E-1, E-2, E-3, TN under the USMCA, R-1, and entrepreneur parole. · Study grounds — F-1 (academic study) and M-1 (vocational study). · Permanent residence through employment — EB-1, EB-2, EB-3 and EB-5; through family — the green card for an immediate relative of a US citizen. · The agency charges not per ground but per form: a single USCIS schedule of fees by form, where one ground may cost several forms.

Puerto Rico has no immigration law and no immigration authority of its own: the island is part of the United States for the purposes of the immigration statute. The statute says so itself — 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(38) names Puerto Rico as part of the «United States» in the geographical sense and § 1101(a)(36) as a «State»; the text of the code was read on 28.08.2026 at govinfo.gov. The sixteen grounds here are therefore the same federal grounds as for the United States, with links to the USCIS pages, and each of the sixteen pages was checked as reachable on 28.08.2026. They are still worth recording separately: the island has its own page, and without them it would say nothing about what people actually move here on. Three things set the island apart from the mainland, and they belong to procedure rather than to law: a flight from the continental United States is domestic, so no passport and no immigration control for US citizens and permanent residents; no separate Puerto Rican quota and no separate permit exist; and there is no consular filing «in Puerto Rico» — the visa is issued by the same US consulate as for the mainland. None of the grounds carries a fee by category: USCIS publishes its schedule by FORM, not by category, and one ground may cost several forms.

Long-term visas and residence permits

H-1B Specialty Occupations

Work

term 36 morenewabledoes not count toward permanent residencefamily allowed

Fee: The fee is charged not for the ground but for the FORM: USCIS publishes a single schedule of fees by form (I-129, I-140, I-485, I-526E and the rest), and one ground may cost several forms. The agency prints no separate «per category» amount.

official source · read 2026-08-28