H-1B Transfer After a Layoff

How to find companies that sponsor H-1B visas

Two federal datasets record who has actually petitioned, both free and both public. Use the Department of Labor's LCA disclosure file as your working list — it is current to FY2026 Q3, and it carries the job title, the SOC code, the worksite and the wage, which is what lets you filter it down to roles you could actually do. Use the USCIS Employer Data Hub to sanity-check volume for a specific employer.

What this data does not prove

This is the part that matters most when you are working against a clock, because a list of past filings looks far more like a list of opportunities than it is. A filing is a record of something an employer once did. It is not evidence of an open role, a current budget, or any willingness to sponsor you now. Four regulatory facts behind that:

• Certification is a completeness check, not a verification that a job exists (20 CFR 655.730(b))

  DOL states it will not certify incomplete or obviously inaccurate applications and will usually decide within seven working days. That tests the form, not the vacancy behind it.

• One filing can cover several unfilled positions, and names nobody (20 CFR 655.730(c)(5))

  An LCA may cover more than one intended position within an occupation, and no beneficiary is named on it at all. A large filing count can be one speculative application, not many hires.

• It can be filed six months before anyone would start (20 CFR 655.730(b))

  An LCA may be submitted up to six months before the intended start of employment, so a recent filing is not evidence of a role open now.

• An LCA confers no right to work (20 CFR 655.705(c)(4))

  The employer may not let the worker begin until DHS grants work authorisation — or, for someone already in H-1B status moving to a new employer, until the new employer files a non-frivolous Form I-129.

Note also that USCIS's figures reflect only its first decision on a petition — appeals and revocations are excluded, and petitions still pending when the data was generated do not appear at all. Treat both datasets as a way to build a target list worth researching, never as a shortlist of employers who will sponsor you.

Largest H-1B sponsors by initial approvals, FY2023

Computed directly from the official USCIS FY2023 data file — the most recent one USCIS publishes as a bulk download. The interactive hub runs three years further forward, so read this as a picture of who petitions at scale rather than as current hiring.

Source: USCIS H-1B Employer Data Hub, FY2023 data file. USCIS publishes one row per employer address and a single company can hold several tax IDs, so these figures sum initial approvals by employer name; the note under each name shows how many tax-ID fragments were merged. "Continuing approvals" are extensions and amendments for people already working there — a high continuing count next to a low initial count describes an employer maintaining a workforce rather than adding to it.