Tailored explanation for how software developers qualify.
You've won nationally recognized coding competitions with a competitive cash prize, or with good software engineering statures including ICPC, Google Code Jam, Kaggle (non-exhaustive)
Your work, ranging from a high-impact product launch to even a popular open-source project has been covered by major tech media (TechCrunch, Wired) or key developer publications like Hacker News.
You've served as a judge for a technical competition (e.g., a university hackathon, an ACM programming contest) or as a technical reviewer for a major conference (e.g., a Program Committee member for NeurIPS, KubeCon, or Usenix).
This is key for ICs. You created a widely-used open-source project (e.g., high star/fork count on GitHub), architected a core system for millions of users, or hold granted patents for a core algorithm or system design. The key is to work with legal professionals to procure strong reference letters.
You are a member of an exclusive, merit-based technical body (e.g., IEEE Senior Member, ACM Distinguished Member) or a highly selective engineering fellowship that requires peer nomination and has a <5% acceptance rate.
You've held a critical individual contributor role at a distinguished company (e.g., Staff, Principal, or Distinguished Engineer at a FAANG) or were a founding engineer at a successful, venture-backed startup.
Your total compensation (salary, bonus, and vested equity/RSUs) places you in the top 5-10% for your specific role (e.g., "Senior/Staff SWE") and location, benchmarked against industry data like levels.fyi or Radford.
You've authored articles on a major company tech blog (e.g., Google/Netflix/Uber Eng Blog), in a top-tier engineering publication (ACM Queue), or have given an invited talk at a major technical conference (e.g., AWS re:Invent, QCon).
For software engineers pursuing the O-1 visa, the key is to demonstrate extraordinary ability through specific, high-impact technical contributions. We focus on the evidence you live by: the popular open-source project you created, the novel algorithm you designed, or the critical system you architected that scales to millions.
Working at a top-tier "unicorn" or a FAANG company is not a guarantee to get the O-1. The focus must be on your specific, individual contributions to that company's most important projects, not just the company's brand.
You will need credible, senior references (e.g., Staff/Principal Engineers, VPs of Eng, or well-known open-source maintainers) to vouch for your specific impact—how your code, architecture, or optimization was a key technical breakthrough.
Isolating your individual contribution. Your primary challenge, especially if you’re a non-manager, is proving your credibility beyond the success of your team. You will need hard metrics and expert opinion letters to prove your technical design and code were the indispensable ingredients.
Getting the proper external recognition. You likely don't have major media press. Instead, we creatively work with our clients on evidence like a high-star GitHub project, being a top-ranked competitive programmer (e.g., Kaggle, Codeforces), or invitations to be a technical reviewer for a major conference to illustrate your high standing to USCIS.
Establishing the "critical" nature of your role. Unlike a founder, you are an employee. Your challenge isn't setting up a board, but proving your role is "critical" or "essential," even if you don't have a "Staff" or "Principal" title. This involves carefully crafted narrative and reference letter content to highlight your mission critical work
We pre-vetted our attorneys with strong track records, so you don’t have waste months finding a good one.
10x engineers trust us to translate their technical brilliance into compelling O-1 narratives.
Work with 15+ years of combined extraordinary talent visa knowledge & expertise.
We guarantee to complete the petition drafting and submission within 1 month of receiving all supporting documents required to file your long term visa or green card petition. Beyond Border is amongst the fastest legal service provider in the industry, thanks to our tech-enabled approach to petition filing and focus on technologists.
The fee will vary depending on the visa or green card type that best suits your need, but you should budget between US$8,000-10,000, excluding government fees and depending on your long term visa or green card category.
You can visit USCIS's free fee calculator to get an estimate for the associated government fees to process your visa.
Beyond Border is a modern immigration platform founded by immigrants from the technology industry for immigrants. We leverage technology to speed up the end-to-end U.S. immigration petition process, and work with a carefully curated network of attorneys who specialize in U.S. immigration cases for technologists.
Our attorneys maintain a 98% success rate throughout their careers with more than 4,000 approvals. We work exclusively with venture backed tech operators and researchers, which allow us maintain a high approval rate and provide profile building advice given sector expertise.
If your application is rejected, we will review the reasons for denial and help you reapply by addressing any issues or missing documentation.
