USCIS announced that on April 11, 2017, it used a computer-generated random selection process, or lottery, to select the 65,000 general-category cap cases and the 20,000 advanced degree cap cases that will be processed. USCIS will reject and return all unselected petitions with their filing fees, unless the petition is found to be a duplicate filing.

USCIS has not announced when it expects to complete data entry for the selected cases nor when it expects to issue receipt notices.