U.S. Employment Immigration Total Cost Calculator

Split PERM, I-140, consular or adjustment, family, legal, medical, relocation, FX, and delay costs between the sponsoring employer and applicant.

This model uses official fees checked on August 5, 2026. Private costs are not guessed, so enter your actual quotes.

Case and filing route

Choose whether your scenario uses PERM and how forms are filed. The calculator does not decide immigration eligibility.

Labor certification routeEmployer typeFiling methodPermanent residence route

Include I-140 premium processingAdds the $2,965 fee effective March 1, 2026.

Applicant and derivative family

Consular processing includes visa and USCIS immigrant fees; adjustment includes I-485 and the ancillary forms you select.

Applicants age 14 or olderpeopleIncludes the principal applicant; minimum one.Derivative children under 14peopleThe reduced I-485 fee assumes concurrent filing with a parent.

Employer costs

PERM recruitment and labor-certification preparation are assigned to the employer under the DOL cost rule.

Recruitment and advertisingUSDIgnored in a PERM-exempt scenario.PERM legal feesUSDQuote for labor-certification preparation and filing.I-140 legal feesUSDActual quote, separate from government filing fees.Employer internal administrationUSDInternal HR, finance, and management cost.Other employer costsUSDEnter distinct costs that are not counted elsewhere.

Applicant costs and employer support

Enter actual medical, translation, legal, and relocation quotes. Employer support only reallocates the burden.

Applicant’s separate legal feesUSDQuote for separate personal advice or representation.Medical exam per personUSD/personMultiplied by the total family count.Translation and credential costsUSDCombined education and employment document cost.Interview travel and relocationUSDFlights, lodging, and initial relocation budget.Other applicant costsUSDCosts not duplicated in another field.Employer support for applicant costsUSDApplied only up to the applicant’s gross cost.

Exchange rate and delay assumptions

FX and opportunity-cost assumptions are comparisons, not predictions of processing time or foreign-exchange classification.

Base KRW per USDKRW/USDEnter the rate used for the budget or remittance.FX spread%Percentage added to the base rate.Applicant fixed wire feeKRWAdded once to applicant KRW funding.FX sensitivity rangeKRW/USDUsed for the lower and higher rate scenarios.Assumed delaymonthsYour assumption, not an official processing-time estimate.Employer monthly delay costUSD/monthMonthly vacancy, contractor, or replacement cost.Applicant monthly opportunity costUSD/monthMonthly income gap or duplicated living-cost assumption.

Estimated total cost and burden split

Combined direct cost

$1,895

Official fees plus entered private costs

Employer cash cost

$1,315

Direct employer costs plus applicant support

Applicant out-of-pocket

$580

USD budget after employer support

Economic cost with delay

$1,895

Direct cost plus both opportunity costs

Who bears the cost?

Employer share: 69.39%
Applicant share: 30.61%
Applied employer support: $0
Total applicants: 1 people

Government fee breakdown

Government fee breakdown
Item	Amount
I-140 filing fee	$715
Asylum Program Fee	$600
I-907 premium fee	$0
Employment-based immigrant visa fees	$345
USCIS Immigrant Fee	$235
I-485 adjustment applications	$0
I-765 employment authorization	$0
I-131 Advance Parole	$0
Immigration Parole Fee	$0
Total government fees	$1,895

Employer subtotal: $1,315
Applicant subtotal: $580

Private cost breakdown

Private cost breakdown
Item	Amount
PERM recruitment	$0
PERM legal fees	$0
I-140 legal fees	$0
Employer internal administration	$0
Other employer costs	$0
Applicant’s separate legal fees	$0
Medical exams for the family	$0
Translation and credentials	$0
Interview travel and relocation	$0
Other applicant costs	$0
Total private costs	$0

Employer subtotal: $0
Applicant subtotal: $0

Stage-by-stage cash flow

Stage-by-stage cash flow
Stage	Employer	Applicant	Combined
PERM labor certification	$0	$0	$0
I-140 immigrant petition	$1,315	$0	$1,315
Consular or adjustment stage	$0	$580	$580
Medical, documents, and relocation	$0	$0	$0
Employer administration and other costs	$0	$0	$0
Burden transfer from employer support	$0	$0	$0

Applicant KRW funding and FX sensitivity

Rate after spread: 1,400 KRW/USD
Applicant KRW funding: ₩812,000
Employer cost in KRW equivalent: ₩1,841,000
Combined direct cost in KRW equivalent: ₩2,653,000

Lower FX rate

1,300 KRW/USD

₩754,000

Base FX rate

1,400 KRW/USD

₩812,000

Higher FX rate

1,500 KRW/USD

₩870,000

Delay-cost scenario

Assumed delay: 0 months
Employer delay cost: $0
Applicant opportunity cost: $0
Total delay cost: $0

Read before relying on the estimate

Recheck USCIS and State Department fees, form editions, and filing channels immediately before filing.
Premium processing guarantees only a timely USCIS action, not approval or faster PERM, Visa Bulletin movement, or end-to-end immigration.
The calculator does not verify PERM exemptions, adjustment eligibility, online filing availability, or ancillary-form eligibility.
KRW conversion is for budgeting only. Ask the remitting bank about evidence, reporting, and confirmation duties.
Under the DOL rule, the employer may not shift or recover PERM recruitment and labor-certification preparation costs from the worker.
All private costs are zero. Check whether legal, medical, translation, recruitment, and travel quotes are missing.

Not legal, immigration, or foreign-exchange advice

This result is a budget scenario built from your inputs. It does not determine visa eligibility, approval odds, Visa Bulletin timing, processing time, employment terms, fee-sharing legality, or Korean foreign-exchange reporting duties.

Official-source check: 2026-08-05

Related calculators

Why employer-sponsored immigration needs two separate budgets

An employment-based green card is not a single filing fee. Cash moves through labor certification, the I-140 petition, consular processing or adjustment of status, and family-specific medical, document, and relocation stages. Some items belong to the employer as a matter of labor-certification compliance, while others are normally paid by the applicant or can be covered under a separate employer policy.

This calculator applies government fees checked on August 5, 2026 and deliberately leaves private quotes at zero. Enter the parties’ actual legal, recruitment, medical, translation, travel, and internal administration estimates. The result then shows direct cash cost by payer, an employer-support transfer, applicant KRW funding, and a separate delay-cost scenario. It is a planning model, not an eligibility or approval assessment.

Government fees used in the 2026 model

Fixed amounts come from the May 29, 2026 edition of USCIS Form G-1055 and the Department of State visa fee schedule. The I-907 amount reflects the inflation adjustment effective March 1, 2026. Always recheck the live fee table, form edition, filing channel, and any intervening court order before submission.

Key 2026 government fees for employment-based immigration
Stage	Fee	Amount	Default payer
PERM	ETA-9089 government filing	$0	Employer
I-140	Paper / online filing	$715 / $665	Employer
I-140	Asylum Program Fee, regular / small / nonprofit	$600 / $300 / $0	Employer
Optional	I-907 premium processing	$2,965	Selected payer
Consular	Employment visa + USCIS Immigrant Fee	$345 + $235 per person	Applicant
Adjustment	Adult I-485, paper / online	$1,440 / $1,390	Applicant
Adjustment	I-765 / I-131	$260 / $630 per person	Applicant

Do not merge the two parole-related fees

The $630 I-131 filing fee and the separate $1,020 Immigration Parole Fee under Public Law 119-21 are different items. The latter can depend on triggering events, exceptions, and the case’s actual use of parole. Its default is therefore zero; enter a count only after confirming that it applies.

PERM recruitment and certification costs stay with the employer

The Department of Labor’s rule and Fraud Rule FAQs explain that an employer may not seek or receive payment from the worker for activity related to obtaining permanent labor certification. This includes recruitment and legal services for preparing, filing, and obtaining the certification. A worker may retain separate counsel for personal interests, but if one lawyer represents both parties, the labor-certification portion remains an employer cost.

Employer inputs

Enter recruitment, PERM legal, I-140 legal, internal administration, and distinct other employer costs.

Applicant inputs

Enter separate counsel, medical exams, translation, credentials, interview travel, relocation, and other personal costs.

Employer support

Support reallocates cash burden from the applicant to the employer without reducing combined direct cost.

Selecting a PERM-exempt scenario removes entered recruitment and PERM legal costs from the result. That is only a modeling choice. The calculator does not decide whether an EB category, National Interest Waiver, Schedule A case, or other filing is actually exempt.

How to build a defensible estimate

Choose the labor route and employer type. Verify the USCIS definition for small-employer or nonprofit treatment, including related-entity headcount where applicable.
Choose paper or online filing and the residence route. An online dollar amount does not prove that the particular form and case can be filed online.
Enter every family member and ancillary application. Consular processing applies visa and immigrant fees per person; adjustment uses age-specific I-485 amounts plus selected I-765 and I-131 filings.
Separate actual quotes by payer and stage. Check whether a quote is per person, per form, or for the whole family, and avoid entering the same expense twice.
Add support, FX, and delay assumptions. Support changes burden allocation, the spread changes applicant KRW funding, and delay costs remain outside direct filing outlay.
Export the logic, not only the headline. Record the source date, filing stage, payer, quote expiration, and scenario assumptions alongside the total.

Consular processing versus adjustment of status

Cost structure comparison between consular processing and adjustment of status
Question	Consular processing	Adjustment of status
Core government cost	$345 visa plus $235 immigrant fee per person	I-485 by age and filing method
Optional forms	Interview-country travel and lodging	I-765, I-131, and applicable parole fees
Family variable	Per-person charge for every immigrant visa applicant	Concurrent-parent condition for reduced under-14 fee
Model boundary	Does not select a post or panel physician	Does not verify adjustment or ancillary eligibility

The cheaper column is not automatically the correct route. Current status, departure risk, priority date, visa availability, family timing, and employment strategy can control the legal choice. Use this table only after a valid route has been identified.

Worked examples: payer split, FX, and delay

One-person consular baseline

With a regular employer, paper I-140, no premium, and no private quotes, employer government cost is $715 plus $600, or $1,315. Applicant government cost is $345 plus $235, or $580. Combined direct cost is $1,895. This is a statutory-fee floor, not a realistic full-case quote.

Employer support changes shares, not total

If applicant gross cost is $12,000 and the employer contributes $5,000, applicant out-of-pocket falls to $7,000 while employer cash cost rises by $5,000. The combined direct total is unchanged. Tax, employment, and immigration treatment of that support still requires separate review.

KRW funding example

For $10,000 of applicant out-of-pocket cost, a base rate of KRW 1,400, a 1% spread, and a KRW 20,000 fixed wire fee produce an effective rate of KRW 1,414 and total funding of KRW 14,160,000. A KRW 100 sensitivity input displays the applicant funding requirement at rates of 1,300, 1,400, and 1,500 using the same spread and wire fee.

Delay cost is kept separate from direct cash outlay. For a 12-month scenario with $2,000 of monthly employer vacancy cost and $3,000 of monthly applicant opportunity cost, the model adds $60,000 of economic cost. That does not mean the case will take 12 months; it only values the user’s selected stress scenario.

What premium processing does—and does not—buy

I-907 premium processing requires USCIS to take a qualifying action within the applicable period. The action may be approval, denial, a request for evidence, a notice of intent to deny, or another listed action. It does not purchase approval and does not accelerate PERM, Visa Bulletin movement, consular scheduling, or every downstream step. The calculator therefore adds $2,965 but never reduces delay months automatically.

Treat the delay fields as a decision tool. Employers can value vacancy, contractor, retention, and project effects; applicants can value income differences, duplicate housing, and family separation. Comparing optimistic, base, and conservative month assumptions can show whether timing risk is economically material without pretending to predict agency processing.

Accuracy checklist and model limits

Confirm the scope, family add-ons, RFE work, mailing, refund terms, and expiration date in every legal quote
Estimate employer internal cost from actual hours and loaded hourly cost without duplicating outside counsel
Obtain medical quotes from the relevant panel physician or civil surgeon and account for vaccination records
Verify that each form and case can use online filing before selecting an online fee
Confirm concurrent-parent filing before using the reduced under-14 I-485 amount
Ask the remitting bank about evidence, reporting, payment purpose, limits, intermediary fees, and Korean FX compliance
Track priority dates and the Visa Bulletin separately because cost arithmetic does not determine visa availability
Do not use the result as authority for shifting, reimbursing, or recovering a regulated PERM expense

Korean foreign-exchange classification is outside the model

Korean law contains reporting procedures for capital transactions, but an immigration-related remittance is not automatically classified the same way in every structure. The calculator converts USD with a user-entered rate only. It does not decide whether a payment is an ordinary payment, capital transaction, overseas direct investment, or subject to a particular report.

Frequently asked questions

Can I use this for both EB-2 and EB-3?

You can model their cost items, but the calculator does not determine category eligibility or whether PERM is required. Confirm the legal route first, then enter the matching expenses.

Why are average attorney fees not prefilled?

Scope varies with case complexity, family size, employer process, RFE coverage, and included services. Entering stage-specific quotes is more traceable and avoids presenting a market guess as a rule.

May the applicant pay premium-processing cost?

The payer selector is a cash-flow scenario, not a legal conclusion. Review the PERM cost rule, employment terms, and the case-specific arrangement with qualified counsel before assigning the actual cost.

Does employer support reduce the combined cost?

No. It reduces applicant out-of-pocket and raises employer cash cost by the same amount. The combined direct cost remains unchanged.

Why might the actual payment differ?

Common causes include a new fee schedule, an unavailable online channel, a different family form combination, omitted medical or travel quotes, and extra evidence work. Revalidate government fees and private quotes separately.

Build a shared budget before money moves

Compare a government-fee floor, an actual-quote case, and an FX-and-delay stress case. Record who pays, when the payment occurs, and when each source or quote was checked. That gives the employer and applicant a reviewable budget rather than a single unexplained headline.

Return to the result