How long is a typical student visa?

[drajesh]

If I apply for a master's program (MS) in the US, what will be the length of the visa that will be given to me? Is it of 2 years or 5 years?

[fuzzylogician]

It'll likely be for the duration of the program. For a MS, 2 years then.

[TakeruK]

There is a difference between whether you mean "visa" or "status". A "visa" is a right to enter the US and it is issued by a US Embassy. It goes into your passport and looks like a passport page (with your photo ID) etc. You only need this to enter the US -- once you are in, the visa can expire and it's no problem (if it does expire, it just means you need to apply for another visa before you can re-enter the US). Visas are limited by both length and/or number of entries. For example, you might have a visa that lets you enter as many times as you want in 2 years. Or, you might have a visa that lets you enter the US 5 times in 5 years. These restrictions are based on what kind of treaties the US has with your home country's government. The length of your visa does not necessarily have to be correlated with the length of your school program.

 

On the other hand, "status" (i.e. F-1 or J-1) is your right to remain in the US for a specific reasons (i.e. graduate school). The I-20 or DS-2019 is proof of your status and it is issued by your school's International Office. My school's international office told us that they usually put the maximum allowable time (without asking for an extension) on the I-20 or DS-2019 so that we don't have to worry about getting it renewed during our studies. This could vary between schools of course. In my program, you have to petition the Graduate Office before starting your 7th year of PhD, so my DS-2019 is good for 6 years.

 

So, for you, the limitations of your visa really depend on what country you're from. The length of your F-1 or J-1 status is probably going to be the maximum length of your program, so probably between 2 and 3 years?

 

By the way, while on either F-1 or J-1 status, there are opportunities to extend your status after graduation for 2-3 more years in order to work in your field in the US. You will probably learn more about this after you arrive!

[Andean Pat]

It'll likely be for the duration of the program. For a MS, 2 years then.

 

Not necessarily quite. Actually, in my case, my program lasts for 5 years, but the school has issued my I-20 for 8 years which means I'll be applying for an 8-year long visa. 

 

OP, contact you International Student Office for information, they are very familiar with this type of things. I have contacted them for maaaaany reasons and have been super helpful.

[fuzzylogician]

Not necessarily quite. Actually, in my case, my program lasts for 5 years, but the school has issued my I-20 for 8 years which means I'll be applying for an 8-year long visa. 

 

OP, contact you International Student Office for information, they are very familiar with this type of things. I have contacted them for maaaaany reasons and have been super helpful.

 

Regardless of the dates on your documents, you will be out of student status soon after your program ends. The visa, as was mentioned above, is only needed to enter the US, and it needs to be accompanied by a valid I-20. Your ISO reports the status of all international students once a semester. Once you've graduated, your I-20 will no longer be valid, even though it was originally issued for a longer period of time. After your I-20 expires, you can't stay on a student status in the US (OPT/AT options aside). So, if everything goes right, you will have visa+I-20 for at least the duration of the program (I know of some cases of students who got docs for shorter durations and needed to re-issue documents even though it was known that their program would be longer; that happens sometimes to citizens of certain countries). But even if the documents (in principle) are valid for longer than the program, once you're not in the program you can't continue to use these documents. Therefore it's the duration of the program that matters for calculating how long you could use your student status to remain in the US.

[Arcanen]

Not necessarily quite. Actually, in my case, my program lasts for 5 years, but the school has issued my I-20 for 8 years which means I'll be applying for an 8-year long visa. 

 

OP, contact you International Student Office for information, they are very familiar with this type of things. I have contacted them for maaaaany reasons and have been super helpful.

 

Visa length is 5 years maximum, you can't get an 8 year visa. If you require more than 5 years, you'll have to apply for another visa. As mentioned above visas are entry documents rather than status documents, but doctoral students often need to fly out of the country to attend conferences, so...

[fuzzylogician]

As mentioned above visas are entry documents rather than status documents, but doctoral students often need to fly out of the country to attend conferences, so...

 

Yes. Furthermore, you need to get a signature on your I-20 showing its validity that is no more than 12 months old (6 for Canada and Mexico) every time you re-enter the US. If you're not a current student, you can't get your documents validated even if somehow the dates are for a longer period of time.

 

This is not even mentioning the new immigration crack-down on people in student status that's starting now in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing. I don't know if you could get by with something like this in the past, but I doubt you could now.

[TakeruK]

I know that some of my international classmates have visas that are only valid once, so every single time they leave the country, they have to apply for another visa. This makes conference travel extremely difficult, because they have to factor in a few extra days to apply for another visa during their travels. Fortunately, even if you are from country X and are traveling to country Y, you can apply for a visa to enter the US from a US Embassy/Consulate at Country Y, without having to return to your home country. For some of my other classmates, visas are only valid for 1-2 years, so once in a while, they have to go to e.g. Mexico (we're close to the border) in order to apply for a visa to re-enter the US, in advance.

[Cyrone]

On top of that, they usually give you a few weeks after the last day of classes. So there's some leeway on leaving the country (allowing for some travel, goodbyes)

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[Andean Pat]

OK, my visa came and you were right, it was issued for five years. I suppose that was so because funding is for that long (in theory, my program is longer). I understand that visas are entry status, like tourist visas. It reflect the purpose of one's stay in the US, dismissing any attempt to immigrate. 

 

Fuzzy I did not understand what meant by "new immigration crack-down" due to Boston marathon bombing. what did you mean? It's now harder to get in?

[Arcanen]

OK, my visa came and you were right, it was issued for five years. I suppose that was so because funding is for that long (in theory, my program is longer).

 

No, it's just the maximum length of an F-1 visa they can issue that is permitted in a passport according to most countries agreements with the US. Even if you had guaranteed funding for 8 years, your visa would still just be the 5.

 

I too found it strange that it isn't really clarified as a "rule" anywhere I could find, but it's what I was told by ustraveldocs.com

[fuzzylogician]

Fuzzy I did not understand what meant by "new immigration crack-down" due to Boston marathon bombing. what did you mean? It's now harder to get in?

See here: