The United States Department of State has announced new changes to the diversity visa lottery program.
The new changes will affect all applicants to the next US diversity visa lottery program that is yet to be announced. According to US Immigration Lawyer Brad Bernstein, there are three major changes that have been announced.
Every applicant in the diversity visa lottery program will now be required to have a valid and unexpired passport when they apply. Each applicant will also be required to enter their personal information and photo found in the passport and then upload the passport page together with the photo.
At the same time, applicants will be charged $1 (equivalent to about Sh129) registration fee when submitting their entry.
Can I travel to UK or Australia if my USA visa was cancelled and I was deported?
The form where they fill in their information will no longer use the wonder gender but will henceforth use the word ‘sex’ to distinguish between male and female applicants. Age has also bee replaced with date of birth.
“These new rules go into effect about April 10 to 11 2026. That means that the visa lottery registration dates should be announced soon and the next entry period will likely be open sometime after mid-April 2026,” said Mr. Bernstein.
“If you plan to enter the green car lottery, make sure you have a valid passport ready now.”
According to the State Department, the new changes will allow customs and immigration officials to verify identities and limit duplicate or fraudulent entries.
These changes come close to four months after the United States suspended the green card lottery scheme following a mass shooting at Brown University in December 2025. This shooting was attributed to 48-year-old Claudio Neves Valente.
Valente had entered the US through the diversity visa lottery program (DV1) in 2017 after which he was granted a green card.
