Indian IT companies are significantly reducing their dependence on H-1B visas and moving toward greater local hiring in the United States, as tougher immigration rules, higher costs and increased scrutiny reshape their traditional business model.
According to USCIS data cited by NDTV, H-1B registrations from several major Indian IT firms have fallen sharply for Financial Year 2027.
Infosys reportedly reduced registrations from 8,886 to 759, while TCS cut them from 5,955 to just 284. HCL America, Tech Mahindra and Wipro also recorded declines ranging from around 85 per cent to nearly 96 per cent.
The drop comes amid a series of changes to the H-1B programme under the Donald Trump administration.
In September 2025, the US introduced an additional $100,000 payment requirement for certain new H-1B petitions involving workers seeking entry into the country from abroad. The measure was later extended until September 2027 and continues to face legal challenges.
The scrutiny increased further in September 2026, when Trump signed an executive order directing federal agencies to more closely examine H-1B petitions filed by companies that had recently laid off American workers.
These developments appear to be pushing Indian IT companies to rely more heavily on workers already based in the United States rather than transferring large numbers of employees from India.
Despite the fall in fresh registrations, Indian professionals still dominate the H-1B programme.
USCIS data for FY2025 showed that Indians accounted for 69.9 per cent of all approved H-1B beneficiaries. Of around 406,000 approved beneficiaries, about 283,000 were born in India. China was a distant second with a 12.1 per cent share.
This strong Indian presence reflects how deeply companies such as Infosys, TCS and Wipro have traditionally depended on the H-1B route to deploy engineers and technology professionals at client locations across the US.
However, the broader H-1B trend also shows a clear slowdown.
Total registrations increased from around 274,000 in FY2021 to a record 780,884 in FY2024. Since then, they have fallen sharply, dropping to about 479,000 in FY2025 and further to around 358,000 in FY2026.
The decline suggests that the once-aggressive H-1B hiring model is cooling as companies adapt to a more restrictive environment.
For Indian IT firms, the strategy now appears to be shifting toward hiring more Americans and permanent residents locally, while using H-1B visas more selectively for specialised roles.
That shift could gradually change the nature of Indian IT operations in the US.
Instead of a model built heavily around moving employees from India to American client sites, companies may increasingly expand local recruitment, invest in US-based talent and reduce their exposure to visa-related uncertainty.
At the same time, Indian professionals are likely to remain a major part of the H-1B ecosystem because of their strong presence in technology, engineering and specialised professional roles.
The bigger change, therefore, is not the disappearance of Indian talent from the US market, but a transformation in how Indian IT companies build and manage their American workforce.
As visa costs rise and regulatory scrutiny tightens, local hiring is becoming a more important part of the long-term strategy for Indian technology firms operating in the United States.
