E-2 Visa Cost 2026: What You Pay at the Consulate and USCIS

Every E-2 case pays the government on one of two routes. An application at a consulate pays the visa fee and, for some nationalities, a reciprocity fee. A change of status or an extension inside the US pays USCIS petition fees instead. The attorney fee and the business plan are paid separately, on top of the government fees.

The calculator estimates your own E-2 visa cost on either route. Set the route, consulate or USCIS, and the number of full-time employees the business has. Then add premium processing and the family members who come with you.

A consular application has one government fee. You pay $315 to the State Department for the visa application, per person, before you schedule the interview. The online forms themselves, Form DS-160 and the E supplement Form DS-156E, carry no charge of their own.

A second fee depends on your nationality. The State Department charges a reciprocity fee when it issues the visa, mirroring what your country charges US citizens for a similar visa. The fee and the visa’s validity come from the same reciprocity schedule, and most treaty nationalities pay nothing.

Inside the US, a change of status to E-2 or an extension of stay goes to USCIS on Form I-129, and it carries two fees. A business with 25 or fewer full-time US employees pays a $510 petition fee and a $300 Asylum Program Fee, $810 together. A nonprofit owes only the $510. Above that headcount the two fees run $1,015 and $600, or $965 and $600 when the petition is filed online.

USCIS counts full-time equivalents across the business and every affiliate or subsidiary, so a new E-2 company with a handful of staff sits in the lower tier. One question on the form settles it, and the company’s most recent quarterly payroll return backs up the answer.

A USCIS approval grants E-2 status. It does not issue a visa. The first time you travel abroad you apply at a consulate as if from scratch and pay the consular fee there. A case that starts with USCIS often pays both schedules. You can still change status inside the US when leaving is impractical, and the fee difference is part of that choice.

Premium processing on Form I-907 costs $2,965, and USCIS then has 15 business days to act on an E-2 petition. Acting means an approval, a denial, a notice of intent to deny, or a request for evidence. The fee brings the decision forward; it does not make approval more likely.

USCIS charges the same amount on a first change of status and on an extension. When it fails to act in time, it returns the fee and keeps the case in the premium queue, under 8 CFR 106.4.

You can also add it to a petition already in the queue. A consular application has no premium service, so the fee never arises on that route.

Published E-2 attorney fees run from about $5,000 to $15,000, and the spread comes from how much work the file takes. A quote rises when the source of funds has to be traced across accounts and years. It rises again when you buy a business instead of starting one, and when the consulate asks for a full company file.

Check what a quote includes before you sign. An E-2 case needs the eligibility review, the source-of-funds tracing, the DS-160 and DS-156E or the Form I-129 package, the cover letter, the exhibits, and preparation for the interview. Ask whether a request for more documents after the interview is included, because a low quote often stops at the interview.

On imigOS a licensed immigration attorney takes an E-2 case from strategy to filing for a fixed $8,000, and the figure is agreed before you commit. The fee includes case strategy, document review, the legal brief and the government forms, the filing itself, every reply to a request for evidence, and courier costs. The pricing page lists what the fee includes.

Every E-2 application includes a business plan, and it is a separate cost from the attorney fee. On imigOS a business-plan writer produces it for about $1,500. Published prices run from about $1,500 to $5,000.

The plan sets out the business model, a market analysis, a marketing plan, the operations, hiring projections with job descriptions for the key roles, and five-year financial projections. Those projections include the first-year operating budget and how the invested capital is allocated. Officers read them to decide whether the business meets the E-2 visa requirements on income and jobs. The numbers in the plan, the forms and the exhibits have to agree.

A plan written earlier for a bank loan or for investors is a starting point, and the writer reworks it around what a consular officer looks for. When you are the investor, your own job description in the plan is also the evidence that you will develop and direct the business.

The immigration attorney does not write the plan. The attorney checks it against the rest of the file before anything is filed.

An E-1 visa costs the same as an E-2 on both routes. The consulate charges its visa fee and applies its reciprocity schedule without distinguishing between the two. USCIS charges one Form I-129 fee and one Asylum Program Fee for both. Premium processing is open to both on identical terms, and on imigOS the flat attorney fee does not change either.

An E-1 file is built from different evidence. A treaty trader documents trade that already flows between the US and the treaty country, so the exhibits are contracts, invoices and shipping records. Among the reciprocity examples, only Spain sets a different E-1 fee: $204, against $124 for the E-2.

A spouse and unmarried children under 21 take E-2 status too, and their fees follow your route. At a consulate each family member pays the $315 visa fee and their own reciprocity fee. A family of three from Italy pays $945 in visa fees and $594 in reciprocity fees. Inside the US one Form I-539, $470 on paper, covers the spouse and every child together.

The spouse can work without a separate application. USCIS treats E-2 spouses as permitted to work from the day their status begins, and an I-94 record marked E-2S proves it to an employer. A work permit card on Form I-765 is optional and costs $520 on paper or $470 online. Children can attend school but cannot work.

Family members do not need the treaty nationality. A German investor’s Brazilian spouse takes E-2 status at the same fee as any other family member.

An extension inside the US costs the same as the first filing. It goes on a new Form I-129 with the same petition fees as the first time, plus premium processing if you want it. USCIS grants E-2 status two years at a time with no limit on the number of extensions. You pay the fee again every two years for as long as you stay on this route.

A consular visa has its own validity. The consulate issues it for the period your nationality gets under the reciprocity schedule, up to five years for many treaty countries. Each entry on it gives a two-year stay. Renewing it means a new application at the consulate, with the visa fee and the reciprocity fee again.

The legal work is usually lighter the second time. The business and the source of funds are already documented, so the attorney updates the file. A sale of the business, a merger or a new owner is different. That is a substantive change, and it needs a new Form I-129 with the full fees. Asking USCIS whether a change counts as substantive also goes on Form I-129 with fee.

Most E-2 cases land between about $9,800 and $13,800: the government fees, the flat attorney fee and the business plan. The table shows four common cases.