DV 2026 Lottery Statistics Published!
. . . most of those selected will end up NOT receiving any of the visas available for the DV-2026 Program
Note: This article concerns the DV 2026 LOTTERY whose RESULTS were released on Saturday, May 3, 2025.
News
The Visa Bulletin for the month of November 2025 was released last week; and in it are the statistics of the DV-2026 Lottery.
The Details
According to the statistics, during the DV 2026 Entry period, 20,822,624 of the total entries submitted were qualified entries.
And from that number, only 129,516 applicants – which includes principal applicants, and their spouses and children who entered the Lottery along with them – were selected to apply for 51,850 Diversity Visas which will be available during Fiscal Year 2026 (i.e. October 1, 2025 to September 30, 2026).
The 51,850, which is lower than the normal 55,000, are the total Diversity Visas available for the DV-2026 Program. The difference will be made available to applicants of two other U.S. immigration programs, namely the NACARA and the NDAA Programs.
What this means
It is important to note that the number of persons selected compared to the number of visas available means that most of those selected will end up NOT receiving any of the visas available for the DV-2026 Program. That is something that happens every year: far more applicants are selected than the total number of Diversity Visas available.
It is also important to note that applicants who do not receive Diversity visas or “Issued” status by September 30, 2026, will lose the chance to emigrate to the United States as part of the DV-2026 Program, and will have no further claim despite being currently selected.
Breakdown
The highest numbers of DV-2026 selectees are from the following countries, with each topping 5,000:
from the Africa Region: Algeria, Egypt and Sudan
from the Europe Region: Russia and Ukraine
The breakdown of the 129,516 selectees by region and by country is as follows:
| AFRICA | ||
| ALGERIA 5,457 | ESWATINI 3 | MOZAMBIQUE 4 |
| ANGOLA 763 | ETHIOPIA 3,287 | NAMIBIA 3 |
| BENIN 1,064 | GABON 62 | NIGER 109 |
| BOTSWANA 7 | GAMBIA, THE 198 | RWANDA 1,252 |
| BURKINA FASO 252 | GHANA 1,642 | SENEGAL 478 |
| BURUNDI 1,616 | GUINEA 1,051 | SIERRA LEONE 639 |
| CABO VERDE 35 | GUINEA-BISSAU 10 | SOMALIA 1,554 |
| CAMEROON 3,533 | KENYA 3,949 | SOUTH AFRICA 187 |
| CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC 19 | LESOTHO 6 | SOUTH SUDAN 72 |
| CHAD 482 | LIBERIA 1,593 | SUDAN 5,226 |
| COMOROS 12 | LIBYA 276 | TANZANIA 404 |
| CONGO, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE 2,210 | MADAGASCAR 48 | TOGO 2,473 |
| CONGO, REPUBLIC OF THE 448 | MALAWI 159 | TUNISIA 202 |
| COTE D’IVOIRE 926 | MALI 268 | UGANDA 1,513 |
| DJIBOUTI 204 | MAURITANIA 261 | ZAMBIA 236 |
| EGYPT 5,527 | MAURITIUS 2 | ZIMBABWE 327 |
| EQUATORIAL GUINEA 12 | MOROCCO 3,670 | |
| ERITREA 206 | Western Sahara 2 | |
| ASIA | ||
| AFGHANISTAN 4,200 | JORDAN 1,092 | SINGAPORE 6 |
| BAHRAIN 18 | KUWAIT 101 | SRI LANKA 1,028 |
| BHUTAN 278 | LAOS 68 | SYRIA 624 |
| BURMA 1,540 | LEBANON 141 | TAIWAN 247 |
| CAMBODIA 811 | MALAYSIA 17 | THAILAND 360 |
| INDONESIA 385 | MONGOLIA 227 | TIMOR-LESTE 1 |
| IRAN 4,137 | NEPAL 3,933 | UNITED ARAB EMIRATES 154 |
| IRAQ 616 | OMAN 11 | YEMEN 2,449 |
| ISRAEL 153 | QATAR 66 | |
| JAPAN 141 | SAUDI ARABIA 577 | |
| EUROPE | ||
| ALBANIA 1,590 | GERMANY 420 | POLAND 343 |
| ARMENIA 2,639 | GREECE 58 | PORTUGAL 40 |
| AUSTRIA 35 | HUNGARY 121 | Macau 5 |
| AZERBAIJAN 1,817 | IRELAND 30 | ROMANIA 161 |
| BELARUS 1,545 | ITALY 267 | RUSSIA 5,510 |
| BELGIUM 26 | KAZAKHSTAN 2,723 | SERBIA 324 |
| BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA 51 | KOSOVO 172 | SLOVAKIA 26 |
| BULGARIA 142 | KYRGYZSTAN 3,324 | SLOVENIA 6 |
| CROATIA 14 | LATVIA 53 | SPAIN 84 |
| CYPRUS 8 | LITHUANIA 79 | SWEDEN 34 |
| CZECH REPUBLIC 44 | MOLDOVA 1,208 | SWITZERLAND 22 |
| DENMARK 8 | MONTENEGRO 57 | TAJIKISTAN 3,708 |
| ESTONIA 17 | NETHERLANDS 24 | TURKEY 3,191 |
| FINLAND 20 | Aruba 4 | TURKMENISTAN 2,542 |
| FRANCE 309 | NORTH MACEDONIA 165 | UKRAINE 5,283 |
| French Polynesia 1 | NORTHERN IRELAND 10 | UNITED KINGDOM 1,303 |
| New Caledonia 4 | NORWAY 6 | UZBEKISTAN 3,754 |
| GEORGIA 1,406 | ||
| NORTH AMERICA | ||
| BAHAMAS, THE 23 | ||
| OCEANIA | ||
| AUSTRALIA 599 | MICRONESIA 1 | SAMOA 14 |
| Christmas Island 1 | NAURU 8 | SOLOMON ISLANDS 4 |
| Cocos (Keeling) Islands 55 | NEW ZEALAND 229 | TONGA 100 |
| COOK ISLANDS 24 | Tokelau 4 | VANUATU 13 |
| FIJI 2,094 | PAPUA NEW GUINEA 14 | |
| KIRIBATI 15 | REPUBLIC OF PALAU 3 | |
| SOUTH AMERICA | ||
| ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA 2 | ECUADOR 1,270 | PERU 1,596 |
| ARGENTINA 124 | GRENADA 5 | SAINT KITTS AND NEVIS 11 |
| BARBADOS 3 | GUATEMALA 367 | SAINT LUCIA 9 |
| BELIZE 2 | GUYANA 24 | SAINT VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES 8 |
| BOLIVIA 269 | NICARAGUA 167 | SURINAME 8 |
| CHILE 83 | PANAMA 36 | TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO 139 |
| COSTA RICA 99 | PARAGUAY 19 | URUGUAY 13 |
| DOMINICA 8 | ||
Ineligible Countries
Natives of the following countries are not eligible to participate in the DV-2026 Program: Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, China (including Hong Kong SAR), Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, India, Jamaica, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, South Korea, Venezuela, and Vietnam.
That is why they do not feature in the table above.
Banned Countries
Finally, it is worth noting that individuals from the countries listed BELOW have been banned from being issued U.S. immigrant visas. As such, Diversity Visa applicants chargeable to those countries will not be issued visas as long as the ban remains in place. And if the ban is not lifted before the DV 2026 Program ends, such applicants will end up losing the opportunity to immigrate to the U. S. as indicated earlier in this article.
The banned countries are: Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen; Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela.
