The Annual Asylum Fee: how much, who pays, and where

The annual asylum fee (AAF) is a payment required for each year that an application for asylum remains pending. It was created by H.R.1, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (Pub. L. 119-21), signed on July 4, 2025, and codified at 8 U.S.C. § 1808. Below: the amount for fiscal year 2026, who owes it, the official payment addresses at USCIS and in immigration court, the deadlines, the consequences of nonpayment, and where those consequences stand after recent federal court rulings.

In brief

• The amount for fiscal year 2026 is $102 per application per year. The statute allows no waiver and no reduction.

• One fee is charged per application, from the principal applicant, once the application has been pending for a year or more. Where it is paid depends on whether the case sits with USCIS, an immigration court, or the Board of Immigration Appeals.

• USCIS cases are paid through my.uscis.gov and immigration court cases through epay.eoir.justice.gov. Where the case is before the Board of Immigration Appeals, payment follows the instructions in the Board's written order.

Status as of August 14, 2026. The fee is being collected, but the penalties for nonpayment in USCIS cases are on hold. On August 5, 2026, the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, in Venezuelan Association of Massachusetts v. USCIS (No. 26-13038-NMG), stayed nationwide those provisions of the April 29, 2026 rule that call for rejecting a pending application, terminating employment authorization, and initiating removal proceedings over an unpaid fee; the stay runs until the court rules on the merits. The fee itself is not cancelled, and USCIS continues to issue notices and accept payments. In immigration court the picture differs: under Matter of L-F-R-, 29 I&N Dec. 787 (BIA 2026), decided July 24, 2026, nonpayment defeats the asylum claim alone and does not reach withholding of removal or protection under the Convention Against Torture.

Contents

• What the annual asylum fee is

• How much the fee is in 2026

• Who owes the fee and when

• Where to pay: USCIS, immigration court, or the Board

• How payment works at USCIS

• How payment works in immigration court

• How appeals at the Board are handled

• If no notice arrived or the payment window expired

• What happens if the fee goes unpaid and why penalties are on hold

• What the fee does not reach: withholding of removal and protection under the Convention Against Torture

• Timeline of the rules since July 2025

• Scams: which sites and offers are not official

• Frequently asked questions

• Official sources

What the annual asylum fee is

The annual asylum fee is a mandatory payment for each calendar year that a Form I-589 remains pending. It comes from section 100009 of H.R.1, codified at 8 U.S.C. § 1808, which directs the Secretary of Homeland Security or the Attorney General to require the fee "in addition to any other fee authorized by law." In practice the agencies do not charge the fee merely because an application crosses into a new calendar year: they count a year of pendency, meaning 365 days from filing.

It is distinct from the one-time asylum application fee under 8 U.S.C. § 1802, a minimum of $100 due when the application is filed. The first is paid once at filing; the second recurs every year the case stays open. Before July 2025, applying for asylum in the United States carried no fee at all.

No fee waiver applies to either charge. The statute bars waivers and reductions outright, and the DHS rule confirms that a waiver request may not be submitted.

How much the fee is in 2026

For fiscal year 2026 the amount is $102. For fiscal year 2025 the statutory minimum was $100, and from FY 2026 forward the figure is indexed: the prior year's amount plus the increase in the CPI-U for July over the same month of the preceding year, rounded down to the nearest dollar (8 U.S.C. § 1808(b)(2)).

A practical consequence follows. Notices mailed in 2025 state $100, and the payment system may still display that figure. The amount stated in the current notice or court order is the amount to be paid.

The fee attaches to the application, not to each family member. One application covering a spouse and children carries a single fee; separately filed applications each carry their own. USCIS states that the fee applies to the principal applicant only.

Who owes the fee and when

The obligation arises once an application has been pending for at least one year. The counting differs by agency.

• USCIS. Under the Federal Register notice of July 22, 2025 (90 FR 34511), the first fee, for FY 2025, reaches applications filed on or before October 1, 2024 that were still pending on September 30, 2025. For applications filed after October 1, 2024, the obligation arises once the application has been pending for 365 days. The date of any later payment is set by the agency notice, and the interval between payments may prove shorter than a year.

• Immigration courts and the Board. Per EOIR materials, the fee is owed by anyone whose application had been pending for one year or more on or after October 1, 2025, and every additional 365 days of pendency triggers another fee.

One group stands apart: members of the Ms. L. v. ICE settlement class and their qualifying additional family members. As of February 5, 2026, USCIS paused collection of several H.R.1 fees from them and rescinded payment notices issued earlier.

Where to pay: USCIS, immigration court, or the Board

The payment address is set by which body holds the application at the time of payment. A payment made in the wrong system does not transfer automatically: agency materials set out no uniform transfer procedure between USCIS and EOIR.

Cash and paper instruments are not an option. Since February 23, 2026, EOIR no longer accepts checks or money orders: all fees run through the portal electronically. USCIS accepts the fee online only.

How payment works at USCIS

The procedure appears on the Form I-589 page at uscis.gov: the agency issues a personal notice stating the amount, the method, and the deadline, with a copy to any representative listed on Form G-28. Thirty days run from the notice. Under 8 CFR 208.3(c)(6) the period runs from the fee notice date rather than the date the applicant receives it, and EOIR materials use the same formula. While the fee remains payable, USCIS cannot approve the asylum application.

1. Checking the obligation: at my.uscis.gov/accounts/annual-asylum-fee/questionnaire, the A-Number and the receipt number for the application are entered.

2. A payment button means the fee is due; an alert that no payment is required means the obligation has not arisen at that moment.

3. Payment runs by credit card, debit card, or a U.S. bank account; where no card exists, a prepaid card can be used.

4. The confirmation screen displays an Agency Tracking ID. It appears once and serves as proof of payment alongside the receipt.

5. USCIS sends the receipt to the online account or by mail, depending on how the application was filed.

Practitioners note that notices do not reach everyone and advise checking the payment page independently once the second year of pendency begins. The problem is documented in the litigation record: in Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project v. USCIS (D. Md., No. SAG-25-03299), the court observed on February 2, 2026 that notices were systematically sent to outdated addresses and that some applicants received none at all.

How payment works in immigration court

In immigration court the obligation is triggered by a written order from the judge. Under EOIR memorandum PM 26-01 of January 2, 2026, the agency sets no uniform deadline: immigration judges fix it case by case at their discretion. Orders with two-day deadlines appear in the litigation record, which is why mail, email, and any court online account carry practical weight here.

1. Payment is made at epay.eoir.justice.gov: the A-Number is entered and the filing type corresponding to the annual asylum fee on Form I-589 is selected.

2. The portal runs through Pay.gov and accepts cards, a bank account, PayPal, and Amazon Pay.

3. Payment produces a receipt and a Payment Tracking ID; with those, the receipt can be retrieved again at epay.eoir.justice.gov/receipt.

4. The Payment Tracking ID stays available in the portal for 20 days after payment; after that it is requested from the court.

5. A copy of the receipt goes to the court and to the government attorney (OPLA) before the deadline in the order. The agency has published no uniform procedure for filing that proof.

Where the fee was already paid to USCIS and the case then moved to court, proof of the earlier payment is retained and presented as the judge directs; public guidance sets out no uniform crediting procedure.

How appeals at the Board are handled

For cases on appeal, the Board of Immigration Appeals issues its own written order with an amount and a deadline, and states that it will not charge the fee without one first. As of publication the EOIR portal has no dedicated entry for Board payments, so payment follows whatever the order directs.

Under Matter of L-F-R-, appellate immigration judges hold the same authority over deadlines and consequences as immigration judges: the statute draws no distinction between proceedings before a court and before the Board.

If no notice arrived or the payment window expired

The USCIS payment page returns one of three answers: the fee is due, the fee is not due at this time, or the payment period for the case has expired. The third message has appeared for people who never received a notice.

USCIS stated that beginning May 29, 2026 it would send fresh notices to those who had been noticed earlier but had not paid, with a new 30-day deadline. In August 2026, advocacy organizations reported that some applicants who had previously seen the expiration message regained the technical ability to pay, which is why periodic checking of the page retains value.

Practitioners describe the following steps when that message appears: saving a dated screenshot of the message; contacting USCIS at 1-800-375-5283 or through the online chat and obtaining a service request number; and asking a congressional office to inquire with the agency, which anyone may request regardless of citizenship. The agency has published no guaranteed process for reopening a missed payment window.

What happens if the fee goes unpaid and why penalties are on hold

The DHS interim final rule of April 29, 2026 (91 FR 22952, effective May 29, 2026) set the consequences in USCIS cases: rejection of the pending Form I-589 once 30 days pass from the personal notice; a halt to the accrual of time toward employment authorization; rejection or denial of any pending application for employment authorization and immediate termination of an existing (c)(8) document; and, for those without lawful status, a Notice to Appear or expedited removal where applicable. The filing fee already paid is retained on rejection.

Those consequences are not being applied now. On July 21, 2026 the District of Massachusetts entered a temporary administrative stay, and on August 5, 2026 it stayed the relevant provisions under 5 U.S.C. § 705 until final judgment, finding the plaintiffs likely to show that this part of the rule is procedurally invalid: rejecting an asylum application touches substantive rights rather than agency procedure. The court expressly extended the stay beyond the parties before it.

The stay removes neither the fee nor the duty to pay it, and it may be revisited. It does not operate in immigration court, where Matter of L-F-R- controls: failure to pay by the deadline the judge sets leads to the asylum claim being pretermitted or deemed abandoned.

What the fee does not reach: withholding of removal and protection under the Convention Against Torture

On July 24, 2026, the Board held in Matter of L-F-R-, 29 I&N Dec. 787 (BIA 2026) that the annual asylum fee and the consequences of nonpayment run only to an application for asylum under section 208 of the INA and do not extend to statutory withholding of removal under section 241(b)(3) or to protection under the regulations implementing the Convention Against Torture. The Board rested on the plain text of the statute, which speaks only of an "application for asylum."

The practical effect: a single Form I-589 carries three forms of protection, and nonpayment does not let a judge pretermit the form as a whole. Withholding and CAT claims must be considered separately. In L-F-R- itself, the judge's pretermission of the entire form was reversed and the record remanded for those claims.

Timeline of the rules since July 2025

Scams: which sites and offers are not official

The annual asylum fee is accepted only on my.uscis.gov and epay.eoir.justice.gov. Look-alike domains have surfaced around other government payment systems.

• Offers to "obtain a waiver" or "reduce the amount" run against the statute: no waiver exists for H.R.1 fees.

• Demands for payment by wire transfer, cryptocurrency, gift cards, or to an individual's account are not an official channel.

• A USCIS notice carries the A-Number, the receipt number, the amount, and the deadline; the obligation can be checked on the agency payment page without an intermediary.

• The receipt together with the Agency Tracking ID (USCIS), or the receipt together with the Payment Tracking ID (EOIR), is kept as proof of payment.

Frequently asked questions

How much is the annual asylum fee in 2026?
$102 per application for each year of pendency. The amount is indexed annually to the CPI-U; notices issued in 2025 state $100, and the payment system may still display that figure.

Is the fee charged for every family member?
No. The fee attaches to one Form I-589 and to the principal applicant. Where each family member filed a separate application, there are as many fees as applications.

Can the fee be waived or paid in installments?
No. H.R.1 bars waivers and reductions, and a waiver request for these fees is not accepted.

What happens if no notice arrives?
The obligation arises independently of whether the paper reaches the applicant, and it can be checked directly on the USCIS payment page with an A-Number and receipt number. The litigation record confirms systemic failures in notice delivery; in USCIS cases the penalties for a missed deadline have been stayed since July 21, 2026.

Will an asylum application be rejected over nonpayment?
In USCIS cases that consequence appears in the April 29, 2026 rule, but its operation is stayed pending final judgment in the District of Massachusetts. In immigration court, missing the deadline set by the judge can result in the asylum claim being pretermitted or deemed abandoned, meaning it is not considered on its merits.

Does nonpayment affect withholding of removal and protection under the Convention Against Torture?
No. Under the Board's decision of July 24, 2026, the fee and the consequences of nonpayment do not extend to those forms of protection, which must be considered separately.

What happens to employment authorization?
The rule provides for termination of a (c)(8) document when the asylum application is rejected, and for denial of a pending application for authorization. That part of the consequences is currently stayed in USCIS cases.

How many times must the fee be paid?
For every year the application remains pending. The agencies have published no single calendar for later payments and notify separately.

Official sources

This material is informational, is not legal advice, and reflects the state of the question as of August 14, 2026. Rules and amounts change, including through pending litigation; before making a payment, and after a missed deadline, the details are verified against official sources and, in a contested situation, with a licensed immigration attorney.