Work in the United States
The biggest prize and the longest odds.
More about United States
There is no general graduate work visa: you study, use OPT, then need an employer to win an H-1B lottery that from FY2027 is weighted by salary — which counts against new graduates. The upside is that South Africans face no country green-card backlog.
See the 6 visa routesCompare countries
Degrees that travel best
13 of 23 fields rated 4 or 5
- 5 Finance & EconomicsOpen door · shortage or priority list
- 5 Computer Science & ITOpen door · shortage or priority list
- 5 Data Science & StatisticsOpen door · shortage or priority list
- 4 Natural SciencesOpen door
- 4 Agricultural ScienceOpen door
- 4 EngineeringExams or bridging · shortage or priority list
- 4 Veterinary ScienceExams or bridging · shortage or priority list
- 4 NursingExams or bridging · shortage or priority list
Show all 23 fields
- 4 PhysiotherapyExams or bridging · shortage or priority list
- 4 Actuarial ScienceExams or bridging · shortage or priority list
- 4 Social WorkExams or bridging · shortage or priority list
- 4 Occupational TherapyMajor requalification · shortage or priority list
- 4 PsychologyMajor requalification · shortage or priority list
- 3 Business ManagementOpen door
- 3 Humanities (BA)Open door
- 3 Quantity SurveyingRecognised, paperwork only
- 3 Chartered AccountancyRecognised, paperwork only
- 3 ArchitectureExams or bridging
- 3 LawExams or bridging
- 3 MedicineMajor requalification
- 3 DentistryMajor requalification
- 3 PharmacyMajor requalification
- 2 TeachingExams or bridging
Good to know
- Working language
- English.
- For South African passport holders
- South Africa has no treaty route: no TN (Canada/Mexico), no E-3 (Australia), no H-1B1 (Chile/Singapore), and SA is not on the E-1/E-2 treaty list.
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SA is not a Visa Waiver country, so a visa and interview are required. The advantage: SA sits under 'All Chargeability Areas', so no India-style green card queue.
- Shortage list
- Schedule A, Groups I and II (20 CFR 656.5)
The closest US equivalent to a shortage list.More
Schedule A occupations get blanket labour certification, skipping the normal PERM recruitment test. Group I covers registered nurses and physical therapists; Group II covers exceptional ability in the sciences or arts, including performing arts.
- Studying there instead
- NCES reports average published 2022-23 tuition of about USD 9,800/yr in-state at public four-year institutions and USD 40,700 at private nonprofits.
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International students pay the higher non-resident rate at public universities; no current international-specific figure could be officially sourced.
General information about published rules, not immigration advice; for an individual application use a licensed adviser in United States. Researched 2026-10-07.