In the days since, the administration proposed that H-1B visas be approved based on skill level and wages, instead of the current randomized lottery system. It's also floated the possibility that certain workers, such as doctors, may be exempt from the fee.
The rapid policy shifts have put some startups in a tricky spot when it comes to hiring skilled talent, since H-1B visas help many tech companies employ foreign engineers and other technical hires.
Some venture capitalists and founders are increasingly bullish on foreign tech hubs in places like Canada and the United Kingdom, while others hope the proposed pay-to-play model will help them attract even better talent.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman also commented on the changes. "We need to get the smartest people in the country, and streamlining that process and also sort of aligning financial incentives seems good to me," Altman said on CNBC this week.
Business Insider looked at publicly available data from the Department of Labor and US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to see which startups had received the most H-1B visa approvals so far in 2025.
Those approval numbers may not equal the number of people on H-1B visas currently employed at the startups.
Databricks, Cohesity, Stripe, Gusto, Plaid, and Deel declined to comment for this story. Magic Leap said it's following the recent executive order and additional guidance closely to comply with all visa and immigration laws.
The remaining startups included didn't respond to requests for comment.
These are the 20 startups to get the most H-1B visas approved this year.
ByteDance
BuzzFeed News reported Monday that TikTok's owner ByteDance had scraped content from Instagram and Snapchat in 2017 to create fake accounts on Flipagram, TikTok's predecessor. Here, a TikTok employee looks at his mobile phone as he walks past the logo of TikTok in a London office on February 9, 2022.
Tolga Akmen/AFP via Getty Images
Certified H-1B approvals: 1,360
Total employees worldwide: 120,000, according to Pitchbook
Total funding: Nearly $19 billion, according to Pitchbook
Headquarters: Beijing
Databricks
DataBricks CEO Ali Ghodsi
Databricks
Certified H-1B approvals: 248
Total employees worldwide: About 8,000, according to the company
Total funding: Over $15 billion, according to the company
Headquarters: San Francisco
Stripe
Stripe Co-founder and CEO Patrick Collison.
AOP.Press/Corbis/Getty Images
Certified H-1B approvals: 151
Total employees worldwide: About 9,000, according to the company
Total funding: $2.2 billion, according to the company
Headquarters: San Francisco and Dublin
OpenAI
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
Certified H-1B approvals: 76
Total employees worldwide: 4,500, according to PitchBook
Total Funding: nearly $35 billion, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: San Francisco
Cohesity
Sanjay Poonen, Cohesity CEO
Cohesity
Certified H-1B approvals: 65
Total employees worldwide: 6,000, according to the company
Total Funding: nearly $2 billion, according to the company
Headquarters: Santa Clara, California
Applied Intuition
Applied Intuition CEO Qasar Younis.
Matthias Balk/picture alliance via Getty Images
Certified H-1B approvals: 65
Total employees worldwide: 492, according to PitchBook
Total funding: over $1 billion, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: Mountain View, California
Saviynt
Certified H-1B approvals: 55
Total employees worldwide: 1,361, according to PitchBook
Total funding: $530 million, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: El Segundo, California
Anthropic
"And then in twelve months, we may be in a world where AI is writing essentially all of the code," Anthropic's CEO Dario Amodei said at a Council on Foreign Relations event on Monday.
Halil Sagirkaya/Anadolu via Getty Images
Certified H-1B approvals: 41
Total employees worldwide: 1,000, according to PitchBook
Total Funding: $32 billion, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: San Francisco
Scale AI
Brian Snyder/REUTERS
Certified H-1B approvals: 34
Total employees worldwide: 1,400, according to PitchBook
Total funding: $16.4 billion, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: San Francisco
Ripple
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse.
Stephen McCarthy/Getty Images
Certified H-1B approvals: 33
Total employees worldwide: 900, according to PitchBook
Total funding: $326 million, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: San Francisco
Gusto
Gusto CEO Joshua Reeves.
Gusto
Certified H-1B approvals: 33
Total employees worldwide: 2,800, according to the company
Total funding: $751 million, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: San Francisco
Rivos
Certified H-1B approvals: 32
Total employees worldwide: Unknown
Total funding: $370 million, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: Santa Clara, California
Magic Leap
Magic Leap sells augmented reality glasses.
JOSEP LAGO/AFP via Getty Images
Certified H-1B approvals: 28
Total employees worldwide: 1,254, according to PitchBook
Total funding: $3.98 billion, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: Plantation, Florida
In a statement to BI, a Magic Leap spokesperson said the company is following the recent executive order and additional guidance closely to comply with all visa and immigration laws. Magic Leap said it doesn't disclose employee numbers or funding totals.
Verkada
Verkada CEO Filip Kaliszan.
Verkada
Certified H-1B approvals: 26
Total employees worldwide: 2,455, according to PitchBook
Total funding: $655 million, per PitchBook
Headquarters: San Mateo, California
Plaid
Plaid cofounder and CEO Zach Perret.
Cody Glenn/Getty Images
Certified H-1B approvals: 24
Total employees worldwide: 1,200, according to PitchBook
Total funding: $1.31 billion, per PitchBook
Headquarters: San Francisco
Nuro
Nuro CEO Jiajun Zhu.
Nuro
Certified H-1B approvals: 23
Total employees worldwide: 974, according to PitchBook
Total funding: $2.33 billion, per PitchBook
Headquarters: Mountain View, California
Form Energy
Form's CEO and cofounder Mateo Jaramillo
Form Energy
Certified H-1B approvals: 23
Total employees worldwide: 854, according to PitchBook
Total funding: $1.43 billion, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: Somerville, Massachusetts
Deel
Alex Bouaziz, Deel on Centre Stage during day two of Collision 2022 at Enercare Centre in Toronto, Canada.
Vaughn Ridley/Sportsfile for Collision via Getty Images
Certified H-1B approvals: 22
Total employees worldwide: Over 6,500, according to the company
Total funding: $689 million, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: Deel is fully remote, with no physical offices.
Zipline
Zipline drone takes off from 25-foot long platform
Zipline
Certified H-1B approvals: 21
Total employees worldwide: 1,446, according to PitchBook
Total funding: $1.23 billion, according to PitchBook
Headquarters: South San Francisco
Brex
Brex cofounders and co-CEOs Pedro Franceschi (left) and Henrique Dubugras
Brex
Certified H-1B approvals: 21
Total employees worldwide: About 1,100, according to the company
Total funding: $1.29 billion, according to the company
