USCIS long EAD processing time

My i-765 receipt date was 11/23/2020 (Nebraska Service Center). It’s been more than 8 months now and still nothing yet. I know it’s only slightly outside of their reported processing time (6.5-8 months for EAD for pending 485) but that processing time has increased from 3-5 months since November. I’m getting worried that it can take up to a year now.

According to my lawyer, she started seeing a trend where USCIS just outright issued green cards and skipped over the EAD/AP card and the interview altogether. This might be the cause for the delay in issuing EAD cards.

Is anyone experiencing EAD processing delay or hearing of people getting their green cards without having to interview or receiving their EAD first?

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Hi Kalpesh,

Thank you very much for the link to the thread. It’s very helpful.

So what my lawyer heard/saw seems to check out and that seems to explain why there’s practically no progress on my EAD.

It’s great that they are focusing on issuing GC and waiving the interview in the process.

However, this might not be a blessing in my case because that could mean it will take longer for me to receive any official doc from USCIS. I’m saying this because I hit my 6th year H1B max out in December 2020 and have been out of a job since waiting for my EAD/AP. And the fact that I haven’t received medical RFE (although biometrics given in January 2021) worries me even more because that means they probably haven’t got to my case yet.

Any expedite request my lawyer put in got denied so now I’m just playing the waiting game. Sigh.