The US Embassy in Mexico announced that it has begun offering to reschedule visa interviews to a later date. This particularly applies to those who are applying for a B1/B2 visitor visa for the first time and already have an interview appointment for 2025. Consequently, hundreds of thousands of Mexican applicants are expected to be able to purchase a US visa sooner than planned.
Applicants have already begun to receive notices from consulates offering to reschedule the interview date to 2024. Offers come from the sender address . «If you have been notified that you may be able to reschedule your appointment and the system does not indicate that appointments are available, we encourage applicants to periodically check for available appointments…», — the embassy said in a statement.
During the coronavirus pandemic, US consulates were closed and did not issue visas. As a result, after the resumption of visa issuance, huge queues of visa applicants formed at consulates. In Mexico in particular, registration at most consulates until recently was carried out more than 16 months later, for 2025 and later. At the end of 2023, consulates began to work much faster, and although the calendar of available dates for visa interviews most often still shows 2025, if you check the available dates every day, you can catch a date for 2024, 2-4 months from the current one.
In 2023, US consulates in Mexico set a record by issuing 2.3 million visas of various types — this is the highest figure ever and 35% more than in 2022. This also equates to 22% of the total number of US visas issued worldwide.
US diplomatic missions in Mexico include an embassy and consular section in Mexico City, 9 consulates in certain states of Mexico, and 9 consular agencies. The closest US diplomatic mission to Cancun is in Merida, Yucatan. Currently, only Mexican citizens and residents can purchase a US visit visa in Mexico.