“Will you require visa sponsorship?” — how employers actually ask it
One of the two questions that decides whether an application can go anywhere at all, and it is asked in more different ways than most people expect. We read the application forms of 160 employers that ask it — 1,425 instances in all — from their own public job-board APIs. This is what the question looks like in practice.
What it is checking
Asks whether you would need the employer to sponsor a work visa, now or later. Sponsorship costs an employer time and fees, which is why it is asked early. Separate from whether you can work there today.
The shape of the answer
94% of these forms give you a fixed list rather than a text box, and 92% of what those lists offer is nothing but yes and no. There is usually nowhere on the form to explain a situation, so the choice is the whole answer. 95% are marked required.
| Option offered | Times it appears |
|---|---|
| No | 1,241 |
| Yes | 1,225 |
| I am authorized to work for any employer in the country outlined in this role (ie: citizen, permanent resident, etc.) | 23 |
| My current work authorization requires a renewal or sponsorship now or in the future (ie: H1-B, OPT, TN, etc.) | 23 |
| My status to work in the country in this role's location is unknown | 23 |
| Employee Card | 20 |
| BlueCard | 20 |
| Family Reunification Permit | 20 |
| Temporary protection | 20 |
| Full-time student visa (23V) | 20 |
| Visitor Permit | 20 |
| Permanent Residency / Green Card | 20 |
64 distinct options appear across the corpus. The long tail is mostly one employer listing every permit type it recognises.
244 ways of asking the same thing
The wording matters more than it looks: two forms can ask about the same fact and accept different answers. These are the most common, with the number of employers using each — the form's own words, not a paraphrase.
| Question, as the form words it | Employers |
|---|---|
| Will you now or in the future require visa sponsorship? | 10 |
| Will you now or in the future require sponsorship for employment visa status (e.g., H-1B visa status)? | 5 |
| Will you now or in the future require sponsorship for employment visa status? | 5 |
| Will you now, or in the future, require visa sponsorship? | 3 |
| Do you require visa sponsorship? | 2 |
| Will you now or in the future require sponsorship for a visa to remain in your current location? | 2 |
| Will you now or in the future require sponsorship for employment in the United States? | 2 |
| Will you now or in the future require sponsorship for employment visa status (e.g. H-1B visa status)? | 2 |
| Will you now or in the future require sponsorship? | 2 |
| Will you now or in the future require visa sponsorship to work in the United States? | 2 |
| Will you now, or in the future, require sponsorship for employment visa status (e.g. H-1B visa status)? | 2 |
| (Skip this question if you are applying to work in Canada or the UK). Do you now or in the future require sponsorship? | 1 |
Employers whose exact wording we have
Each of these pages lists every question on that employer's form, including this one.
8am · Adyen · Affirm · Airbnb · Airtable · Alpha 9 Oncology · Alphasense · Amyris · Anthropic · Aptos · Asana · Assemblyai · Axial · Axon · Bevi · Bill · Boku · Boulder Care · Boulevard · Box · Brex · Bringg · Calendly · Carbon Direct · Carbonchain · Carvana · Centrum Health · Chime Financial · Circleci · Cloudflare · Cockroach · Cocoon · Coinbase · Culture Amp · Databricks · Degreed · Dollar Shave Club · Doximity · Dropbox · Elastic · Enova International · Eve · Fastly · Fin · Fireblocks · Fivetran · Flexport · Flock Homes · Future · Galileo · Gemini · Genius · Genius Ai · Ghx · Ginkgo Bioworks · Gitlab · Gocardless · Gofundme · Grafana · Headspace · Headspace Providers · Hippo Insurance · House Rx · Hume Ai · Huntress · Instacart · Kaizo · Kbra · Kiwico · Knock · Komodo Health · Lab37 · Launchdarkly · Layerzero · Legion · Lithic · Loyal · Ltse · Magic Leap · Manifest · Marqeta · Mercury · Mixpanel · Mntn · Modern Health · Mongodb · Mozilla · Myfitnesspal · N26 · Natera · Netlify · Neuehealth · New Relic · Newsela · Nourish · Nuro · Odeko · Ophelia · Optimal Dynamics · Oshi Health · Outschool · Pacaso · Pagerduty · Pathai · Pave · Peregrine · Persefoni Ai · Pinwheel · Podium · Pomelo Care · Postman · Premier Medical · Prolific · Quip · R Zero · Razorpay Software Private · Recursion · Relationalai · Robinhood · Roofstock · Runwise · Samsara · Scopely · Shopmy · Sidecar Health · Signifyd · Singlestore · Smartsheet · Sofi · Sourcegraph · Sovrn · Squarespace · Stockx · Stripe · Stubhub · Studs · Sumo Logic · Syndio · Tanium · Techstars · Temporal · Tenable · True Anomaly · Truffle Security · Twilio · Upgrade · Upslide · Urban Sports Club · Vera Therapeutics · Vercel · Verisign · Viam · Waymark · Webflow · Whisper Aero · Wholesail · Wonderschool · Wrike · Yugabytedb · Zynga
What this page does not tell you
It does not tell you what to answer. What is true for you is not visible from a job board, and a confident steer on a question about your right to work — or on a contract you have signed — would be worth less than nothing. What is here is what the form will put in front of you, so that nothing on it is a surprise.
Nor does it say whether any employer filters on the answer. Whether a form's answers are used that way is not published by any of these job boards, and the honest position is that we cannot see it.