US Green Card Lottery (DV) Eligibility Checker for Sri Lankans

The US Diversity Visa (DV) program — the "green card lottery" — makes roughly 55,000immigrant visas available each year to natives of countries with low rates of immigration to the United States. Selection is random, but before you can be selected you must meet two eligibility requirements set out in the State Department's Diversity Visa Instructions. This checker evaluates both, deterministically, using only the rules — it does not estimate any "chance," because there is none to estimate.

1. Country / nativity test. Your eligibility is tied to your country of birth, not your citizenship or residence. Sri Lanka is eligible for DV-2027. A short list of high-immigration countries (for DV-2027 these include India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, China mainland, the Philippines, Vietnam, and others) is noteligible. If you were born in an ineligible country, you may still qualify by cross-chargeability: claim your spouse's eligible country of birth — if you both immigrate together — or a parent's country of birth, if neither parent was born in or resided in your ineligible birth country when you were born.
2. Education-or-work test. You satisfy this with either route. The education route requires a completed 12-year course of formal elementary and secondary education (US high-school equivalent). In Sri Lankan terms, A/L / Grade 12–13, a diploma, or a degree meets it — but G.C.E. O/L alone, completed after about 11 school years, does not. The work routerequires two years of experience within the past five years in an occupation that O*NET rates as Job Zone 4 or 5 with an SVP (Specific Vocational Preparation) of 7.0 or higher — that is, a job that normally needs at least two years of training or experience.
3. Verdict. You are eligible when the country test passes andat least one of the education or work routes is met. If the country test fails with no cross-chargeability option, you are not eligible. If the country passes and your education is below the 12-year bar but you are unsure whether your job qualifies, the checker returns an amber "likely eligible — confirm your occupation" result and links you to O*NET to settle it.

Each verdict is computed two independent ways — a step-by-step rule walk and a separate truth-table lookup — and the tool only ships a result when both agree, the same cross-check discipline used on the site's tax and fee calculators. The eligible-country list is republished every DV year; this build stores the DV-2027 list and shows the verification date so you always know which cycle it reflects.

Why the O/L vs A/L distinction matters so much

The single most common reason a Sri Lankan applicant misjudges their eligibility is the education rule. The DV education requirement is measured in years of formal schooling, benchmarked to a US high school diploma, which is 12 years. Sri Lanka's G.C.E. O/L is normally taken in Grade 11 — roughly 11 years of schooling — so it does not by itself satisfy the route. Passing A/L (Grade 12 and 13) clears the bar comfortably, as does any diploma or degree. If you hold only O/L, do not assume you are disqualified: the work-experience route is a genuine second path, and many skilled trades and technical roles qualify. Confirm your specific occupation's Job Zone and SVP on O*NET before you rely on it.

Three scenarios that map to the most common situations Sri Lankan applicants ask about. Enter each into the checker above — the verdict and reasons should match exactly.

• US Dept of State — Diversity Visa Instructions (eligibility, education, cross-chargeability)
• US Dept of State — Changes to 2027 DV Program Entry Period
• Official Electronic Diversity Visa entry portal (free — the only place to enter)
• O*NET OnLine — Job Zone & SVP for the work-experience route

The eligible-country list and eligibility rules on this page were last cross-checked against the US State Department's DV-2027 Diversity Visa Instructions on 2026-07-10. Because the country list is republished each DV year, the page is reviewed whenever a new DV bulletin is issued. This tool is informational and is not legal or immigration advice.