Filling out the DS-160: the form the consul reads before meeting you

The DS-160 is your visa application. Everything you enter is in front of the consul at your interview. Here you'll find how to fill it out correctly, what it asks, when to submit it and who also needs the DS-156E for an E visa.

Before you ever sit across from a consul, they've already met you, on screen. The Foreign Affairs Manual puts it plainly: everything you enter on the DS-160 is available to the officer at your interview. Your personal, passport and travel details, your social media accounts from the last five years. The interview often lasts only a few minutes because the form has already answered most of the questions.

That's why the DS-160 is more than a formality. It is your application. What it says has to be accurate, has to match your documents and has to match what you say in the interview. This guide shows how the form is structured, which answers cause the most mistakes, how the photo and barcode work, and when a second form, the DS-156E, comes into play for E visas. The rules come from the Foreign Affairs Manual, the State Department's documentation on the forms and the embassies in Vienna and Bern.

1What the DS-160 is

The DS-160 is officially the Online Nonimmigrant Visa Application. It's the application form required by immigration law for nonimmigrant visas, and it is fully electronic, with an electronic signature. It replaced the old paper form DS-156. You complete it in the State Department's Consular Electronic Application Center, the online portal for visa applications.

Just as important is what the form is not: it isn't the whole application yet. The Manual defines exactly when a visa application has been made. It takes three things: the completed and signed DS-160, the paid application fee and your biometrics, meaning a photo and, where required, fingerprints. Only once all three are in place must the consul decide on your application.

Every applicant needs their own DS-160, including spouses and children, even babies. For children under sixteen and for people who can't complete the form themselves, parents or a guardian may fill it out. Anyone who helps is named on the form. The applicant should sign, meaning click the submit button, personally if they are able to.

The State Department estimates the DS-160 takes ninety minutes on average. For the DS-156E, the supplemental form for E visas, it estimates four hours. Allow more time if you've traveled a lot, lived in several places or changed employers.

2Before you start: what to have ready

Most mistakes don't come from misunderstanding the questions but from hunting for the answers. So before your first click, gather what you need for the biographical section: your passport, your previous US visas and the dates of your earlier trips to the USA, your addresses, your employers and education, details on your spouse and parents, your phone numbers, email addresses and social media accounts from the last five years and, if you're applying for a petition-based visa, the USCIS approval with its receipt number.

If you're applying for an E or L visa, also keep the company documents at hand: name and address of the US company and of the company abroad, your position, your salary. The details must match the petition, the business plan and the documents you bring to the interview later. A different formation date or company name isn't a disaster, but it's a question you don't need.

A word on past refusals and problems: when the form asks, answer in full. Hiding something that's in the authorities' records turns an explainable story into a credibility problem. If you're unsure how to disclose a past refusal, a conviction or an overstay, sort it out before you submit.

3Language, names and spelling

The DS-160 must be completed in English unless the form explicitly says otherwise. The help text for the questions is available in many languages. That helps with understanding, but your answers still have to be in English.

The Manual is strict about names. Enter your given name, middle names and surname exactly as they appear in your passport. Add every other name you've ever been known by, such as a birth name, a religious name, a stage name or a name from a previous marriage. If your name today differs from the one on your first visa, list the earlier name.

Special characters such as umlauts and accented letters, and double-barreled names are a classic stumbling block. Follow the spelling in your passport and stick to it across every form, including the DS-156E and your appointment profile. Different spellings of the same name across documents lead to follow-up questions.

The same goes for company names and addresses: be consistent. Write the US company exactly as registered, with LLC or Inc., and the company at home with its legal form.

4The photo

The photo is part of the biometrics without which your application isn't complete. The Manual provides two routes: you upload an image file to the DS-160, or your photo is taken when you give your biometrics. If the upload fails, you may present a paper photo to the consular section.

The State Department publishes the exact requirements for size, background and capture on its visa photo page. Follow them, and make especially sure the photo shows you as you look today. The embassy in Vienna has two photo booths in the waiting room, where four pictures cost eight euros, but it explicitly asks applicants to bring their own photos to save time.

So the practical advice is: upload the photo, and bring a print anyway. It costs you nothing and can save you a second trip through the line.

5Social media, phone numbers and email: five years

The DS-160 asks for your social media platforms and the handles you use on them, your phone numbers and your email addresses, each for the last five years. These questions used to be on the supplemental form DS-5535; the State Department moved them into the DS-160.

List everything you used during those five years, including accounts you rarely use or have since deleted. A forgotten account is annoying, but a platform left out on purpose can be treated as a misrepresentation. If you're unsure whether an account counts, clarify it before submitting.

That's separate from the request to make accounts public. Posts ask applicants in certain classes to set the privacy settings on all social media accounts to public so they can be reviewed. The list includes H-1B and H-4, F, M and J, I, K, Q, R and TN. E, L and O are not on it (as of October 2026).

Some applicants are also handed form DS-5535 after the interview. It asks about travel, addresses and employers over the last fifteen years and about all spouses. The State Department requires it only from some applicants, for closer review. If you get it, complete it in full. In Bern, you submit it only if the consul has asked for it.

6Submission, barcode and appointment

At the end, you sign electronically by clicking the signature field and submit the form. You then get a confirmation page with a barcode. The number starts with AA. Print the page and keep the number. You'll need it to book your appointment, for the interview and later to check your application status online.

The embassy in Vienna has published a clear warning about the barcode. Every applicant must bring a confirmation whose number matches the one used to book the appointment. If it doesn't match, you won't be admitted to the interview. So check before your appointment that the numbers are the same. If you completed a new DS-160 afterward, update the number in your appointment profile; the embassy in Vienna provides instructions for this.

Submit the DS-160 in good time. Vienna explicitly asks applicants to submit the form at least two business days before the interview so the application can be processed quickly on the day. The system sets the order anyway: you can only choose an appointment once the DS-160 is submitted and the fee is paid.

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7The DS-156E for E visas

The E-1 treaty trader visa and the E-2 treaty investor visa come with an extra form: the DS-156E, Nonimmigrant Treaty Trader/Investor Application. The State Department uses it to collect the information it needs to check whether you meet the requirements for an E visa. It expects around 43,000 applicants to fill it out.

Who needs it has changed, and many guides still get it wrong. Under the Foreign Affairs Manual as amended on February 17, 2026, all E-1 and E-2 applicants submit the DS-160. On top of that, every applicant who is not a family member also submits the DS-156E, with one exception: the principal investor of an E-2. Their DS-156E questions are built into their DS-160. Spouses and children never need the DS-156E.

In practice: are you investing in your own US business and applying for the E-2 as the investor? Then you only fill out the DS-160, but you answer the additional E-2 questions in it. Are you applying for an E-1 as the owner of a trading company? Then you also need the DS-156E. Are you coming as a manager or specialist for an E-1 or E-2 company? Same again.

You open the DS-156E online after the DS-160, print it and submit it in person, by email or by mail, depending on the post. The consular officer has it scanned into your file. Expect more work: the State Department estimates four hours, because the form collects the company details the officer needs to assess the E visa. Your answers must match your business plan and financial documents. The next steps are covered in our guides to the E-2 application and the E-1 application.

8After you submit: mistakes and new forms

If you spot a mistake after submitting, the clean fix is a new DS-160. You then enter the new barcode in your appointment profile so the form and the appointment match again; the embassy in Vienna publishes instructions on how to change the number in your profile. This matters most for substantive errors, such as a forgotten previous refusal. Address the mistake openly in the interview if the officer asks about it.

If the officer refuses you under Section 221(g) after the interview because documents are missing or a review is pending, you don't need a new DS-160 within one year. The Manual is explicit: if you submit the requested documents within one year of the refusal, you neither fill out a new form nor pay the fee again. After one year, a new DS-160 is due, with a new fee. More in our guide to 221(g).

After a refusal under Section 214(b), by contrast, you start from scratch. Reapplying means the same steps as the first time: a new DS-160, a new fee, a new appointment.

9Common mistakes that raise questions

Most DS-160 problems aren't lies, they're inaccuracies. The most common ones we see:

• The name differs from the passport, or a previous name is missing.
• The barcode on the confirmation you bring differs from the one in your appointment profile because a second form was filled out in the meantime.
• US travel dates are estimated and contradict the dates the authorities have on record.
• Company details differ from the petition or the business plan.
• Social media accounts or email addresses from the last five years are missing.
• The form is submitted at the last minute and the appointment comes before it's processed.

None of these mistakes leads to an automatic refusal. But each one costs time in the interview or a second appointment. Fill out the form calmly, with your documents next to you, and you take most of the uncertainty out of the conversation at the window. And since the consular officer alone decides on your visa, a clean form is the part you fully control.

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In short

• No DS-160, no visa application: the form, the paid fee and your biometrics together make up the application.
• The form must be completed in English, with your names exactly as in your passport and all previous names.
• Social media accounts, phone numbers and email addresses from the last five years belong in the DS-160.
• The confirmation barcode must match your appointment profile; Vienna asks you to submit at least two business days before the interview.
• The DS-156E is needed by the E-1 principal applicant and all E employees, not by the E-2 principal investor and not by family members.

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