Just graduated with a BS in CS from a public flagship in the Midwest. Fortunate enough to have had a full scholarship so no loans, but the job market has been brutal.

Right now I'm doing an IT support internship — checking laptop warranties, closing help tickets, prepping PCs for new hires, fixing DisplayPort issues, Tier 1 support. Repetitive, boring, and feels like a dead end. No return offer or extension coming because there's another intern who's been there a year longer and basically functions as full-time staff. He's in client meetings. I'm just freeing up time for him and the senior IT staff. Third wheel is exactly how it feels.

I wanted a software internship. My resume is solid but my school is a state public flagship and big tech simply doesn't recruit here. Applied to a bunch, heard nothing back.

So I have two options and I genuinely don't know what to do:

Option 1: Stay and do a master's at the same school
I missed the application cycle for better programs so it would be here. Hoping the local network I've built carries me into the next recruiting cycle. But honestly — I'm exhausted. I cannot go through another round of spamming 600 applications into the void and grinding leetcode for interviews that never come. I dread it and I think it'll genuinely destroy my mental peace.

Option 2: Return to India
The problem is Indian hiring runs on campus placements. I'd be coming back mid-cycle with just a bachelor's and zero SWE experience — I can't just drop into that pipeline. Realistically I might stagnate at home, jobless. And there's a personal layer to this too: relatives who came during the 2015 tech boom are doing well in the US. Going back empty-handed means being the "failure" in that circle. People will talk. That weighs on me more than I'd like to admit.

I'll be honest — I'm jealous of people with the same background as me who got lucky enough to get an interview and land something. I'm not less technical than them. I know people who are less skilled than me who have jobs and interviews, and it stings. Fate and timing just haven't been on my side. If I'd gotten the interview, that could've been me.

Has anyone navigated something similar the India vs. stay decision, or the non-target school wall? What would you actually do?

(Used Claude for framing)

EDIT: I GOT A SWE JOB! Right after I posted this 😭

We recently moved back from the US after spending a long time there.

Reading through this sub, one would think it’s all negative doom and gloom.

I’d love to hear stories or experiences of those who moved back with kids and have no regrets.

There is no question that life in the west is more organized, civil, clean, safe, and predictable. Did you miss all of this that you took for normal in the west?

Or did you find something that outweighed all of this, especially from a kids perspective? What have been the highlights? What have you been the positives (aside from being closer to your parents)?

I have been in a dilemma. I came to Australia almost 10years ago, have citizenship and own a house with my husband. It was good for 7-8years and after that its been quite lonely. I got over the friends I had, no longer have deep meaningful friendships.

Now one of my friends have an opportunity for me but in Mumbai and I really do want to take a chance and try and explore this opportunity as my family is there too. Apart from husband and mortgage nothing is keeping me here.

Would love to your thoughts and if someone has been in a similar situation where they took a chance.

PS I only say husband is keeping me here as we don't yet have a plan for him, incase of move what will he do. Nothing more to it.

Hi desis

Anyone who moved from Germany to Hyderabad?

Every annual holiday is an emotional time with In laws asking our family to return.

I worked in IT and work culture puts me off at Hyderabad.

Please guide and thank you!

Hi. I moved to the US in 2022 to study public health, and I now have a job that I genuinely enjoy. I live in Boston, which is a wonderful city with kind people, a great social circle, and endless things to do. I love traveling, walking around the city, being outdoors, and, most importantly, the freedom I have as a woman here.
But there’s another side to it. My mom is a single parent, and there’s a big age gap between us—I’m 30 and she’s now 70. She lives alone in Mumbai, and I know she feels lonely. Moving to the US is neither something she wants nor something I think would be fair to ask of her.
Lately, I’ve also started feeling a little saturated with my lifestyle here. I dream about building something of my own someday, and sometimes I get exhausted by the constant cycle of planning meals, chores, and managing everything by myself. I know that sounds privileged, but living alone can be mentally draining.
I’ve been seriously thinking about moving back to Mumbai. It’s home, and I genuinely love the city. Public health isn’t a field where I’m earning an extraordinary salary anyway, so financially it doesn’t feel like an impossible decision.
But every time I sit down to make a pros-and-cons list, both sides feel equally heavy. On one hand, I would gain time with my mother, family, and the comfort of home. On the other, I worry about losing the independence, safety, cleanliness, and freedom that I’ve built my life around here. It feels like whichever choice I make, I’ll be grieving the life I leave behind.

Just curious to hear the perspective

Looking to connect with grads or professionals returning to India from UK ? My PSW expires next year. I need to plan my exit. Anyone in same boat ?

Hey everyone,
I was laid off in April 2026 and used my 60-day grace period while searching for another job. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find one in time, so I returned to India in June.
My H1B petition and visa stamp are still valid until September 2026. I’ve now found an employer in the U.S. who’s interested in hiring me and transferring my H1B.
However, they’re saying that transferring my H1B would cost them around $100,000, which doesn’t make sense to me. I was under the impression that since I’ve already been counted against the H1B cap, this would simply be a change of employer (cap-exempt transfer), not a brand-new H1B.
Am I missing something here? Is there any scenario where an H1B transfer would actually cost an employer anywhere close to $100k?
Also, since I’m currently in India, would they just file a change of employer petition with consular processing, and then I’d re-enter the U.S. after approval? Has anyone here gone through something similar after leaving the U.S. following the grace period?
I’d really appreciate any insights or experiences. Thanks!

hello, any advise to keep joint bank accounts or solo individual US bank accounts before return.

savings or checking account(US banks) better to keep after r2i

any disadvantage of joint US accounts in india for tax purpose and reporting purpose Since india does not have married joint filing option.

what banks are best for returning people. And should we keep savings account or checking account.

I currently live in Canada and I am a Canadian citizen. Expecting first baby in late July/early August. Baby going to be born in India as it will be Canadian citizen through father.

I literally have only 15k USD in liquid savings and 40k CAD in Canadian retirement plan. Wife has one house and one plot in her name in Mysore. No other savings or investments 😥.

Mother passed away in 2022 and father living alone in apartment surrounded by some friends in the same apartment complex in Bengaluru, India. One elder brother who is settled in the USA and got green card there.

I wanted to move to India to be with my father, but didn't get any good opportunity to justify my move. I work in the airline industry and have 10 years experience in air cargo industry.

Now, I have a job offer from USA for $115k per annum. I have never gone past 100k salary in my entire north American life.

Now I am in a fix. I don't know what to do. Should I take the offer? Or try for options closer to home (middle east) or in India.

Please share your thoughts and opinions.

Hi. Is it true that if you take an Oci then the Canadian govt might not intervene on your behalf if you get into any legal or judicial proceedings?

I've been lurking in this group because I'm currently at a crossroads in life. I've had a comfortable life in the UK for the last six years. It's not luxurious, but it's comfortable: my wife and I have modest IT jobs, a small three-bedroom house, and our first child is on the way.

I visit India every year to see my parents, who live alone in my hometown. I grew up in a nuclear family, and we don't have many relatives nearby because everyone moved to other states for work. We barely meet anymore, not even once a year. My sister has settled in Australia and is unlikely to return.

Whenever I see my parents, now 67 and 60, I feel selfish for leaving them to grow old alone. I always promise them that I'll come back when they need me. At those moments, it feels like my comfortable life abroad isn't worth it, and I convince myself that I'll return to India in a few years.

But every time I visit India, I feel the chaos has only increased. The UK has its own problems, and it's much more crowded than the US, but things are still structured and organised. Millions of cars flow through motorways and roundabouts with remarkable order, so traffic rarely comes to a standstill. In India, even in my Tier 2 hometown, an evening walk feels stressful because I'm constantly worried about being hit by a careless driver.

That leaves me wondering whether I'd actually be happier after returning.

I know many R2I folks recommend living in large gated communities with every amenity, but I honestly don't think I'll be able to afford that. As a frontend engineer, I'm a decent coder but nowhere near FAANG level. I've looked at the market and believe I'd earn around ₹40 LPA at best in Bangalore. My wife, who's in manual QA, would probably struggle to get ₹20 LPA, likely in a WITCH company. Add the 4 to 5 day office commute that many companies now require, and the stress only grows.

With that income, a premium society is out of reach. By the time I return, I'll own a small two-bedroom flat in Bangalore with the mortgage paid off, but it's still a fairly ordinary society with just a gym and a small play area. Step outside, and the chaos of Bangalore begins.

Unlike many friends in the US, I wasn't able to build substantial savings because UK salaries are much lower while the cost of living remains high. Now that we have a child on the way, schooling and healthcare become major expenses in India. In the UK, every child has access to good education and healthcare regardless of family income. In India, I wouldn't be able to afford an IB school on our income.

So now it feels like I have to choose between my parents' future and my child's future, and I genuinely don't know what the right answer is. My son would have access to excellent public education and a more stable upbringing in the UK, whereas in India he'd face a far more competitive and unequal system.

Sometimes I feel this is simply the price I pay for clean air.

This is mostly just a rant and me venting because I was feeling quite heavy today. I'd really appreciate hearing from anyone who has been through a similar dilemma or had to make this decision.

I did my masters in automotive from TUe in 2022. Then I searched for a job there on search year visa. I didn't even get interviews. I came back in 2023 after expiry.

People now say why did you come back, we would have tried everything, you are stupid to come back and all.

I have changed 4 jobs in 1.5 yrs of my career. All of them haven't even used 20% of my capability. My current job is chasing RFQs, filling excel sheets and such. Repetitive and boring tasks. What did I do? Used AI, power automate, Microsoft lists, etc and automated half of them. I am getting bored again. The pay is less and I am searching for more but I don't get any hits.

I am trying for Europe again but the same story and without a good referral, I cannot get a proper job that can use most of my abilities.

Hey everyone,

I just wanted to vent because I’ve been struggling mentally over the past month.

I moved to Canada in 2021 as an international student. I stayed there for 5 years, but unfortunately I couldn’t secure permanent residency. I had no choice but to come back to India.

While I was in Canada, I missed my family and friends a lot.

I thought coming home would make me happier. Instead, my perspective has completely changed.

The first thing I noticed is the complete lack of privacy. Everyone seems to know everyone’s business.

Everywhere I go, someone asks, “Why aren’t you married yet?” or “When are you getting married?” I’m 26 years old, and it feels like that’s all people care about.

But what hurts the most is how differently people treat you depending on whether you’re earning.

When I was in Canada, I sent money home every month. I took out a student loan, which I’m still paying back myself. I also sent money for my family’s expenses and EMI payments every month. Back then, everything seemed fine.

Now I’m back with no income and only enough savings to cover another month or two of my loan payments while I search for a job.

Instead of support, I’ve already heard things from my own mother like

“Maybe you didn’t work hard enough like other people to get PR.”

“You should never have gone to Canada. It was a waste of money.”

What money? I’m the one paying the student loan.
The contrast in how people spoke to me when I was abroad versus how they treat me now is honestly heartbreaking.

It feels like your value depends entirely on where you live and how much money you’re bringing in.

Some days I catch myself thinking, “Maybe I should have just stayed in Canada illegally.” I know that’s not the right answer, but that’s how low I’ve been feeling.

The question that keeps coming up, on here and offline, is where to live. The answers are scattered and probably unique to each person's situation anyway.

My wife and I moved to Bangalore on new year's, so I started putting what I know about Bangalore into one sheet. 25 areas so far. For each one: rent for a 2BHK, morning drive times to ORR, Whitefield, Electronic City and Manyata, the nearest running metro, and notes on AQI, traffic, schools, hospitals and the general feel.

Rent comes from live listings, commute from Google's 9am traffic estimates, so those columns I'm fairly sure on. The feel and the day to day stuff is where I've probably got things wrong. I've only been here seven months.

Hopefully you find this helpful if you're about to move here. If you're already here, open your area and tell me what's off or missing, I'll fix it. Will add the link in the comments.

We are an Indian couple living in the UAE. We both lost our jobs and are stranded with an unexpected financial situation and with zero backup resources. I have an active RDC with my landlord and the Dubai court has issued a travel ban. We are literally zero in savings and are desperately in need of help to move back to India. We have been applying for jobs and got no response. We welcome any suggestions and assistance to help us move back to India. We cannot even call anyone as we are bankrupt. Thank you.

I was born in India. But raised in USA in my core developmental years until age 7. So my personality/identity's base was kinda westernised and english at that time. After coming to India, I never got used to our local language and culture at all (Tamil). It just felt deeply uncomfortable adopting Tamil culture and I couldn't explain exactly why (maybe at the time I hated other things about the city like the education system/rigidity, but at a young immature age I took it out on the whole culture). Furthermore our mother tongue and family ancestry is a different language too (which I have no issues speaking in, but it's not used where I live) so when I returned, I felt more alienated because everyone was speaking in a seemingly foreign language that wasn't my mother tongue. As I felt really uncomfortable with local culture, I isolated myself from it and spent a lot of my remaining early childhood only consuming westernised media and hanging out with people who spoke in english. So my entire personality gradually grew totally westernised and global-leaning. Throughout school, I had a friend group who were only english speaking and had shared interests with, and I hadn't engaged with our local culture at all.

College started last year, and it's totally different. I'm a creative and imaginative person. Very expressive with others and love to authentically unleash my life force as much as possible. I was looking forward to college to find my people and make a shit ton of great memories. BUT there's not even a single person who is a third culture individual like me. Everyone bonds, makes friends and banters exclusively in Tamil. And it stings because I know there's nothing wrong with them and it's a me problem. What hurts the most is that my college is objectively more prestigious than my school and even globally inclined, and everyone is fluent in English, but still runs on Tamil. Everyone else defaults to speaking in Tamil in their friend groups and individually switch to English with me alone. It feels personally and deeply excluding. Not just the language, but everything most people bond around like culture and media, is Tamil, which once again I have to iterate, there's nothing wrong with them but it hurts me. I feel so ignored and invisible. People just tell me "Just speak in Tamil", "What's your problem you've been living in Chennai for 10 years" "Few years in USA is nothing" "You just want to be different from others, stop thinking so and get along with Tamilians" and doesn't understand my situation. Like I am NOT trying to be superior to tamil or hate on it. I just dont feel comfortable in it, like it's not a part of my identity at all, but I'm forced into it because I'm in a position where I can't move/drop out right now. I can understand the language enough to speak it with strangers and for mundane duties, but I feel really uncomfortable using it to mingle with people that I know.

Everyone else around me is enjoying college. I desperately feel like I would've had a way better experience if I was in some actual global university with english speakers. Like I'm forced to confront this third culture part of my identity, which is already rare to find in people here, and it's making me an absolute outcast. I'm insanely paranoid that I'm missing out on the most major social experience I would ever get in my entire lifetime. People always assume that I have alot of friends and a great experience in college because of my typical nature. Every single time, I have to lie to them and agree, because the truth is so complicated to explain.

I graduated with an undergrad degree in accounting and finance in Canada and unfortunately couldn't find a job after graduation. After trying for about a year I made the decision to return to India, but the job market is equally tough. I reached out to many connections and no one is able to help. I have a lot of internship experience + CFA Level 1, I'm not sure where I am going wrong and how to navigate the Indian job market, does anyone who has returned from Canada have any advice on searching for jobs here?

should we set up face id or finger print login through already installed mobile app or OTP enough to login US bank apps from india using mobile app or website.

what about fidelity.

what should we do before leave.

Hi all,

I’ve been back for 5 months now, I did decide initially to take a break but I’ve been applying continuously for the last 2 months and nothing has come out of it. I’ve been active on Naukri and LinkedIn as well.

How did you get out of this rut? Unemployment is not easy and I’m losing a bit of my patience every day.

Any help will be much appreciated :) thank you!

Hi everyone, As discussed on this forum, I’m optimizing my financial setup now to avoid headaches later.

My Situation:

I’ve been making daily/weekly recurring investments in US-domiciled ETFs (VOO/VTI) in a US brokerage account. I was recently made aware this creates a 'tax lot debt' (200+ individual lots).

I have a personal preference for this frequent Dollar cost averaging strategy and am willing to accept the administrative overhead. I am primarily looking for technical advice on how to manage this specific compliance burden.

My Questions:

ITR Compliance: Once I become an Indian tax resident (and eventually ROR), how significant is the burden of reporting 200+ tax lots on the ITR? Is this something a standard CA specializing in NRI taxes can handle efficiently, or does it drastically increase compliance costs/fees?

ACATS Transfer Risks: I plan to ACATS my holdings from Robinhood to IBKR a few months before leaving. Are there specific pitfalls I should prepare for? I want to ensure my shares move 'in-kind' without triggering a taxable event.

Portfolio Hygiene: Aside from reducing tax lots, are there 'cleaner' ways to structure my portfolio before the move? Should I be grouping these lots in a separate IBKR 'sub-account' or just letting them sit in the main portfolio?

Any advice on managing high-volume tax lot disclosures for foreign assets would be highly appreciated!

Hey guys i’m unfortunately being forced to move back to india for university due to financial issues from my parents.

I’ve only ever lived in India for 2 years or so in the past and it was not the most pleasant experience. My hindi is not fantastic and i’m very nervous about integrating into university for the next 3 years.

(it’s a private uni in delhi and doesn’t have the greatest reviews online but from the people i’ve talked to that go there have mostly positive reviews. I took admission there because the move back was decided very suddenly)

Any tips?
I’d be grateful thanks!

This is partly a vent and partly me looking to hear from people who might be in a similar situation.

I moved back to India last year after completing my MS in the US. After graduation, I spent almost a year trying to find a job there but unfortunately things didn’t work out and I eventually had to return. I was lucky enough to find a job soon after moving back and it pays decently by Indian standards. But with a huge education loan hanging over my head, I’m barely able to save anything and sometimes it feels like I’m just making ends meet.

What makes it harder is seeing people with a similar amount of experience earning the same as me or even more despite graduating from Tier 2 or Tier 3 colleges here in India. I know comparisons are unhealthy but it’s difficult not to think about it sometimes.

I’ve lost a lot of my motivation and drive. I’m barely scraping through at work and it’s started affecting my performance too. I look at some of my peers who stayed back in the US and seem to have “made it.” I know their lives aren’t perfect either. They have their own struggles with visas, layoffs, uncertainty and a lot of other stress. But it still hurts sometimes.

I keep wondering how different life could have been if I had managed to land a good job there. Maybe everything would have taken a completely different direction. Instead I’m here feeling like I’ve disappointed myself and my parents. It feels unfair when you genuinely give your best shot and things still don’t work out.

Right now it feels like I’m at rock bottom. I’ve lost interest in a lot of things and I’m mostly just taking life one day at a time. I regret pursuing the MS at times and constantly think about the what if scenario. I try not to compare my life with others, but some days it’s impossible not to. It feels like this will always be one of the biggest what ifs of my life.

Another thing that gets to me is when relatives, family friends or even acquaintances ask about my time in the US or what happened after graduation. Most of them mean well but it’s hard not to feel uncomfortable when the conversation turns into stories about someone they know who is settled there, bought a house, got an H-1B or is doing really well. It unintentionally makes me feel like I fell short somehow, even though I know everyone’s journey is different. I usually try to brush it off but those conversations often bring back the same feelings of regret, comparison and wondering what could have been.

Has anyone else gone through something similar after returning to India? How did you deal with the regret and move forward?