When applying for a U.S. immigrant visa or lawful permanent residence (a green card) based on a parent or stepparent, it's normal for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to require a birth certificate. After all, the legal validity of this document is an important part of establishing eligibility to immigrate to the United States. But some children don't have a birth certificate from when they were born. If they try to get one later, will this work?
What we are describing is often referred to as a "delayed" or "late-registered" birth certificate. This article describes how to use one in the U.S. immigration application process.
A birth certificate registered much later than the actual birth can indeed be accepted by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), although this depends partly on what country you are from, why the birth certificate was unavailable in the first place, and whether you have any other, "secondary" proof of your birth.
In some instances, for example, parents who live in remote or rural areas simply can't afford to go into the cities where the appropriate government offices are found, in order to do the registration. In others, birth certificates are simply unavailable for certain time periods or due to certain events, such as fires at a government office.
If birth certificates are known to be unavailable to people born at the same place and time as you, this will raise the likelihood that USCIS will accept a delayed birth certificate for you. To find out the U.S. government's opinion of whether your parent should have been able to get a birth certificate for you, see the U.S. Department of State's so-called visa reciprocity tables, choose your country, and check the entry on birth certificates.
Even if there's a good reason for you to lack a birth certificate that was issued around the time of your birth, USCIS is always on the lookout for fraud. There's a good chance it will ask you for more information, such as sworn affidavits from your closest family members, school and medical records showing your name as well as your parent's name, and so forth. If doing so won't hold up the process, your U.S. petitioner might want to submit these along with the I-130 visa petition. Otherwise, you can wait until the U.S. government requests such follow-up documents.
If a late-registered birth certificate becomes an issue in your case, it would be worth hiring an experienced immigration attorney. to help.