You need to speak to a lawyer.

Also look into more friendly (Canada/EU) countries. US immigration is ... hostile right now.

To setup the company, you don't need to live in the US. Today IMO your best solution is to register a Delaware corp via Stripe Atlas. It's relatively cheap, but keep in mind you'll have to pay taxes and an accountant, so plan for a few thousand USD.

In terms of visa/moving to the US to work on your startup, certainly you should ask a lawyer. I think you can come at least once on ESTA and/or OPT. Your best long term solution is an E2 visa, which typically cost in the order of the $10k, and it's issued after you have spent a certain amount of money through your startup, say $50k-100k. The nice thing about the E2 is that your company becomes eligible for E2, and after that you can issue multiple visas to multiple people, say 3-5.

Please note that these are all ballpark numbers to give you a sense. It worked for us, it may not work for you. You definitely need a lawyer to assist you in all these steps.

I believe your best bet is Stripe Atlas: https://stripe.com/atlas

You can use OPT, but would suggest not to so so because it will have implications on how long you can stay in the US after graduating. CPT is another option if your college allows you to use it. Post-graduation, OPT, H1-B, B1/B2 and O1 are all viable options of varying difficulty

For H1B I should be employed by someone. In OPT, I couldn't find anything related to self-employment(https://www.uscis.gov/working-united-states/students-and-exc...).

There are VC firms that can help you work on an H1B, or even make you an employee in the short term. There's also programs in MA where an university can employ you on an H1B and let you work on your startup. I believe UMass Boston's VDC program is one. OPT is a completely valid option too (source: know a ton of people who have used this and have extensively spoken to attorneys about it)

You may not. As a student on F1 Visa you are not allowed to work in any capacity without the approval of your school. You can invest in a business, but you are legally not allowed to perform any tasks for the business.

my understanding, you can become a business owner/share holder, but you can't actively work on the startup.

Is there any way to bypass that or any work-around?

It sounds like you are looking for a loophole. This is really bad idea. Don't throw away your future for something that is statistically going to fail.

However, after giving that a disclaimer, I know quite a few H1Bs who have side projects. As an H1-B visa holder, you are not allowed to work for anyone except for your sponsor. You cannot work for your own business same as F1 students.

So they don't make any money off them and are very careful to make it look like a business. They don't even have affiliate links or anything on their websites. Everything is 100% free.

However, privately their hope is that one day once they are citizens, they can monetize their product or sell it.

In a way, I envy their position because they are able to focus on product 100% without worrying about monetization.