February 6, 2026
Hybrid working is stabilising around the world, office occupancy report claims
A new study of office utilisation trends around the world suggests hybrid working patterns have largely settled, with average occupancy remaining well below pre-pandemic norms and peak attendance continuing to cluster midweek. The Hybrid Occupancy Index 2025–2026 [registration] published by workplace analytics firm HubStar, draws on data from more than 300 million square feet of office space across 173 buildings in 13 countries, covering more than 27,000 workspaces between January 2023 and December 2025.
The report finds that office attendance continues to concentrate on Tuesdays, which recorded the highest global occupancy of any weekday at 58.6 percent in 2025. Mondays averaged 46.4 percent, while Fridays remained the quietest day at 34.5 percent. The pattern has remained broadly consistent across three years of data, reinforcing the idea that many organisations have defaulted to an informal three-day office week.
The authors of the report argue that this concentration creates operational inefficiencies, with offices experiencing congestion on peak days while still sitting largely empty the rest of the week. The report estimates that most workplaces continue to operate with vacancy rates of 40 to 50 percent on average.
Rather than introducing blanket return-to-office mandates, the report recommends more dynamic approaches to attendance, including team-based anchor days and incentives to spread demand more evenly across the week. It also highlights the emergence of “intentional Fridays”, where organisations experiment with meeting-free policies, shorter days, seasonal closures, or designated remote-only rules.
The report also suggests that the purpose of the office has shifted, with organisations increasingly focused on why employees come in rather than how often. The report argues that employees are more likely to commute when the workplace experience supports collaboration, connection, and focused work, describing this as a new form of “earning the commute”.
Meeting rooms oversized and underused
One of the report’s clearest findings is a mismatch between meeting room supply and actual meeting behaviour. the report found that 64 percent of meetings take place in rooms designed for four people or fewer, while 78 percent occur in rooms for six people or fewer.
In contrast, large boardrooms appear to be significantly underused. Rooms with a capacity of more than 17 people hosted fewer than 4 percent of meetings booked and were only 11.6 percent full on average when in use.
HubStar suggests many organisations could reduce wasted space by converting oversized boardrooms into multiple smaller meeting rooms, and by improving booking systems to recommend appropriately sized rooms based on likely attendance.
The rise of the Zoom room
The report also identifies growing demand for small, enclosed rooms for solo work, with employees increasingly using meeting rooms as makeshift private spaces for video calls or focused work.
Rooms designed for one to three people were found to be only 43.8 percent full on average when occupied, indicating that they are typically being used by a single person. The report claims this has given rise to the “Zoom room” as a new informal workspace category.
At the same time, the report notes that phone booths and phone rooms take up less than 1 percent of available space globally, leaving workers with limited alternatives to open-plan desks.
The report also argues that organisations should invest in purpose-built solo spaces with better acoustics, ventilation and technology, rather than allowing meeting rooms to be consumed by individual calls.
Shift towards enclosed workspaces and informal social zones
The report highlights subtle but significant changes in office layouts over the three-year period. Desks still dominate, accounting for 71 percent of all workspaces in 2025, but enclosed offices have more than doubled from 4 percent in 2023 to 10 percent in 2025.
Despite this increase, HubStar notes that most desks remain in open-plan environments. In 2025, 77.9 percent of desks were in open-plan or bullpen-style layouts, while only 20.1 percent were in cubicle-style or focus configurations. The report suggests this imbalance contributes to employees seeking privacy in meeting rooms.
Meanwhile, the strongest growth in utilisation was recorded in informal “support spaces” such as cafés, lounges, reception areas and barista hubs. HubStar describes these as spaces that support ad-hoc collaboration and social interaction, arguing that employees are increasingly coming into the office for “casual collisions” rather than formal meetings.
The report notes rising utilisation in cafés and communal eating areas, wellness and meditation spaces, training and town hall areas, and informal lounges, reinforcing a broader trend towards hospitality-led workplace design.
City differences show commuting and culture still matter
While global trends were consistent, the report also points to significant variation between cities.
London, for example, recorded a sharp increase in midweek attendance, with Tuesday occupancy reaching 75 percent in 2025, compared with 63 percent in 2024. HubStar suggests this reflects a compression of office attendance into core collaboration days.
Stockholm was the strongest performer in the dataset, reaching 92 percent occupancy in March 2025, far above the global average for the same month. The report attributes this to strong public transport infrastructure and cultural norms favouring in-person working, although occupancy dropped sharply in July due to Sweden’s widespread summer leave patterns.
Amsterdam, which previously outperformed global benchmarks, saw occupancy fall during the second half of 2025, dropping to 43 percent in August. HubStar suggests this may reflect a mature hybrid culture in which employees are increasingly exercising flexibility, potentially including shorter office visits or use of coworking hubs closer to home.
Stability, but no full offices
HubStar concludes that hybrid work has evolved from a temporary adjustment into a long-term operating model. With occupancy stabilising in the 50 to 60 percent range, the report suggests many organisations are still holding more space than they need and should focus on reconfiguring workplaces around real behaviour rather than policy expectations.
Instead of trying to fill desks, it argues, employers should consider right-sizing their real estate portfolios and reinvesting savings into spaces that support the mix of collaboration, privacy and informal interaction employees increasingly value.
