Before the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, 17 percent of U.S. employees worked from home 5 days or more per week, a share that increased to 44 percent during the pandemic. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the remote working trend, as quarantines and lockdowns made commuting and working in an office close to impossible for millions around the world. Remote work, also called telework or working from home (WFH), provided a solution, with employees performing their roles away from the office supported by specialized technology, eliminating the commute to an office to remain connected with colleagues and clients. What enables working from home?

To enable remote work, employees rely on a remote work arrangements that enable hybrid work and make it safe during the COVID-19 pandemic. Technology supporting remote work including laptops saw a surge in demand, video conferencing companies such as Zoom jumped in value, and employers had to consider new communication techniques and resources. Is remote work the future of work?

The response to COVID-19 has demonstrated that hybrid work models are not necessarily an impediment to productivity. For this reason, there is a general consensus that different remote work models will persist post-COVID-19. Many employers see benefits to flexible working arrangements, including positive results on employee wellness surveys, and potentially reducing office space. Many employees also plan on working from home more often, with 25 percent of respondents to a recent survey expecting remote work as a benefit of employment. As a result, it is of utmost importance to acknowledge any issues that may arise in this context to empower a hybrid workforce and ensure a smooth transition to more flexible work models.

Percentage of workforce teleworking or working remotely prior to February 1, 2020, on March 31, 2020, and percentage of workforce able to carry out a majority of their duties during the COVID-19 pandemic, by North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code, business employment size, type of business and majority ownership.

The percentage of employed persons in Europe that sometimes work from home increased significantly between 2020 and 2021, reaching **** percent in France, *** percent in Germany, *** percent in Spain, and *** percent in Italy. This increase, driven by the public health restrictions imposed by governments during the Coronavirus pandemic, has proved to be durable in the preceding years, with rates declining slightly in all countries, but remaining at much higher levels than in the pre-pandemic era. France now has around ** percent of employees with the ability to work from home, while Germany has close to ** percent, with significantly lower rates in Spain and Italy.

Employed persons working from home as a percentage of the total employment, by sex, age and professional status (%)

As of 2023, 8.9 percent of employed people in the European Union usually worked from home. This share of home-office workers varied widely between European countries, with a 21 percent of finish workers usually working from home, compared to only one percent of Romanian workers. It was in general more common for women to work from home usually than men, however, this was notably reversed in some countries, such as Ireland where almost 23 percent of men regularly worked from home.

The percentage of the working population that does not commute to work. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community SurveyYears Available: 2018-2022, 2019-2023Please note: We do not recommend comparing overlapping years of data due to the nature of this dataset. For more information, please visit: https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/guidance/comparing-acs-data.html

The trend of working remotely has been slowly increasing globally since 2015, with a *** to ***** percent annual increase rate. However, the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 upended the world economy and global markets. Employment trends were no exception to this, with the share of employees working remotely increasing to some ** percent in 2022 from just ** percent two years prior. The industry with the highest share of remote workers globally in 2023 was by far the technology sector, with over ** percent of tech employees worldwide working fully or mostly remotely. How are employers dealing with remote work? Many employers around the world have already adopted some remote work policies. According to IT industry leaders, reasons for remote work adoption ranged from a desire to broaden a company’s talent pool, increase productivity, and reduce costs from office equipment or real estate investments. Nonetheless, employers worldwide grappled with various concerns related to hybrid work. Among tech leaders, leading concerns included enabling effective collaboration and preserving organizational culture in hybrid work environments. Consequently, it’s unsurprising that maintaining organizational culture, fostering collaboration, and real estate investments emerged as key drivers for return-to-office mandates globally. However, these efforts were not without challenges. Notably, ** percent of employers faced employee resistance to returning to the office, prompting a review of their remote work policies.

Introduction

Work From Home Statistics: Since the COVID-19 pandemic, a major shift in work culture has taken place globally. Remote work, often referred to as work from home, has become a permanent option for many employees. According to data from Owl Labs and Global Workplace Analytics, about 30 percent of employees in the United States now work remotely full-time as of 2024. Meanwhile, 65 percent of employees prefer remote work over traditional office roles. In Europe, approximately 22 percent of workers were working from home regularly by the end of 2023. Remote work opportunities have also expanded, with LinkedIn reporting a 20 percent rise in remote job postings compared to pre-pandemic levels.

In terms of cost savings, employees who work from home can save an average of USD 6,000 annually on commuting and daily expenses. Additionally, businesses are seeing benefits, as employers can save around USD 11,000 per year for every remote employee. However, not all regions have fully embraced this trend; for instance, in countries like Japan, less than 10 percent of employees work remotely as companies encourage a return to traditional office environments.

As stated in Work from Home Statistics 2025, employees are resigning from their positions to get a remote job if they are called back to the office. Remote work is peace of mind, with which work-life balance is handled.

Percentage and average percentage of workforce anticipated to work on-site or remotely over the next three months, by North American Industry Classification System (NAICS), business employment size, type of business, business activity and majority ownership, first quarter of 2025.

This dataset contains the percentage of workers who report working from home for each county in the U.S. with a population of over 65,000 for the years 2010 to 2019. The data were taken from the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey, 1-year Summary, Commuting Characteristics by Sex (S0801-C01-13).

The percentage of the working population that does not commute to work. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey Years Available: 2018-2022, 2019-2023

In 2020, approximately *** million people worked mainly from home in the United Kingdom, an increase of around **** million people when compared with 1998, when just *** million workers mainly worked from home. As a share of all workers in the United Kingdom, this was the equivalent of **** percent of the UK workforce, compared with **** percent in 1998. Rise of the hybrid workforce More recent figures on working location trends in Great Britain, indicate that as of June 2024, around ** percent of workers had worked from home exclusively in the last seven days, with a further ** percent only travelling to work. Just over a ******* of British workers, however, had both worked from home and travelled to work in the last seven days. Although less common than only travelling to work, hybrid working has generally been more popular than only working at home since around Spring 2022, and is possibly one of the most enduring impacts that COVID-19 had on the labor market. Demographics of homeworkers While advancements in internet connectivity and communication software have enabled more people to work from home than ever before, there are still obvious disparities in the share of homeworkers by industry. Over **** of the UK’s agriculture workforce in 2020 regularly worked from home, compared with just *** percent of those that worked in accommodation or food service. In the same year, the region with the highest share of people working from home was South West England at **** percent, while Northern Ireland had the lowest at just *** percent.

Percentage and average percentage of workforce anticipated to work on-site or remotely over the next three months, by North American Industry Classification System (NAICS), business employment size, type of business, business activity and majority ownership, third quarter of 2024.

In 2023, the technology industry had the highest share of remote employees worldwide, with **** percent of tech industry employees globally working fully or mostly remotely. The agencies and consulting industry along with the finance and insurance industry came in second and third place, with **** and **** percent of employees working primarily remotely, respectively.

In 2021, ** percent of respondents currently working at least partially outside the office indicated that their company has a 100 percent remote policy. This is a slight increase from the previous year. Only ** percent of respondents stated that remote work in their company is allowed but not the norm, down from ** percent in 2020. Global shift to new work in 2020 In 2020, the outbreak of the global COVID-19 pandemic led to a shift from work in the office to work from home, to keep the workforce and the community safe. While this created some struggles in the beginning, many organizations and employees have since adapted and are thriving. Many employees appreciate the benefits of working remotely. Accordingly, one in two individuals indicate that the ability to work remotely is an important decision factor for future employment. Companies experiment with hybrid work models As a result, many companies worldwide are updating their policies to accommodate this new way of working. These include a combination of both flexibility on work location and productive in-person and digital collaboration opportunities. For this reason, organizations are not only actively monitoring both employee well-being and productivity but are also evolving operations to support a hybrid workforce.

This dataset contains the percentage of workers in Atlanta metro counties who report working from home for the years 2010 through 2019. The data come from the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey 1-year Summary. The data is in a "wide" format to support creating visualizations with specific software.

In 2020, over 56 percent of people working in Artistic, Literary, and Media Occupations worked mainly from home in the United Kingdom, the most of any occupation category. Workers in agricultural jobs also had a higher share of their workforce working from home, with the next two highest rates being for occupations related to agriculture.

Average percentage of workforce anticipated to work on-site or remotely over the next three months, by average percentage, North American Industry Classification System (NAICS), business employment size, type of business, business activity and majority ownership, second quarter of 2022.

In 2020, 35 percent of employees in Switzerland sometimes worked from home, compared with the average for the European Union, which was 8.7 percent. Since the arrival of the Coronavirus pandemic, economic and social restrictions have meant that an increasing percentage of European employees have had to work from home more often, with the share of people who usually work from home reaching 12.3 percent in 2020.

In June 2025, approximately 13 percent of workers in Great Britain worked from home exclusively, with a further 26 percent working from home and travelling to work, while 44 percent only travelled to work. During this time period, the share of people only travelling to work was highest in March 2022, at 60 percent of respondents, with the peak for only working from home occurring in June 2020. In general, hybrid working has become steadily more popular than fully remote working, with the highest share of people hybrid working in November 2023, when 31 percent of people advising they were hybrid working. What type of workers are most likely to work from home? In 2020, over half of people working in the agriculture sector mainly worked from home, which was the highest share among UK industry sectors at that time. While this industry was one of the most accessible for mainly working at home, just 6 percent of workers in the accommodation and food services sector mainly did this, the lowest of any sector. In the same year, men were slightly more likely to mainly work from home than women, while the most common age group for mainly working from home was those aged 75 and over, at 45.4 percent. Over a long-term period, the share of people primarily home working has grown from 11.1 percent in 1998, to approximately 17.4 percent in 2020. Growth of Flexible working in the UK According to a survey conducted in 2023, working from home either on a regular, or ad-hoc basis was the most common type of flexible working arrangement offered by organizations in the UK, at 62 percent of respondents. Other popular flexible working arrangements include the ability to work flexible hours, work part-time, or take career breaks. Since 2013, for example, the number of employees in the UK that can work flextime has increased from 3.2 million, to around 4.2 million by 2024. When asked why flexible work was important to them, most UK workers said that it supported a better work-life balance, with 41 percent expressing that it made their commute to work more manageable.