Presence in US offices is increasing, but the trend of returning to the office continues to be marked by significant regional differences. In the first half of 2026, office visits nationwide rose by 6 per cent year-on-year, reaching the smallest gap to pre-pandemic levels, according to data from footfall tracker Placer.ai. This six-month period of footfall marks an acceleration compared to the annual increase of 1.9 per cent observed during the same period in 2025.
Despite this positive development, a full and even recovery in office presence is still a long way off. Office visits in the US remain 31.2 per cent below 2019 levels, according to Placer.ai’s August office market report. While cities such as Miami and New York are making progress towards initial frequencies, Denver and Chicago still have a long way to go.
The hybrid working week appears to have become established – for now. A survey in the report covering eleven major US markets showed that office presence diverges widely geographically. Offices are filling up in Miami, where presence in the first half was 11.5 per cent below 2019 levels. Presence in Denver, by contrast, recorded a shortfall of more than 40 per cent compared to 2019 figures in the first half.
The 'most improved' performance during the January to June period was shown by West Coast hubs Los Angeles and San Francisco, with annual increases in footfall of 13 per cent and 10.9 per cent respectively. These two cities achieved the largest annual gains in the report.
Hybrid working weeks have had a lasting impact on corporate culture in the US, but the popularity of this model is declining in some markets. The highest proportions of office presence on Fridays are recorded in Miami and Dallas, where about one in seven weekday office visits falls on a Friday. In Chicago, however, Friday accounts for less than one in ten office visits. This is the same city where the personalised video platform Cameo announced a $10,000 salary increase last year for every new and existing employee who returned to their Fulton Market office four days a week.
Compared to the crowded office lifts of 2019, footfall in today’s office towers still has a long way to go – as does the year 2026. With six more months to report and a continuously increasing number of companies mandating office presence, the permanence of hybrid working models in America remains an open question.
