Who Is Really Returning to the Office?

From supermarkets to tech giants, a growing number of employers are tightening workplace policies, with some pushing for a pre-pandemic return to five days a week in the office. This has created a backdrop of “return-to-office” headlines, framing hybrid work as under threat.

Yet the data tells a more complex story. While commuting has rebounded since the pandemic, the UK has not reverted to its pre-2020 workplace norms. Instead, a new stable hybrid settlement appears to be in place.

High-profile companies including Amazon, Morrisons, HSBC and JP Morgan Chase are among those that, in 2025, tightened hybrid policies or moved towards more regular office attendance. Virgin Media O2’s 2025 Movers Index Report found that 78% of office-based companies now require employees to attend the office at least three times a week.1 These announcements have fuelled a sense that flexible work is on the decline.

Many employers frame these decisions around culture, collaboration and speed of decision-making. Dr Cevat Aksoy, economist and co-founder of the Global Survey of Working Arrangements, notes that in some sectors a return to five-day office weeks is “driven by the fact that hybrid can underperform when meetings and management practices weren’t redesigned for it.” He adds that with a cooler labour market than in 2021–22, “some employers may also find it easier to enforce stricter attendance.”

For workers, however, these shifts can have a significant impact. Morrisons’ headquarters in Bradford trialled a four-day working structure in 2024, but has since returned to five working days, with increased mandatory time in the office. Finance graduate Alexandra Cockburn says the company believed the change was “best for the business in terms of communication”. Working closely with suppliers, she explains, meant aligning more closely with their schedules. But the move has come at a cost. “It’s definitely decreased my flexibility as a young professional,” she says.

Link to interactive chart:https://www.datawrapper.de/_/fwyds/

In 2020, just under half of workers were commuting at all, as companies were forced into remote work. As COVID-19 restrictions eased, that figure climbed sharply, reaching around 70% by 2022. Since then, however, the trend has flattened, and despite increased rhetoric about returning to the office, the proportion of working adults commuting has remained stable.

Global data reinforces this picture. According to the Global Survey of Working Arrangements2, average working from home fell from 1.6 days per week in 2022 to 1.27 in 2024/25 across a panel of 22 countries. Crucially, most of that decline occurred between 2022 and 2023. “Since then, it has largely stabilised,” says Dr Aksoy. Dr Aksoy cautions that “‘return-to-office’ headlines can be misleading in cases whereby a company tightens its policy from two days at home to one, it often gets reported as a full return, even when hybrid remains the norm.”

Interactive chart: https://www.datawrapper.de/_/2FHXW/

A breakdown of working arrangements from ONS’s Opinions and Lifestyle Survey November 2025 helps explain why hybrid remains largely in place. 39% of respondents say they cannot work from home at all, reflecting the many jobs in health, retail, transport and other sectors that require a physical presence. Among those who can work remotely, however, hybrid dominates: 27% work from home some of the time, while only 11% do so all of the time.

Interactive chart: https://www.datawrapper.de/_/pVojM/

Age also plays a significant role in who benefits from flexibility. Workers aged 30-49, often in established careers and more likely to have caring responsibilities, are the most likely to work from home some or all of the time. Younger workers are more likely to be in roles where remote work is not possible, while older workers also show relatively high levels of flexibility, often linked to seniority and job type.

These patterns intersect closely with income. Remote-friendly roles tend to be higher paid and concentrated in professional sectors such as technology, finance and consultancy. Lower-paid jobs in retail, logistics and frontline services are far less likely to offer any scope for working from home. As a result, flexibility itself has become unevenly distributed across the income spectrum, with implications for earnings, inclusion and labour market participation.

Interactive chart: https://www.datawrapper.de/_/LkGGd/

Five years on from the pandemic, the UK labour market no longer resembles either 2019 or 2020. Commuting has returned partially, hybrid work remains widespread, and employers continue to experiment with office policy. Return-to-office mandates make headlines and shape parts of the debate, but they do not signal a total return to the old normal.

As Dr Aksoy puts it: “Not every job can be done remotely, but where flexibility is possible it should be transparent and fair. Most workers prefer two to three days a week at home, making hybrid the norm in many office-based roles. Firms that ignore this risk losing talent.”

Good hybrid practice means clear role-based rules, predictable schedules and meetings that work equally well for remote staff, with performance judged on outcomes rather than face time. The evidence suggests Britain is not heading back to the office - it is settled into this new way of working.