Remote work is the practice of working at or from one's home or another space rather than from an office or workplace.
The practice of working at home has been documented for centuries, but remote work for large employers began on a small scale in the 1970s when technology was developed that could link satellite offices to downtown mainframes through dumb terminals using telephone lines as a network bridge. It became more common in the 1990s and 2000s, facilitated by internet technologies such as collaborative software on cloud computing and conference calling via videotelephony. In 2020, workplace hazard controls during the COVID-19 pandemic catalyzed a rapid transition to remote work for white-collar workers around the world. This shift largely persisted even after restrictions were lifted.
Proponents of a geographically distributed workforce argue that it reduces costs associated with maintaining an office, grants employees greater autonomy and flexibility—which improves their motivation and job satisfaction—eliminates environmental harms from commuting, allows employers to access a more geographically diverse pool of applicants, and enables employees to live where they prefer.
Opponents of remote work argue that remote telecommunications technology has been unable to fully replicate the advantages of face-to-face interaction, that employees may be more easily distracted, and that reduced social interaction may lead to feelings of isolation.
History The practice of working at home has been documented for centuries. Management had to rely on trust and control to successfully manage distributed work. In addition to dispersed operations that relied heavily on a combination of explicit information and detailed record-keeping, more tacit and situated knowledge developed through socialization. For example, the Hudson's Bay Company showed a variety of control mechanisms including selection techniques, information requirements, and direct local oversight through its distributed practices of socialization, communication, and participation. Managers found that "common sense" was not enough to encourage everyone to comply.
The England and Wales census of 1911 included a question about each resident person's employment (if any) and included a question about whether they worked "at home".
In the early 1970s, technology was developed that linked satellite offices to downtown mainframes through dumb terminals using telephone lines as a network bridge. The terms telecommuting and telework were coined by Jack Nilles in 1973. By 1984 a United Technologies programmer lived in Washington state and telecommuted to his Connecticut office, and the company estimated that executives with computers at home did another two hours of work there. In January 1986, Erik Sandberg Diment of The New York Times reported in his weekly column that "As one of the seemingly few people to be actively engaged in telecommuting", he had only visited his office twice in the previous year. In 1979, five IBM employees were allowed to work from home as an experiment. By 1983, the experiment was expanded to 2,000 people. By the early 1980s, branch offices and home workers were able to connect to organizational mainframes using personal computers and terminal emulators.
In 1995, the motto that "work is something you do, not something you travel to" was coined. Variations of this motto include: "Work is what we do, not where we are."
Since the 1980s, the normalization of remote work has been on a steady incline. For example, the number of Americans working from home grew by 4 million from 2003 to 2006, and by 1983 academics were beginning to experiment with online conferencing.
In the 1990s and 2000s, remote work became facilitated by technology such as collaborative software, virtual private networks, conference calling, videotelephony, internet access, cloud computing, voice over IP (VoIP), mobile telecommunications technology such as a Wi-Fi-equipped laptop or tablet computers, smartphones, and desktop computers, using software such as Zoom, Webex, Microsoft Teams, Google Meet, Slack, and WhatsApp. Remote-first companies have also experimented with consumer messaging platforms to strengthen workplace culture. For example, CRM company Close has used Snapchat internally to encourage informal communication among distributed employees.
In his 1992 travelogue Exploring the Internet, Carl Malamud described a "digital nomad" as a person who "travels the world with a laptop, setting up FidoNet nodes." In 1993, Random House published the Digital Nomad's Guide series of guidebooks by Mitch Ratcliffe and Andrew Gore. The guidebooks, PowerBook, AT&T EO Personal Communicator, and Newton's Law, used the term "digital nomad" to refer to the increased mobility and more powerful communication and productivity technologies that facilitated remote work.
European hacker spaces of the 1990s led to coworking; the first such space opened in 2005. The new economy production no longer requires people to work together in the same physical space to access the tools and resources they need to produce their work and allows for distributed work.
In 2010, the Telework Enhancement Act of 2010 required each executive agency in the United States to establish policy allowing remote work to the maximum extent possible, so long as employee performance is not diminished.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, millions of workers began working remotely for the first time. Cities in which the population of remote workers increased significantly were referred to as Zoom towns. According to a U.S. Labor Department study published, millions of Americans ceased working from home by 2022, and the number of employers reporting teleworking decreased to the level before pandemic levels. From August to September 2022, approximately 72 percent of private-sector businesses reported little to no telework among workers, compared to roughly 60 percent from July to September 2021. During the Information Age, many startups were founded in the homes of entrepreneurs who lacked financial resources.
Remote work during COVID-19 A 2020 study of the COVID-19 pandemic estimated that 93% of world workers lived in countries with some sort of workplace closure. This figure was composed of: 32% living in countries with required closures for all but essential workplaces; 42% in countries where specific firms or worker categories had been closed; and 19% in countries with only recommended workplace closures.
The extensive use of remote work under COVID-19 constituted a major organizational transformation. However, the implementation of remote work during COVID-19 was hurried, and new technologies and operating systems had to be implemented without previous testing or training. Organizations reported concerns about losses in culture and productivity whilst workers were more concerned about declines in social interactions, internet connectivity and increased workload. Additionally, 25% of remote-working Americans were resistant to employer mandates to return to in-office work. Especially after the end of the pandemic, many businesses tried to recall their workforce to the office.
The abrupt transition to remote work during the pandemic led to an increase in both physical and mental health issues among workers; distractions from others in the home and a lack of dedicated workspaces were common negative influences on health and well-being, while effective communication with coworkers was supportive of health and well-being. The transition also increased the amount of time that individuals spent sitting at a workstation by up to two hours more per day, yet, most workers indicated being as productive working remotely as compared to office work before the pandemic. Supporting workers to identify effective approaches for boundary management between home and work across physical spaces, social interactions, and the use of time is critical. Research suggests that remote work can lead to increased employee satisfaction and productivity, but may also create challenges in team cohesion.
The transition to remote work during the pandemic highlighted the importance of access and equity among individual workers to support productivity and well-being. The remote work arrangement during COVID-19 was better for higher-paid and higher-management personnel in terms of productivity and reported well-being; whereas individuals at the bottom end of the earning spectrum experienced reduced remuneration. Utility bills also increased during the COVID-19 pandemic in an inconsistent manner. Utility bills for minorities and lower income individuals were more likely to increase because they lived in housing that was older, with less effective insulation and without energy-efficient appliances. The increase in electricity also came due to the people using their utilities at different times of the day.
A 2024 PNAS study found that remote work dispersed economic activity away from city centers, in particular in cities with high levels of remote work.
Statistics
In 2020, 12.3% of employed persons, including 13.2% of women and 11.5% of men, in the European Union who were aged 15–64, usually worked from home. By country, the percentage of workers that worked from home was highest in Finland (25.1%), Luxembourg (23.1%), Ireland (21.5%), Austria (18.1%), and the Netherlands (17.8%) and lowest in Bulgaria (1.2%), Romania (2.5%), Croatia (3.1%), Hungary (3.6%), and Latvia (4.5%).
In 2023, economist and telework expert Nicholas Bloom said about a third of all working days are remote, slashing corporate real estate expenditures, and up from 5% before the pandemic. Bloom believes quickly progressing technology has facilitated and will continue the trend, but drawbacks for some kinds of positions will remain.
A September 2022 study surveyed workers from 26 countries in mid-2021 and early 2022. Its respondents work from home an average of 1.5 days per week.
United States The U.S. Census Bureau estimated that 13.8 percent of U.S. workers, more than 22 million people, usually worked from home in 2023. The share was down from 17.9 percent in 2021 and 15.2 percent in 2022, but remained more than twice the 5.7 percent recorded in 2019.
According to a Gallup poll in September 2021, 45% of full-time U.S. employees worked from home, including 25% who worked from home full-time and 20% who worked from home part-time. Ninety-one percent of those who worked remotely (fully or partially) hoped to continue doing so after the pandemic. Among all workers, 54% believed that their company's culture would be unchanged by remote work, while 12% believed it would improve and 33% predicted it would deteriorate.
Gallup found in February 2023 that, among remote-capable employees in the U.S., 20% worked on-site, 28% exclusively remote and 52% hybrid.Goldberg, E. (March 30, 2023). Do we know how many people are working from home? The New York Times. Retrieved on May 2, 2023.
Gallup. Hybrid Work Indicators. Retrieved on May 2, 2023.
According to the United States Office of Personnel Management, 50% of all U.S. federal workers were eligible to work remotely and agencies saved more than $180 million because of remote work in fiscal 2020.
A September 2022 study surveyed workers in mid-2021 and early 2022. Its 2,079 US subjects worked from home on average 1.6 days per week, similar to the global average of 1.5 days per week.
United Kingdom These results may vary based on the type of sample collected. Certain groups may have fewer office workers (e.g., in more urban locations or industries requiring more manual labour). As such groups may find remote working impossible, their presence or absence in these samples may affect the analysis.
A June 2022 survey of 56 offices found that 51% had no policy requiring office attendance, 18% requiring two days per week, 11% requiring three days per week, and 20% had policy set at team-level.