Welcome to the

Office Busyness Index

The analytics behind building utilization.

Being at the heart of the city:
There’s nothing quite like it.

Busy places can create vibrant, lively and enriched experiences. Build connectivity and spark energy. And, fuel financial performance.

We’ve witnessed a transition in recent years as our spaces evolve to match a new level of human resiliency. And as work models and workers reshape workplaces, it’s never been more important to consider the utilization of office buildings — the true busyness.

The Office Busyness Index in the media

Chicago's Office Utilization Is Steadily Creeping Up Bisnow As of September, Chicago’s central business district was 63.5% as busy as it was in September 2019, prepandemic, according to Avison Young’s Office Busyness Index — up from 59% in August and 58% last September.

Return-to-office has settled. Is this as good as it gets for downtown? Boston Globe Foot traffic downtown rose 8 percent in the first six months of 2025 compared to the same time in 2024, according to data from the landlord-backed group, though it was still around three-quarters of 2019 levels.

The ‘Zombie Buildings’ at the Heart of the Office Meltdown Wall Street Journal Office utilization in River North is about 48% of its 2019 level, according to commercial real-estate company Avison Young. That compares with an average of 55% in Chicago’s central business district and 62% nationally.

Nashville workers are returning to offices at a faster rate than the US average The Tennssean "In looking at our office busyness index in Nashville today compared to 2019, we are far and away leading the southeast in terms of bouncing back in utilization of office space," Avison Young's Nashville senior insight analyst Brennan Forster said. "As compared to the rest of the U.S., we're strong."

Zero in on the word busyness

Busy places can create vibrant, lively and enriched experiences. Build connectivity and spark energy. And, fuel financial performance.

“Busyness,” derived from “busy,” refers to the quality or state of being busy or occupied with various activities. It’s primarily used to describe a state of being rather than a specific action. For this index, Busyness can be defined as the degree or intensity of activity within an office environment.

Learn more about the busyness of office markets

View more Busyness Index Data Bites

What you see in this dashboard is just one slice of our data.

Explore the basics here, and then to get a look behind the curtain, reach out. One of our analysts would love to walk you through the entire set of data which includes additional layers such as amenities, industries, classifications, sustainability factors and more.

Unleash the power of the index, for your property or your city

Get in touch

Jen Rosenak

- Principal, U.S. Director of Market Intelligence
- Market Intelligence

[email protected]

+1 610 276 3144 x 63144

Danny Mangru

- Senior Manager, U.S. Office Lead, Market Intelligence
- Market Intelligence

[email protected]

+1 212 729 4560