The office may no longer be the center of working life in quite the way it once was.
Office vacancy across major U.S. markets has climbed to 21%, up from 17% at the start of the pandemic, as hybrid schedules reshape how often people actually show up.
Some 60% of remote workers have been told to spend more time in the office over the past two years, and as the return-to-office push gathers pace, the environment people return to matters more than ever.
A workplace is not just a desk and a meeting room; it shapes mood, energy, creativity, routine, and even how people feel about the job itself. A beautiful building, lively neighborhood, great views, walkable lunch spots, outdoor space, or simply a setting with a bit of character can turn the office from somewhere employees have to be into somewhere they might actually want to be.
What We Did
Amid this transition, a new question started to emerge among workers: if employees are going to come back to the workplace, what kind of office actually feels worth leaving home for?
To explore that, we surveyed 3,005 workers and asked which company workplaces they would most like to work from.
Respondents were asked to judge the workplace itself, not salary, perks, company reputation, or culture. The results point to something bigger than office design.
They show what workers now seem to crave from physical workplaces: identity, scenery, comfort, movement, and a reason to be there beyond a laptop and a lukewarm coffee.
Key Findings
The Dream Office Is No Longer Just A Silicon Valley Fantasy.
Tech still shows up strongly, with Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Adobe, TikTok, Duolingo, and LinkedIn all appearing in the wider ranking. But the top tier is much more varied than the old ‘nap pods, ping pong tables and free snacks’ office stereotype.
The national top 10 includes Bloomberg, PGA TOUR, Servco Pacific, Hilton Grand Vacations, Patagonia, Bridgestone, Hawaiian Airlines, and Amazon’s Spheres.
That mix suggests workers are not simply chasing the most famous tech brands. They are responding to offices that feel distinctive, location-aware, and visibly different from a standard corporate floor.
Hawaii May Be The Surprise Office-Envy Capital.
Three Honolulu workplaces land in the national top 10: Servco Pacific, Hilton Grand Vacations’ Hawaii Operations Hub, and Hawaiian Airlines’ corporate headquarters. That is not just a tropical fluke.
Each of those offices has a strong sense of place. Servco leans into local business history and warm design details, Hilton Grand Vacations benefits from huge mountain-to-ocean views, and Hawaiian Airlines carries the emotional pull of travel and island identity.
In other words, Hawaii’s advantage is not only weather. It is that the offices seem to belong exactly where they are.
Workers Seem To Love Offices That Do Not Feel Trapped Indoors.
Over and over, the strongest entries are workplaces with gardens, courtyards, terraces, trails, water views, mountain views, sports fields, outdoor meeting areas, or some kind of green space.
PGA TOUR’s Global Home is set into the Sawgrass landscape. Patagonia’s Ventura headquarters is tied to coastal outdoor culture. And Amazon’s Spheres quite literally put a conservatory in the middle of downtown Seattle.
The Best-Ranked Offices Tend To Behave Like The Brand.
The ranking gets more interesting when the workplace feels like a physical version of the company. PGA TOUR has an indoor golf simulator and terraces. Porsche’s Atlanta headquarters sits beside a driving track.
McDonald’s Chicago HQ includes Hamburger University and a restaurant with rotating global menu items. YETI’s Austin office has a fire pit, brew house, outdoorsy energy.
L.L.Bean turned a former warehouse into a bright, courtyard-filled workplace that reflects its “outside” identity. These are not just nice offices; they are brand worlds employees can actually sit inside.
New York Still Owns The Classic Power-Office Fantasy.
Bloomberg takes the number one spot nationally, while Google’s St. John’s Terminal also makes the top five and Etsy appears just outside the top 10. What stands out is that New York’s strongest workplaces are not bland towers for the sake of height.
Bloomberg has the energy of a newsroom-meets-market floor. Google’s Hudson Square campus reuses a former rail terminal.
Etsy’s Brooklyn headquarters reflects craft, sustainability, and maker culture. The appeal is not simply ‘big city office.’ It is density, history, movement, and a workplace with a bit of theatre.
Adaptive Reuse Has Serious Pull.
A surprising number of the most interesting offices are not shiny new boxes, but old structures given a second life.
Google St. John’s Terminal reworks rail infrastructure. Google Chicago occupies a former cold-storage building. Lumina Foundation sits in the Bottleworks district. Lamar Advertising transformed a former data center. Raven Industries reused an old biscuit factory. Audible turned a Newark church into its Innovation Cathedral. URBN built its campus into historic Navy Yard buildings.
Workers seem to like offices with a past. Places that feel layered rather than freshly assembled from a corporate fit-out catalogue.
Sports And Outdoor Brands Have An Unfair Advantage.
Nike, Adidas, Patagonia, Burton, Timberland, YETI, Garmin, PGA TOUR, Porsche, Under Armour, and Hudl all benefit from a built-in sense of movement.
Their offices can credibly include tracks, fields, labs, trails, product testing, sports materials, mountain views, or active design cues without it feeling forced. In a post-hybrid world, that matters.
Some Of The Strongest Offices Are In Places People Might Not Expect.
This is not just a coastal elite ranking. Fargo has Microsoft and Aldevron. Bismarck has Bobcat’s Acceleration Center. Sioux Falls has Raven and First PREMIER Bank. Boise has Simplot, Micron, and Clearwater Analytics. Bentonville has Walmart’s expanding Home Office. Tulsa has One Williams Center.
These entries show that office envy is not limited to Manhattan, Seattle, or San Francisco. A workplace can feel aspirational because it brings scale, design, technology, or purpose into a place people do not automatically associate with “dream offices.”
Purpose Can Be As Powerful As Perks.
Not every enviable workplace is about rooftop terraces or dramatic views. Aldevron’s Fargo campus is tied to biomanufacturing and modern medicine.
Bobcat’s Acceleration Center includes testing zones where ideas can move from screen to machine. 3M, Milliken, IDEXX, BETA Technologies, Hypertherm, and Toyota Motor Manufacturing West Virginia all have the appeal of real work happening close to the office.
There is a different kind of envy there: the feeling of being near invention, production, research, or problem-solving rather than floating in a decorative office bubble.
Hospitality Has Quietly Become A Workplace Design Advantage.
Marriott’s Bethesda headquarters is an obvious example, with innovation labs, cafés, meditation rooms, a test kitchen, and a connected hotel. Hilton Grand Vacations also scores highly with views and comfortable amenities.
But the broader point is that workers increasingly judge offices like guests judge hotels: Is it pleasant? Is there somewhere good to sit? Is the lighting decent? Does the building make the day easier? The line between workplace and hospitality space is getting blurrier, and employees appear to notice.
Final Thoughts
The big lesson is that workers do not seem to be rejecting the office itself. They are rejecting boring offices. The most popular workplaces in the rankings offer employees things they cannot replicate at home.
A good office does not need to be a glass dome or a famous headquarters. But it does need to answer a basic question: why should someone want to be here?
The companies that emerged highest in the survey have understood that the workplace is not just about real estate. It has become a recruitment tool.
Methodology:
This study surveyed 3,005 U.S. workers in May 2026 to identify the company office locations they would most like to work from based solely on the physical workplace setting. Respondents were asked to evaluate a range of office locations across America, considering factors such as the surrounding area, scenery, walkability, nearby amenities, outdoor access, architecture, and overall sense of place. Participants were instructed not to take salary, employee benefits, company culture, job role, or employer reputation into account when making their selections. The survey was conducted online using a nationally representative panel of working adults and was balanced across age, gender, region, and employment sector. Results were weighted where necessary to align with U.S. workforce demographics, providing a broad snapshot of America's most envied office locations.
