Key points:
- As of the end of October, 7.8 % of Indeed job postings advertised remote or hybrid work, down from a high of 10.4% in February 2022.
- Indeed analyzed 59% of all sectors — not just those sectors (including tech) where remote work is typically more common — and found that the share of remote jobs fell or remained unchanged.
Our monthly Labor Market Update examines significant trends using Indeed and other labor market data. Our US Labor Market Overview chartbook provides a more comprehensive view of the US labor market. Data from our Job Postings Index — which stands 9% above its pre-pandemic baseline as of November 8 — and the Indeed Wage Tracker (including sector-level data) are regularly updated and can be accessed on our data portal.
Return-to-office policies are making headlines as companies including Amazon and Starbucks revise their remote work offerings, and the overall share of job postings on Indeed advertising remote/hybrid work has fallen significantly in recent years. While much of the initial downturn in the share of remote postings can be attributed to overall declines in the jobs most likely to offer remote roles (including many tech jobs), there are signs that more recent declines could be attributed to shifting attitudes towards remote work.
When pandemic lockdown measures were first announced in March 2020, postings that mentioned remote or hybrid work accounted for 3.3% of all US job postings on Indeed. By February 2022, the share had jumped to a peak of 10.4%. At the time, the national unemployment rate was just 3.8%, and the level of job postings was 60% above its pre-pandemic baseline. As the broader job market subsequently cooled (unemployment rose to 4.1% as of October, and overall job postings are now only 9% above pre-pandemic norms), the share of job postings offering remote work also fell, ending October 2024 at 7.8%, down 2.6 percentage points from the February 2022 peak.
Much of the initial downturn in remote work opportunities can be attributed to a broad decline in postings overall for the jobs typically more likely to offer remote work (including many tech roles). If the mix of jobs today were the same as it was in 2022, or rather if job postings for tech and other remote-friendly jobs had not fallen considerably over the past few years, the total share of remote postings would have remained at or near 2022 peak levels well into 2024. In the last few months, however, the share of remote postings has begun to drop regardless of the job mix (the graph below shows the fixed-weight and actual shares, both trending downward).
This decrease in postings, independent of the occupational mix, shows that remote work preferences may be changing within these typically remote-friendly sectors. Over the past year, the share of job postings offering remote work has declined in 46% of the sectors analyzed by Indeed, and held steady in 13%. In 41% of sectors, that share has grown over the same period. It’s also important to note that the total remote share is relatively small (less than 7%) in more than half of the sectors where the remote work share of postings has grown.
Comparatively, the remote share fell in seven of the ten sectors with the highest share of remote postings as of October 31 (all of which had at least 22% of postings offering some kind of remote work). The accounting sector had the most significant year-over-year decrease in remote postings, falling six percentage points (from roughly 31% to about 25%), followed by software development and IT, both with a 3.8 PPT decrease. Overall, the total number of postings in these sectors remains relatively high, but the year-over-year decline points to changes within high-remote sectors.
The sectors that paint the clearest picture of changing trends in remote postings are those that have made headlines for their shifting return to office policies — namely software development, IT, and information design. Overall postings in these sectors are below their pre-pandemic baselines, so any drop in the number of remote postings in these sectors should be expected. What may not be expected is a decrease in the share of job postings within these sectors that advertise remote work. For example, assume there are 100 total IT postings and 50 offered remote work — that would represent a 50% remote share. If the number of IT postings fell to 50, you might expect 25 to still offer remote work (maintaining the 50% share). But the share of remote postings in these tech-related sectors also decreased, showing that the decline in remote postings isn’t just about an overall reduction in postings for those sectors.
As the return-to-office push for existing employees continues, the year-over-year decline in remote job postings shows that new hires, including those in the tech sector, are being impacted by changing attitudes. Still, perspective is essential. Although remote postings aren’t at their height, the share of remote-eligible postings is three times greater than at the start of 2019. Remote work isn’t going anywhere, but may be past its peak.
Methodology
A deep review of the methodology behind Indeed’s Hybrid/Remote Tracker can be found here.
We identify job postings as open to remote work if the job title or description includes terms like “remote work,” “telecommute,” “work from home,” “hybrid,” or similar language, or if the location is explicitly listed as remote. These postings include both permanent and temporarily remote jobs, though employers often don’t specify.
We calculate the remote share of postings on a daily basis. When reporting data on specific months, we present the monthly mean of the daily series.
The Indeed Job Postings Index is built from a 7-day moving average of job postings, with the index set to 100 on February 1, 2020. We seasonally adjust each series based on historical patterns from 2017, 2018, and 2019. We adopted this methodology in January 2021. Data for several dates in 2021 and 2022 are missing and were interpolated. Non-seasonally adjusted data are calculated similarly, except that the data are not adjusted to historical patterns.
The number of job postings on Indeed.com, whether related to paid or unpaid job solicitations, is not indicative of potential revenue or earnings of Indeed, which comprises a significant percentage of the HR Technology segment of its parent company, Recruit Holdings Co., Ltd. Job posting numbers are provided for information purposes only and should not be viewed as an indicator of performance of Indeed or Recruit. Please refer to the Recruit Holdings investor relations website and regulatory filings in Japan for more detailed information on revenue generation by Recruit’s HR Technology segment.
