The New Office Boom Isn't About More Offices — It's About Better Offices

Published by Daniel Amodeo, President of Amo Realty
August 10th 2026

For the last several years, the conversation surrounding commercial real estate has focused on one question: Will workers ever fully return to the office?

That may be the wrong question.

The more important question for the future of office real estate is becoming: What kind of office are employees willing to return to?

Across the country, companies are reconsidering what they actually need from their workplaces. Many businesses have embraced hybrid schedules, reduced their overall footprints or become much more selective about signing large leases.

At the same time, demand for office space hasn't disappeared. Instead, companies are increasingly concentrating on the buildings, neighborhoods and amenities they believe will actually attract employees.

The next office boom may therefore look very different from the last one.

America may not need more office space.

It may need better office space.

Companies Can Take Less Space and Still Upgrade

One of the most interesting changes in commercial real estate is that downsizing and upgrading can happen at the same time.

Imagine a company that previously occupied 100,000 square feet in an older building. With employees working hybrid schedules, perhaps it now needs only 70,000 square feet.

That doesn't necessarily mean the company wants the cheapest 70,000 square feet it can find.

The savings created by reducing its footprint can allow the company to move into a better location or higher-quality building while keeping its overall occupancy costs manageable.

A company can therefore reduce the amount of real estate it occupies while simultaneously improving the quality of its workplace.

That's an important distinction when evaluating the future of office real estate.

The Office Is Competing With Staying Home

Before 2020, millions of employees went to an office five days a week because that was simply where work happened.

The office didn't have to be particularly exciting.

Today, it is competing against the convenience of working from home.

If companies want employees to commute into the office two, three or four days per week, there is more pressure to give them a reason to want to be there.

That means the location matters. Restaurants matter. Public transportation matters. Natural light matters. Outdoor space matters.

And increasingly, amenities matter.

Some landlords are responding by transforming office buildings into something closer to a combination of an office, hotel, private club and fitness center.

The amenities appearing in some American office buildings illustrate just how dramatically the workplace is changing.

Atlanta: Yoga, Pickleball, Golf and Even a Dog Run at the Office

One of the more dramatic examples is 1072 West Peachtree in Midtown Atlanta.

The new 60-story tower isn't simply being marketed around modern office space. Its developers describe more than an acre of amenities and services, including an athletic club with strength and cardio training, locker rooms, a sauna, private spa treatment rooms, a recovery room, a yoga studio and even an outdoor yoga terrace.

Then it gets more interesting.

The amenity package also includes a pickleball court, golf simulator, Pilates studio, dog run, outdoor kitchen, great lawn, café, game area, coworking space and fireplace lounge.

Office floors also have balconies, giving employees access to outdoor space without leaving the building.

Twenty years ago, putting a golf simulator, pickleball court, yoga terrace and private spa treatment rooms inside an office development would have sounded excessive.

In today's market, those features help sell the experience of physically coming to work.

New York City: The Rooftop Is Becoming Part of the Office

Outdoor space is also becoming an increasingly important office amenity.

At 1333 Broadway in Manhattan, a new rooftop amenity opened in 2026 for tenants across the building owner's nearby office campus.

Instead of simply placing some tables on a roof, the space includes cabana seating, a wet bar, audiovisual capabilities and unobstructed views of the Empire State Building.

An employee can leave a desk, take a laptop upstairs and work outside overlooking Manhattan. The same space can later become somewhere to meet coworkers, host an event or have a drink.

That is a fundamentally different concept from the traditional office building where virtually everything happened inside a company's leased suite.

The building itself is increasingly becoming part of the workplace.

Boston: An Office Building That Feels More Like a Private Club

Boston's One Congress takes the hospitality approach even further.

The one-million-square-foot office tower includes an entire floor dedicated to amenities.

There is a 7,000-square-foot fitness center with a fitness studio, instructor-led classes and spa-quality locker rooms.

Employees also have access to approximately 15,000 square feet of rooftop terrace space with an outdoor bar, open-air pavilions and panoramic views across Boston.

Inside, there are coffee options, dining, collaborative workspaces, conference and event facilities, lounges and a full-service bar. There's even an enormous bicycle facility with room for 850 bikes and a repair area.

An employee can arrive by bicycle, work, take an exercise class, shower, eat lunch, hold a meeting outside, grab coffee and meet coworkers for happy hour without leaving the property.

That starts to look less like the office towers built several decades ago and more like a hospitality experience.

Older Buildings Are Trying to Compete Too

This transformation isn't limited to brand-new skyscrapers.

Existing office owners are discovering that amenities can be part of repositioning an older property.

At 125 High Street in Boston, the property has been reimagined with a modern fitness center and studio, juice bar and other lifestyle-oriented spaces. Recent upgrades have also included a rooftop terrace and golf simulator.

That's an important example because America can't simply replace every aging office tower.

Many buildings will instead have to compete by reinventing themselves.

This Could Create Two Very Different Office Markets

The biggest mistake when discussing office vacancy is treating every square foot of office space as interchangeable.

It isn't.

A modern office building with outdoor terraces, fitness facilities, restaurants and collaborative spaces is a very different product from an aging building offering little beyond an elevator ride to a floor filled with cubicles.

Yet both properties are counted as "office space."

That helps explain how a city can simultaneously have substantial office vacancy while particular buildings remain highly desirable.

We may increasingly see the American office market divide into two categories.

There will be buildings companies actively want.

And there will be buildings companies occupy only when the rent becomes cheap enough.

Amenities Aren't Just About Spoiling Employees

It would be easy to dismiss some of these amenities as extravagant.

Do office workers really need a golf simulator?

Probably not.

But that's missing the larger economic purpose.

Companies are competing for employees, and landlords are competing for those companies.

If an employer is trying to convince hundreds or thousands of workers that commuting into an office is worthwhile, the quality of that environment becomes part of the equation.

The same applies to landlords.

If two buildings offer similar amounts of office space in comparable locations, but one offers outdoor workspaces, fitness classes, cafés, showers, wellness facilities and social spaces, the buildings aren't really offering the same product anymore.

Amenities become a competitive advantage.

The Office Is Becoming a Social Destination

Perhaps the biggest transformation is philosophical.

The traditional office was designed primarily around individual work.

You arrived, went to your desk, worked and went home.

But individual work is precisely what many employees discovered they can perform effectively from home.

That changes the reason for having an office.

The modern workplace increasingly emphasizes things that are difficult to replicate remotely: collaboration, meetings, training, mentorship, networking and social interaction.

That explains the proliferation of rooftop decks, cafés, lounges, bars, outdoor kitchens and event spaces.

They're not necessarily there because employees need them to perform their jobs.

They're there because they give people reasons to interact with each other.

What Happens to the Offices That Can't Compete?

This shift creates a serious problem for older office buildings.

Some can be renovated and repositioned.

Others can't.

Location can't be renovated. Neither can every structural limitation of an aging building.

Some obsolete properties will eventually be converted to apartments, hotels or mixed-use developments. Others may be demolished and replaced entirely.

That process could gradually remove some of the least desirable office inventory from the market.

Meanwhile, the buildings that remain offices will face increasing pressure to improve.

The Next Office Boom Could Look Completely Different

The office development boom of the future may not be about constructing millions upon millions of additional square feet.

Developers are unlikely to build enormous amounts of generic office space while uncertainty remains about long-term workplace patterns.

Instead, new construction could become much more selective.

Developers may build fewer offices, but invest considerably more in making those buildings destinations.

Existing owners will face the same pressure.

The winners won't necessarily be the buildings with the most desks.

They could be the buildings with the best combination of location, technology, outdoor space, fitness, food, wellness and social experiences.

The Office Market Is Being Rebuilt, Not Restored

The American office market doesn't need to return to 2019 to recover.

It probably won't.

Hybrid work permanently changed the way many businesses think about real estate, and some companies have discovered they can operate with smaller footprints.

But smaller doesn't necessarily mean worse.

Companies can lease fewer square feet and demand much more from every square foot they occupy.

That's why the rise of rooftop decks, yoga studios, fitness clubs, pickleball courts, golf simulators, cafés, bars, outdoor kitchens and wellness facilities is more than a collection of flashy amenities.

It's evidence of a larger transformation in what an office is supposed to be.

The office isn't competing with another office anymore. It's competing with staying home.

And the buildings that give people a compelling reason to come in may ultimately be the ones that define the next office boom.