Manhattan Office Visitations Remain at 72% of Pre-Pandemic Baseline in May 2025

Overall visitation rates unchanged from April 2025, slight improvements year-over-year

NEW YORK, NY – The Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY) today released its latest monthly analysis of Placer.ai location data from 350 Manhattan office buildings for May 2025. This report tracks mobile data of office tenants and their employees, and, where applicable, also reflects the presence of office visitors and retail customers and employees within those buildings.

May 2025 office visitations closely followed the previous month, while slightly higher rates were recorded year-over-year across the market and for higher quality buildings. The overall visitation rate for the month was 72%, equal to April 2025 and one point higher than May 2025. Excluding the Memorial Day holiday, the visitation rate would have been 74%.

Class A+ buildings averaged 85% and Class A/A- buildings averaged 72% of 2019 baselines, equal to April 2025. Compared to a year ago, Class A+ is up from 83% and Class A/A- up from 69%. Class B/C building visitations inched up from 68% in April to 69% in April but did not budge from last May. Looking at submarkets, Midtown registered the highest visitation rate at 75%, exceeding the 70% rate in Midtown South and 68% for Downtown. Downtown visitations are up from 68% this month last year and Midtown South rose from 68% a year ago.

The ratio of buildings with an increase in monthly visitation during May (155) to those with a decrease (179) was 0.9, an increase from the 0.6 ratio in April.

“Overall building visitations have hovered around 75% of 2019 baseline levels for the last few months,” said Keith DeCoster, Vice President of Research at the Real Estate Board of New York. “Downtown visitation has improved recently but has yet to exceed 70% in the recovery. The extension of economic incentives for companies to relocate to lower Manhattan this legislation session is positive for the commercial sector; and we will monitor future Downtown visitation to see if this support provides an added boost.”

The full May 2025 report can be found here: https://www.rebny.com/reports/may-2025-manhattan-office-visitation-report/.

The buildings analyzed in these reports include a representative sample of various types of office buildings. Buildings that were not completed by 2019 are not factored in this report or in the 2025 average visitation rates.

The report analyzes mobile data provided by Placer.ai from geo-fenced buildings, including multiple phones carried by individual visitors. This has no impact on building visitation rates, as the same possibility of individuals carrying multiple phones exists in 2025 and the 2019 baseline.

Findings in these reports include visitation data with a minimum dwell time of seven minutes. In turn, data may include some visitors other than office employees such as building maintenance staff, visitors attending company meetings, as well as visitors to retail at the base of an office building. This visitation rate captures the broader economic impact and use of office buildings.

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The Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY) is the City’s leading real estate trade association. Founded in 1896, REBNY represents commercial, residential, and institutional property owners, builders, managers, investors, brokers, and salespeople; banks, financial service companies, utilities, attorneys, architects, and contractors; corporations, co-partnerships, and individuals professionally interested in New York City real estate. REBNY conducts research on various civic matters including tax policy, city planning and zoning, rental conditions, land use policy, building codes, and other city, state, and federal legislation. REBNY regularly publishes market data, policy reports, and broker surveys. In addition, REBNY provides for its members: informational, technical, and technological resources; networking and charitable service opportunities; qualifying and continuing education courses; professional education programs, seminars, and designations; career-changing awards; legal advice; and a wide range of additional member benefits. For more information, please visit www.rebny.com.