Almost half of Manhattan office workers are back at their workplace on an average weekday, a record high since the onset of the pandemic, according to a survey.

That’s an encouraging sign that the return-to-office pace after Labor Day is slowly picking up even as the hybrid schedule of working just some days in the office continues. The findings are closely watched not only because New York is the largest U.S. commercial property market, serving as a barometer for the rest of the country, but the companies surveyed also are among the nation's largest employers.

As of mid-September, 49% of Manhattan office workers are at their workplace on an average weekday, up from 38% in April and 28% in October, according to the latest survey of more than 160 major Manhattan office employers between Aug. 29 and Sept. 12 by the Partnership for New York City, a business group with a membership that includes many of New York’s business leaders and companies.

The most recent percentage was the highest since the survey began in October 2021 to poll respondents about the percentage of employees in an office on an average weekday, a Partnership spokesperson told CoStar News in an email.

The study also finds the return-to-office rates in Manhattan are projected to increase gradually through the rest of this year, with 54% of workers expected to be in the office on an average weekday by January 2023.

In another positive sign for the office market, the share of Manhattan office employees that are fully remote also dropped to 16% as of mid-September from 28% in April, according to the Partnership’s survey.

Highlighting the gradual pickup since Labor Day, security firm Kastle Systems’ most recent weekly data shows that the return-to-office rate in New York rose to 38% as of Sept. 7 from 34.5% the week before.

Signs of improvement aside, with more than half of New York workers still not back in the office, analysts have said it will remain difficult to lower the market’s vacancy rate, which CoStar data shows has surged to a record high of 12.2% in Manhattan.

While 20% of companies plan to increase their New York real estate footprint in the next five years, up from 18% in an April survey, 22% expect to cut theirs. About 33% expect their footprint to stay the same, up from 30% in April, while a quarter said they don’t know yet, according to the Partnership study.

The survey findings come as employers including tech giant Apple and investment banks such as Goldman Sachs, Jefferies and Morgan Stanley are said to have been firmer about employees returning to the workplace on a more consistent basis or at least some days of the week post-Labor Day.

In a telling example of that, among companies with more than 5,000 employees, which have been slower to come back to the office versus their smaller counterparts, 44% of Manhattan employees are currently in the office on an average weekday — up from 31% in April — and 50% are expected back by January 2023. In contrast, firms with fewer than 500 employees reported 54% of workers back in the workplace, up slightly from 53% in April.

Some 90% of companies encourage their employees to return to the office, with 10% doing so at managers’ and departments’ discretion. About two-thirds of companies continue to use perks such as social activities, free or discounted meals, transportation subsidies and child care support to entice employees to return, according to the survey.

Still, the study found employers’ bids to get workers to return can only go so far. Consistent with past surveys, 77% of employers said a hybrid office schedule will be their predominant post-pandemic policy, largely in response to employee preference. For companies with a hybrid model, 55% of employees are in the office at least three days a week, according to the survey.

In their case for remote working, 36% of employees, the highest percentage, said they are just as productive or more productive working from home versus being in the office, followed by 24% who express concern about public transit being not safe or reliable as their reason for not wanting to return to the office.