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Industry Knowledge Research

The Best Places To Work Remotely

21 August 2023

The growing popularity of flexible working doesn’t just represent a change in the way we work – it’s also a direct reflection of a transformation in the way we live.

As the adoption of fully-remote and hybrid working models continues, one of the main reasons to live in an expensive city centre shrinks in importance. If you only need to be in the office one day a week, living further away is far more viable.

And with less pressure to be based in a city centre to be exposed to job opportunities – smaller towns, villages, and other remote areas become more attractive propositions.

This phenomenon, in turn, could lead to an acceleration of the work near home movement – the idea that you can work from home for the most part and use local flexible workspaces on-demand.

This requires workspace operators to continue to expand into less urban areas to meet growing demand, but we’re already seeing that happen.

Critically, as the work near home movement gathers momentum and adoption of remote work models by employers continues, the choice of where to live becomes less about local job opportunities and more about other quality of life factors.

In other words, the best places to work from home become the best places to work, full stop.

That means we might see a wholesale change in where professionals primarily choose to live, which is massively important for all office operators to pay attention to as it signals where flexible workspaces will be most needed.

The best places to work remotely

So, what makes a place a good option for working remotely? That’s largely subjective, but there are some measurable factors that are generally considered to contribute towards what making a place good to live in, including:

  • House prices
  • Green space
  • Crime rates
  • Internet download speed
  • Air pollution levels
  • Number of doctors
  • Quality of schools

Uswitch recently put together a Remote Work Index that charts 100 towns and cities across the UK, ranking their remote working credentials based on these factors.

The result of their research is a ranked table of locations in the UK that are perfect for remote workers looking for a better quality of life.

Table: Remote Working Index (Click + to expand)
Rank Location Green space Burglary Download speed Air pollution Doctor OFSTED (Schools)
1 Harrogate 1 4 83 12 3 11
2 Bath and North East Somerset 11 6 88 23 8 32
3 Mendip 3 7 98 15 14 28
4 Derry City and Strabane 2 2 80 3 71 44
5 Wigan 45 16 38 27 26 12
6 Cheshire West and Chester 9 17 96 23 29 15
7 St Albans 23 11 40 94 16 1
8 York 17 12 87 26 38 36
9 City of Edinburgh 49 61 28 5 2 23
10 Swansea 17 31 48 13 72 43
11 St. Helens 37 35 20 34 40 22
12 Cheltenham 60 15 39 55 20 2
13 Basingstoke and Deane 5 13 78 30 83 16
14 Stockport 61 10 29 54 23 23
15 Exeter 61 22 47 22 1 61
16 Woking 48 14 23 70 51 5
17 Sefton 49 20 61 17 32 45
18 High Peak 4 3 103 29 10 99
19 Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole 65 28 49 23 13 20
20 Darlington 12 75 26 9 46 69
21 Warrington 36 27 58 37 59 6
22 Belfast 78 1 22 19 53 96
23 Redditch 47 26 23 41 7 88
24 Bedford 8 38 32 77 75 52
25 Solihull 41 17 27 78 61 21
26 Brighton and Hove 53 47 12 66 54 31
27 Swindon 26 23 42 43 82 100
28 Aberdeen City 38 58 102 1 12 26
29 Bolton 54 54 57 35 19 14
30 Telford and Wrekin 20 34 53 31 94 48
31 Plymouth 92 29 16 14 44 87
32 Wycombe 14 8 92 83 56 37
33 South Tyneside 58 73 46 7 47 10
34 Hartlepool 32 96 10 11 93 27
35 Maidstone 6 41 77 69 69 35
36 Sheffield 40 42 90 48 4 61
37 East Staffordshire 7 9 99 65 81 65
38 Chelmsford 10 36 86 81 58 19
39 Worthing 68 23 14 56 60 104
40 Eastbourne 51 32 100 40 17 54
41 Dundee City 73 92 16 2 6 81
42 North East Lincolnshire 23 90 3 44 96 53
43 Gloucester 78 44 11 59 17 97
44 Rochdale 34 55 84 32 45 40
45 Colchester 15 49 72 71 85 39
46 Oxford 61 52 31 78 9 95
47 Cardiff 59 70 34 38 73 42
48 Bristol, City of 91 57 17 49 15 83
49 Oldham 35 60 66 47 33 70
50 Preston 22 95 68 16 86 13
51 Blackburn with Darwen 23 72 75 17 76 57
52 Chesterfield 56 21 95 51 5 101
53 Burnley 19 88 62 20 95 33
54 Nuneaton and Bedworth 46 37 55 72 37 84
55 Newcastle upon Tyne 55 101 76 6 31 30
56 Newport 30 69 60 36 78 82
57 Rotherham 27 46 85 57 43 86
58 Kirklees 28 67 79 39 61 78
59 Cambridge 71 85 13 78 48 17
60 Peterborough 21 68 26 76 104 85
61 Cannock Chase 44 5 93 61 68 102
62 Mansfield 42 78 42 61 22 93
63 Calderdale 13 78 91 28 91 49
64 Middlesbrough 69 103 21 21 57 56
65 Crawley 75 76 5 68 52 67
66 Dudley 97 19 36 73 35 94
67 Milton Keynes 29 30 94 95 100 23
68 Walsall 66 33 68 97 27 59
69 Leeds 43 94 70 46 36 78
70 Stevenage 85 56 2 85 49 73
71 Bradford 31 98 75 33 41 90
72 Coventry 73 23 64 90 73 61
73 Slough 82 48 59 103 23 4
74 Medway 39 73 6 101 97 73
75 Liverpool 95 83 56 45 11 41
76 Watford 88 61 20 100 61 3
77 Glasgow City 81 93 73 4 21 78
78 Thurrock 33 66 37 98 102 58
79 Basildon 52 61 64 82 87 8
80 Stoke-on-Trent 67 53 54 61 67 72
81 Worcester 77 45 97 42 39 77
82 Birmingham 90 59 46 96 28 60
83 Sunderland 57 87 81 8 77 76
84 Reading 93 40 44 88 92 34
85 Doncaster 16 82 89 52 84 103
86 Lincoln 72 100 8 61 70 51
87 Derby 84 51 33 84 78 98
88 London 78 43 104 104 49 7
89 Wolverhampton 104 49 43 75 61 55
90 Norwich 98 91 51 73 34 9
91 Nottingham 94 97 18 89 23 66
92 Southend-on-Sea 86 78 72 67 42 38
93 Northampton 76 71 30 86 90 68
94 Harlow 61 81 4 92 99 92
95 Portsmouth 89 77 9 87 98 61
96 Hastings 70 65 101 53 103 29
97 Kingston upon Hull, City of 102 102 1 58 101 46
98 Southampton 100 89 52 49 66 47
99 Luton 96 61 7 102 89 89
100 Blackpool 101 104 65 10 78 49
100 Manchester 99 99 83 60 30 17
Alternatively, view table HERE

The results put traditionally under-appreciated areas like Harrogate, Bath, Derry, Wigan, and Cheshire in the top 10, while major cities like Leeds, Liverpool, Birmingham, London, and Manchester all sit in the lower half of the table.

These results reinforce the idea that less urban areas will become increasingly desirable as the necessity to be in easy commuting distance to a city-centre office diminishes, but a full transition to this way of working won’t be complete without the emergence of true 15-minute city infrastructure.

Flexible workspaces in remote work hubs

And a big part of the infrastructure that needs to exist for the high-ranking, less urban areas in Uswitch’s Remote Working Index to be truly viable as live-work destinations is a more fully-developed flexible workspace market.

While home working is a popular option and makes up a significant portion of the typical hybrid working arrangement, it’s still important that people have access to high quality workspaces, meeting rooms, and other office amenities

But this access shouldn’t be homogenous. Ideally, it needs to consist of a range of choices – not just one flexible workspace in a town but a number of competing operators with unique offerings.

This doesn’t just offer choice to customers, but also creates a competitive market environment that spurs the operators on to develop their offering and push the boundaries of what a flexible workspace can be.

At present, though, these potential remote work hubs – less urban areas that have a high occurrence of quality-of-life factors – feature a lower density of flexible workspaces than the cities and more urban areas that we’re used to.

This is how the top 10 locations in Uswitch’s Remote Working Index currently compare with major metropolitan areas in terms of flexible workspace density:

Location Uswitch Remote Working Index Rank Number of flexible workspaces Popula-tion Population per workspace
Harrogate 1 2 164,100 82,050
Bath and North East Somerset 2 5 192,400 38,480
Mendip 3 7 116,300 16,614
Derry City and Strabane 4 14 151,109 10,794
Wigan 5 3 329,800 109,933
Cheshire West and Chester 6 9 357,700 39,744
St Albans 7 12 148,600 12,383
York 8 2 201,700 100,850
City of Edinburgh 9 34 526,500 15,485
Swansea 10 2 237,800 118,900
Bristol 48 45 471,100 10,469
Leeds 69 30 809,000 26,967
Liverpool 75 15 484,500 32,300
Birmingham 82 43 1,142,500 26,570
Manchester 100 48 549,900 11,456
Data sourced from ONS (2023) and Valve (June 2023)

In summary, the average population per workspace for Uswitch’s top 10 remote working locations is 54,523. The average for typical urban centres – represented here by Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, and Bristol – is much lower at 23,552.

In other words, there’s a clear imbalance between city centres and smaller localities in terms of population per flexible workspace. Smaller regions, perfectly set up to facilitate the remote work lifestyle in all other ways, lack sufficient workspace options.

This disparity is an opportunity for operators. Those that choose to get ahead of the trend and create inspiring coworking or flexible workspaces in currently neglected areas, are set to capture growing demand.

If you want to be part of this movement, we’re here to help. Contact Spaces to Places to get more information, or book yourself in for a free chat about how we can help you to create flexspaces that meet the new demands of the modern workforce.

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