Hot desking vs. hoteling: Which hybrid model works?
As hybrid work shrinks traditional office footprints, organizations must decide how to support in-office employees. Hot desking and hoteling offer two distinct approaches.
Hot desking and hoteling are two approaches organizations use to let employees share physical and digital office spaces. While the terms are sometimes used interchangeably, they describe different models with distinct implications for end users, available resources and IT support.
As hybrid work becomes a long-term operating model rather than a temporary adjustment, understanding the difference between hot desking vs. hoteling can help organizations determine which approach is the better fit for their workforce and workplace strategy.
Let's explore why hot desking and hoteling are so popular and examine hot desking vs. hoteling to determine which option might be the best fit for your organization.
Why are hot desking and hoteling so popular?
The shift to hybrid work models has changed how organizations think about office space and employee presence. In most cases, only a portion of employees are in the office on any given day, while others work remotely. As a result, many organizations now have more office space than they actively use.
Right-sizing reduces unused space, but it also forces organizations to make explicit decisions about how shared environments are managed. When employees no longer have assigned desks or offices, availability, proximity, and access to collaboration tools must be coordinated deliberately -- not left to chance.
A related model appears in coworking environments, where organizations rent shared office space and access desk availability and digital services on a flexible basis. While often associated with startups and small businesses, these environments reflect the same underlying challenge larger enterprises now face: coordinating shared physical space without friction.
What is hot desking -- and where organizations encounter friction
Hot desking provides workers with office and IT infrastructure services on a first-come, first-serve basis. With hot desking, employees walk into the office, find an available office space and claim it for their own for as long as they are there, accessing IT resources as needed.
In practice, this simplicity creates recurring friction in real-world environments, especially as hybrid attendance becomes less predictable.
- Capacity. When more employees show up than office space is available.
- Collaboration. If two or more employees need to work together yet are physically separated as no adjacent spaces are available.
- Availability of services. When certain IT resources are required but not available at open spots.
- Confidentiality. In situations where privacy is needed.
When these issues appear consistently, organizations often move toward hoteling models that trade spontaneity for predictability and coordination.
What is a hoteling space -- and why enterprises adopt it
Hoteling applies a reservation-based model to individual workspaces. Instead of relying on first-come availability, employees reserve desks or offices in advance, typically through a digital service that coordinates physical space and associated resources.
The core difference between hot desking and hoteling is predictability: with hoteling, workspaces can be reserved in advance. This way, the employee knows the following well ahead of time:
- a workspace is indeed available;
- the exact location of the workspace; and
- what physical and digital resources are available.
While hoteling eliminates many of the deficiencies found with hot desking, it does require that the business or coworking facility set up a reservation service. Additionally, if the office itself only has a limited number of popular locations, hoteling may only offer workers spaces that are less than ideal for what they need on any given day.
Ultimately, the choice between hot desking and hoteling is less about real estate efficiency and more about operational intent. Organizations that prioritize flexibility and spontaneity may tolerate hot desking's tradeoffs, while those optimizing for predictability, coordination and employee experience often find hoteling easier to govern at scale.
Andrew Froehlich is founder of InfraMomentum, an enterprise IT research and analyst firm, and president of West Gate Networks, an IT consulting company. He has been involved in enterprise IT for more than 20 years.
