Companies across the U.S. have been nudging, pushing, or even forcing their workers back into the office, and it seems to be working.

Return-to-office policies have been put in place for more than 1.5 million U.S. workers so far in 2023, and many are complying, according to the latest quarterly office outlook report from real estate services firm JLL. Office occupancy on the busiest workdays is currently about 40% to 60% of pre-pandemic levels. JLL expects that figure to exceed 80% by the end of the year, when another 1 million workers will see RTO policies enacted.

This represents a dramatic turnaround from the dark days of mid-2020, when the average office usage in 10 major U.S. metropolitan areas was just 14%, according to Kastle Systems.

While the recovery has been slow, mandates and RTO policies are now being solidified in a wide range of companies and industries. JLL’s report highlights return-to-office requirements in the insurance industry, large law firms, banks, and telecom companies.

New return mandates in governmental agencies like the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Department of Education will drive further increases in office usage. And, above all, tech companies are increasingly bringing workers back into office buildings. The JLL report states that the 10 largest technology tenants in the U.S. “now all have some form of concrete hybrid attendance policy that impacts the majority of their workforce.”

But there’s one big caveat to JLL’s prediction: Office occupancy is likely to hit or exceed 80% only one or two days of the week. Many companies are still operating on hybrid work schedules, asking or requiring workers to come into the office only a few days a week, if that. “The dominance of hybrid schedules and crowding of hybrid employees on Tuesdays and Wednesdays will continue to drive higher occupancy on peak attendance days than weekly averages imply,” according to the report.

So while RTO work policies certainly seem to be impacting office usage, it may be a while before we see crowded offices Monday through Friday like we did in 2019.