How much time can you save by not commuting?

Of course, the amount of time saved each year by not commuting to work depends on several factors, such as the length and the frequency of the commute. On average, however, studies have shown that remote workers save between 30 minutes to 2 hours per day on commuting time, which adds up to significant time savings over the course of a year or even a lifetime!

Let’s do a simple calculation, based on a 40 hour working week for an average job in Switzerland: There are about 260 working days in 2023. Let’s be generous and say there are 10 public holidays and you’ve got 30 days of vacation time, like we do at PAKD. This leaves you with 220 working days.

Let’s say you are lucky and are living close to your office. You’ll have a short commute of about 30 minutes to work and another 30 minutes back again, which conveniently adds up to one hour per day or 220 hours per year. If you consider that you’re working 8 hours per day, the 220 hours per year would equal 27.5 working days! Please do the math yourselves, because it still hard for me to believe, how much time I’ve personally spent commuting for many years of my life.

If you think about your 1 hour lunch time, that is often spend in cafeterias, restaurants or at your desk without being counted as work time it adds another 220 hours, equaling 440 hours in total per year.

Over 10 years that's 4400 hours or more than 180 full days (at 24 hours) of your lifetime that you spend commuting or at lunch without getting paid for it. 🤯

Having a 30 minutes commute, you can probably call yourself lucky! Depending on your situation, you should do the math yourselves, it’s pretty easy: 1 hour a day adds up to 220 hours or about 9 full days per year.

How much time do you spend “at work” not getting paid for it instead of using this time for other activities, such as exercise, spending time with family and friends, or pursuing hobbies? We’ve been embracing remote work since 2013 and could not imagine it any other way.