Bengaluru: Office absorption in Bengaluru touched a five-year high last quarter, closing at levels the market has not seen since the post-pandemic reopening wave, according to quarterly leasing data compiled by three advisory firms.
The demand engine is unchanged and accelerating: global capability centres. GCC leasing accounted for more than 40 per cent of the quarter’s take-up, spanning engineering R&D, financial services back offices and product design studios that now treat the city as a default location.
Rents have followed volumes. Average quoting rents in the Outer Ring Road and Whitefield corridors rose for the fourth consecutive quarter, and landlords report effective free-rent periods compressing to their shortest since 2019.
Supply, though, is the limiting variable. New completions lag absorption in the prime corridors, pushing occupiers toward pre-commitments in under-construction projects — a pattern that has already pulled several large leases out to 2027 delivery.
Developers are responding with the largest office pipeline the city has seen in a decade. Projects totalling more than 20 million square feet are under construction across the northern and eastern corridors, with institutional capital — including two new foreign funds entering the market this year — underwriting the builds.
The recovery has limits. Vacancy in older, non-transit-adjacent buildings remains elevated, and landlords there are competing on fit-out contributions rather than rents. The market, brokers say, is no longer recovering as one asset class but repricing as two.
