The recovery in occupier activity that emerged in the Dublin office market in the second half of 2024 faced renewed uncertainty in early 2025 following the Trump administration’s adoption of protectionist trade policies and concerns around their impact on the Irish economy.
Occupiers took a measured approach, pausing larger real estate decisions while awaiting greater clarity. Workday’s 416,000sq ft commitment at College Square was an outlier during this time that offered some encouragement to the market.
From the middle of 2025, however, occupier activity began to strengthen as clarity improved, supported by the establishment of a 15 per cent US tariff ceiling on EU goods, including key pharmaceutical exports, better-than-anticipated economic growth projections and continued solid job creation. Knight Frank subsequently revised up its forecast for take-up for 2025 to 2.3-2.5 million sq ft, within range of the market’s long-run average of 2.6 million sq ft.
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While legal firms are set to underpin professional services requirements going forward, the big accountancy companies remained active in 2025 with EY adding 55,000sq ft at its new Wilton Park campus. High-growth tech and financial services occupiers continued to scale up their Dublin operations, including Learn Upon who took 29,000sq ft at One Park Place and Mediolanum who let 47,000sq ft at No 3 Dublin Landings. Meanwhile, some organisations used the year to strategically rightsize their portfolios, including Vodafone and the ESB, who took 63,000sq ft and 39,500sq ft respectively in 70 St Stephen’s Green and The Sidings. A wider flight to quality continued to shape the market, with ESG-accredited space comprising 66 per cent of city centre take-up in 2025 so far.
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Active requirements suggest another robust year for take-up in 2026, but limited availability of large, well-located product will constrain activity. In Dublin 2, only one building more than 100,000sq ft, and five in excess of 50,000sq ft, are available. Although 1.2 million sq ft is scheduled to complete in the next 12 months, 75 per cent is already pre-committed. Just two speculative schemes are due to be delivered during this period – Two Grand Canal Quay (144,000sq ft) and 160 Townsend (103,000sq ft) – both of which are attracting strong interest and are likely to be largely let in the near future.
The consequence of a modest development pipeline is that many occupiers have brought forward their search requirements well in advance of lease events and we expect to see a more competitive pre-let market emerge. Prime rents are likely to hit €72.50-€75.00 per sq ft by the end of next year as it simply will not be viable for developers to build below this level. In the face of this, some occupiers may choose to kick the can down the road and extend their existing leases.
In conclusion, the market retains solid underlying momentum going into 2026, but securing high-quality space will become increasingly difficult. While there have been some encouraging signs that lenders are examining the possibility of funding speculative office development on a very selective basis, without more delivery, Dublin risks pushing growth-minded occupiers to expand elsewhere.
- Declan O’Reilly is a director at Knight Frank
