Work out your desk yield
Usable area first, then everything that is not a desk.
Floor plates planned for yield as well as for people
How this calculator works
- Support area = usable area × amenity share. This covers reception, café, pantry, corridors, phone booths, printing, stores and washroom lobbies where they are within your demise.
- Cabin area = cabins × 110 sq ft. That is a four-person cabin with a door, which is the unit most Indian operators sell.
- Meeting room area = rooms × 180 sq ft, a blended average across small, medium and large.
- Net desking area = usable − support − cabins − meeting rooms.
- Weighted area per desk = (hot share × 32) + (dedicated share × 48).
- Desks = floor(net ÷ weighted area). Memberships are then estimated at 1.6 per hot desk plus one per dedicated desk plus four per cabin.
| Space type | Area used | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Hot desk | 32 sq ft net | Bench run, 1400 mm per person, shared pedestal |
| Dedicated desk | 48 sq ft net | Own pedestal, locker, cannot be packed |
| Private cabin, 4 seats | 110 sq ft | Door, glass front, own lighting circuit |
| Meeting room, blended | 180 sq ft | Mix of 4, 8 and 12 seat rooms |
| Amenity and circulation | 25 – 35% | Reception, café, pantry, corridors, booths |
| Hot desk price | ₹7,500 / month | Mumbai suburban average, 2026 |
| Dedicated desk price | ₹11,000 / month | Mumbai suburban average, 2026 |
| Cabin seat price | ₹16,000 / month | Mumbai suburban average, 2026 |
Pricing is a suburban Mumbai average across Andheri, Powai, Goregaon and Thane. BKC and Lower Parel run 40–70% above these figures; a tier-two city runs 40–50% below.
Worked example — an 8,000 sq ft floor
| Step | Arithmetic | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Usable area | as entered | 8,000 sq ft |
| Amenity at 30% | 8,000 × 0.30 | 2,400 sq ft |
| Six cabins | 6 × 110 | 660 sq ft |
| Three meeting rooms | 3 × 180 | 540 sq ft |
| Net desking area | 8,000 − 3,600 | 4,400 sq ft |
| Weighted area per desk | (0.5 × 32) + (0.5 × 48) | 40 sq ft |
| Desks | floor(4,400 ÷ 40) | 110 desks |
| All-in area per desk | 8,000 ÷ 110 | 72.7 sq ft |
| Monthly revenue at full occupancy | 55 × ₹7,500 + 55 × ₹11,000 + 24 × ₹16,000 | ₹14.02 L |
Density is not the only number that matters
It is possible to push an Indian coworking floor to 55 sq ft all-in per desk, and operators do. What happens next is predictable: the café is too small at lunchtime, there are not enough phone booths, the meeting rooms are booked out by 10 am, and churn climbs. The desks are full and the members leave. Revenue per square foot at month twelve is a better target than desks per square foot at handover.
The specific Indian pressure point is the phone booth. A floor of 110 desks needs around ten single-person booths, and almost every operator we work with underprovisions them, because a booth occupies 18 sq ft that could hold half a desk. Members on video calls then take meeting rooms, meeting rooms run out, and the operator builds more meeting rooms — which is the expensive solution to a cheap problem.
The second is the pantry. Indian coworking members eat lunch at the premises far more than the western operating models assume, and a pantry sized for coffee will have a queue at one o'clock. Budget 0.6 sq ft of pantry and café seating per desk as a floor, not 0.3.
Every constant on this page comes from Greenbox site records — measured drawings, signed BOQs and completion certificates from projects delivered between 2023 and 2026 — rounded to the figures an estimator would actually write down. We publish them so the arithmetic can be audited rather than trusted. Treat the output as a planning figure: accurate enough to brief a landlord, a bank or a family, and not accurate enough to sign a contract against.
What this tool does not cover
- Fit-out cost, which the office interior cost calculator handles.
- Building core and common areas. This tool works on usable area within your demise, not on chargeable or super built-up area.
- Statutory occupancy limits, fire egress capacity and the number of exits, all of which can cap desks below what the area allows.
- HVAC capacity, which in an older building frequently limits density before the floor plan does.
- Power and data provision — 200 W per desk and one data point per dedicated desk is a sensible starting brief.
- Operating cost, staffing and fit-out amortisation, none of which are modelled here.
Workplace fit-outs delivered by Greenbox Design Studio.
Frequently asked questions
How many square feet per desk in a coworking space?+
Thirty-two square feet of net workspace for a hot desk and 48 for a dedicated desk. All-in, once amenity, cabins, meeting rooms and circulation are counted, a well-planned Indian coworking floor lands around 70 sq ft per desk.
What is a good desk density for coworking?+
Sixty-five to seventy-five square feet all-in per desk. Below 60 the amenity starts to fail — queues at the pantry, no free phone booth, meeting rooms permanently booked — and churn rises. Above 85 the economics get difficult in a Mumbai rent.
How many members can I sell per hot desk?+
About 1.6 in India. Attendance is never full, so operators oversell. Below 1.4 you are leaving revenue on the table; above 1.8 members arrive on a Tuesday morning and find nowhere to sit, which is the fastest route to cancellations.
How much space do private cabins take?+
About 110 sq ft for a four-seat cabin with a door and a glazed front. They yield more revenue per square foot than open desks in most Indian markets, which is why the cabin share in new centres has been rising steadily.
How many phone booths does a coworking floor need?+
Roughly one per eleven desks. A 110-desk floor needs ten. Almost every operator underprovides, because a booth takes 18 sq ft that could be half a desk — and then finds its meeting rooms permanently occupied by people on one-to-one video calls.