One in five EU employees is monitored by software, and teleworkers are significantly more likely to be among them
Eurofound’s report Algorithmic management in European workplaces, published on 29 October 2026, finds that 19% of EU employees say a computer program monitors their performance, 18% that one allocates their tasks and 10% that one determines their working hours. The figures come from the European Working Conditions Survey 2024 and cover employees only.
Remote workers are more exposed. According to Eurofound, employees who telework are significantly more likely than those who do not to have their tasks allocated and their performance monitored by a computer program, and they score higher on its measure of algorithmic management intensity. Whether working hours are set automatically does not differ significantly by telework status. Eurofound reports the difference as statistically significant but does not publish separate percentages for teleworkers.
Performance monitoring is the function most strongly linked to harm. Employees subject to algorithmic management report higher job demands, especially work intensity, and are more likely to experience job strain. Where performance monitoring and existing job strain combine, people report more exhaustion and work–family conflict and lower engagement than either factor would predict on its own.
Why this matters
If you work remotely, there is a better-than-average chance that software, not a person, is assigning your work and measuring how much of it you do. That changes what “being managed well” looks like: the questions to ask an employer are what data the tools collect, who sees it, and whether a human reviews decisions based on it. Eurofound’s own policy pointers call for full transparency over monitored data and for employees to be involved through social dialogue as these tools are introduced.
Context
Exposure varies widely by country. Performance monitoring is most common in Belgium (31%), Estonia (28%) and Ireland (26%), and least common in Germany (10%) and in Portugal, Greece and Hungary (12% each). Denmark has the highest overall intensity, with 38% of employees having tasks allocated by software. Clerical workers, technicians and plant and machine operators are the most exposed occupations, and the practice is more common in larger workplaces.
The findings arrive as the EU prepares its Quality Jobs Act, expected to cover algorithmic management, and follow a Eurobarometer survey finding that just over a third of EU small employers use AI to monitor performance. For what the EU AI Act already requires of employers using these tools, see our guide to the EU AI Act and remote-work monitoring.